Art As A Spiritual Pursuit, Not Just A Technical Pursuit

Scott Bradlee just wrapped up a 12-part lecture series called MusicX. They’re all on his Substack, Musings From The Middle, and if you’re a music dork too, you’ll want to go back and watch them all.

In the last episode, Scott said something I’ve wrestled with a lot in my head over the years:

When I was 5ish, after much begging, I got my first guitar. It came home from the store. If I close my eyes, I can smell the smell of the case opening and me looking at it, thinking “Hey, it’s not an electric guitar, but it’s A GUITAR and it’s my sized and, this is going to be so cool.”

So I pick up the guitar, I hold it the way I hold my toy guitars, and I get ready to play it just like my aunts and uncles in the parties at my grandparents house…

(Quick visual reference for you)

…but - in this moment, I am totally spiritually dialed in. Or I’m at least as spiritually dialed in as a 5-year-old can be, but that’s a long way to say I’m all over the feeling of what guitar and music does to me and I have the keys to the kingdom in my hands.

I hold the guitar, I put my left hand up, grab a pick and start to pluck with my right hand and - twwwwwaaaaang garble garble eeeerk.

No skills. Not one. And why would I have them?

Full of the spirit, fresh out of skill.

I started with a local polka musician, graduated up to some non-polka guys, and finally, shoutout to adults with names like Sting Ray, I found the blues, and jazz, and most importantly, somebody who could help match the skill-building I was looking for with the soul-building I needed to get that “Oh THAT” feeling I expected the first time I sat with an instrument.

When Scott says art is more of a spiritual pursuit than a technical pursuit, I remember the moment before I knew how to play a note.

I combine that memory with all the practicing and work that came after, milestoning the moment I realized, circa 13ish years old, that I had a major leg up over the kids in my class who could play the riffs from “Come As You Are” and “Today.” I milestone that moment because they still had the spirit and none of the technique and I kept my head down, inspired, a lot more after that.

That was the moment of my deepest technical drilling. From 13ish, when I realized I had that advantage, I went to widen it out. Lots of bedroom hours went into practicing. Not to become a superstar, and not that I wouldn’t try, but it was enough to turn it into a small college scholarship and some great memories with friends.

And what did I do with it? I know somebody will get hung up on that and it’s a fair question with an important answer. If you want to know what I did with all that life invested in practicing, I’ll gladly point to the guitars behind me in the office while I’m typing this. They’re here for a reason. And even if the keyboard gets way more love than the fretboard these days, this is an art too. They’re both creative acts. They both balance the spiritual with the technical. They both fill my soul.

You can go all technical on anything. You can be the most flawless executor of technique history has ever known. But it’s nothing without soul.

Pure technique without soul is as sterile as bad classical muzak. Pure passion without skill is limited like teenage noise rock at the coffee house. The masters Scott discusses - Hendrix, Miles, Dylan - they didn't choose between the two. They used technique as a bridge to transcendence. For most of us mortals, even a modest combination of both is enough to unlock something profound.

You don’t have to be recognized and remembered as one of the greats. You can play a Hendrix riff (or “Today” by the Pumpkins, no judgement!), or some Miles or Dylan, and you can touch the gods. it’s like how you don’t have to have written Shakespeare to appreciate Shakespeare. Learning to read and why something is good, it’s the same as learning to play a little music and what makes for magic.

Everything gets more beautiful if you’ve got at least a little spirituality and technical know-how.

Scott says, like Feynman said when asked about if science detracted his experience of beauty from when he saw a flower, that the knowledge can make something as simple as a flower even more beautiful.

I agree.

The magic of going from not knowing to realizing how big the world is, and how hard you’ll have to work just to get a little bit deeper into a shared space with the artists - it’s a journey I hope more people will take. Not to make a life at it, or even become full-on artists, but just to experience the possibility and appreciate the craft of it all.

Scott’s series captures this wonderfully, and makes for a great entry-level introduction or expert-level “I hadn’t thought about it like that” exercise. Read the posts, watch the videos, respect the art. Here’s the last one, because if nothing else, you’ll know how it ends without spoiling anything: