Writing as Jazz, Jazz as Writing: Part 8
Words of writing wisdom gleaned from some jazz greats.
Words of writing wisdom gleaned from some jazz greats.
Because I have a musical background, I often think about writing through a variety of musical lenses.
Writing as classical music with its sonata form and three act structure.
Writing as rock music with its raw power of emotion.
Writing as country music with its love of character-driven stories.
Writing as hip hop with its embrace of the poetry of storytelling.
But if I had to choose one musical genre which best fits what we do as writers, it would be jazz.
Why? Because every time we sit down to write, we have to do two fundamental things:
- Write in the moment
- Improvise
Every scene exists in our present tense. We have to be right there with our characters to experience the story unfolding in ‘The Now’.
Every time a jazz musician performs live, they exist in the moment. They find the spark of creativity by playing off each other and giving themselves over to every second of the songs they perform.
Likewise whenever we sit down to write, no matter how much of the story we’ve figured out, we have to give room for spontaneity and to improvise when our characters veer over here or there.
So, too, jazz musicians whose lifeblood is improvisation, making it up as they go along, pushing the envelope, and testing each song in nightly performance.
That inspired me to do a series this week featuring quotes from some of the all-time great jazz players.
Today: Oscar Peterson.
If you have something to say of any worth, then people will listen to you.
As writers, when we produce a story, we are “saying” something. The question is: Is it of “any worth”?
That’s a subjective question, isn’t it? Not everyone aspires to Shakespeare. But no matter how high-toned or low-brow and across all genres, what we write has to come across to a reader as having some “worth”.
How to determine that? Ultimately the reader or audience does. We can’t control that. What we CAN control is this: Does the story have “any worth” to us? If it means something to us, then at least we know we’re writing a story worthy of our time and attention.
We don’t write stories in a vacuum. We write them so people will read, watch, or listen to them. Our goal, in part, is to give them a story which will have an impact on them.
But the first audience we have to satisfy is ourselves. For if we believe a story is a worthy one, chances are some people will “listen” to it because it means something to them, too.
One of my favorite pianists, here is Oscar Peterson performing the delightful “C Jam Blues” in Denmark back in 1964:
Previous posts in this series:
I hope you’ve enjoyed the series. If you’d like more, I’ve got more. Let me know in RESPONSES.