How do you spell fun?

"Because after a while, even lobster starts to taste like soap." - Dave Ramsey

When I taught high school band, I would start off every year by telling my new students that my whole goal for them was to have fun. That's it, just have fun. I loved the stunned reactions on their faces. They'd giggle and do little celebration dances. (Easy A!) 

Then I'd twist the plot.

"Let me spell 'fun' for you, because some of you may have forgotten how to spell it over the summer break," I'd say, matter-of-factly. Accompanied by giggling and whispering, I would walk to the white board, and with a new, fresh dry-erase marker I would spell in tall capital letters:

W - O - R - K

The laughter would stop. Instead, silence. After a minute or so, inevitably, there'd be some kid in the back who would shout out, "Hey! You spelled it wrong! That says WORK!" 

I'd smile, nod my head and say, "Yes. It does say, 'fun.' Excellent reading." 

As you may surmise, what followed was a very pointed discussion. Let me give you a version of it here.

Several years ago I was teaching a gifted drum student who also happened to be a talented basketball player. Only seven years old at the time, he was remarkable in both arenas. Ultimately the basketball schedule got busy enough that he and his parents had to make a choice between the two, and (of course) basketball won out.*

Not long after, I ran into his mom at the local recreation center. We chatted for a minute, then she asked if I'd play basketball with her son and his friends. She explained that they wanted to play, "a real game," but there were only three of them, and did I possibly have time to fill in for a couple minutes? 

Now, I love basketball. I play as much as I can. I post about it on this blog frequently. I was at the rec center that day to play basketball. But I've never had a less satisfying hoops experience than I did that day. Allow me to set the scene for you. 

Even though I'm slow and out of shape, I'm 6'1" (about 185 cm) and have a decent knowledge of the game. These were nine-year-olds. I was a giant compared to them. It took fully the first ten minutes to stop instinctively blocking every shot. None of them could steal the ball from me or really defend me in any way, and none of them could score on me until I chose to let them. I felt like Dwight Howard. 

For about sixty seconds.

It was NOT fun. At all. That was the day I learned that winning isn't everything in basketball, or in life. Especially when there's no multi-million dollar contract or shoe endorsement deal on the line, winning takes a major back seat to fun. And by fun, of course I mean work.

Many times I go to the rec center and get into pick-up games with people who are younger, faster, stronger and more talented than me. And - I've got to tell you - it's usually a lot of work. I have to run hard, jump high, out-think and keep up with a variety of humans in a variety of basketball settings. Sometimes I win and sometimes I lose. I'm always sore the next day. But it's almost always fun. 

My absolute favorite is when I hustle really hard against a player or team that's better than me and am able to gain some success. I block a shot or keep them from scoring, or maybe I finally make that nifty move, hit a great shot, or my underdog team wins. Those small moments of hard-fought victory are exponentially sweeter than easy wins.

They're fun, but only if you work for them.

My new band students every fall wanted to have fun, and they wanted to work. They just didn't know that the two of those things go together. 

The first group of students that I took all the way through that school were phenomenal. They somehow intuitively knew that it was going to take their best work to achieve something great, and they wanted it. Badly. 

One thing the band at my school had never done (and, at this writing, haven't done since) was to qualify for the State Concert Band Festival. As that first group of students entered their senior year, several of them came to me and said, "We want this. We're going to qualify for state this year. We don't want to play any of the easy stuff anymore. We want music that will get the judges' attention, and we'll work as hard as we have to, to succeed."

I didn't want to get their hopes up, but I didn't want to let them down. In rehearsal, we talked frequently and candidly about what would be expected in terms of quality and execution, and they consistently worked to improve themselves. 

We qualified for state that year. It was sort of a miracle. (Part of the story is in another blog post here.) The band played with a level of maturity and passion that we'd never had before, and they accomplished something great. They put themselves on the map. 

Afterward, I heard many of the students say, "That was fun!" 

I'll never forget what that school year felt like in terms of effort. All of the rehearsals, the sectionals, the coaching sessions, the clinics, the tour - all of it. But for all of the pain and effort, what still gives me chills is the memory of walking on stage with those amazing young people and making great musical history at the State Concert Band Festival. What was the last thing I said to them before we took the stage? 

"Let's go have some fun." There was nothing else to say.

As a musician - and especially as a drummer - it can be easy to get into a comfortable place and never want to come out. Once you can play certain styles or pieces, or you've got solo ideas that work, or whatever it is, you might lose your motivation to keep developing your skills. 

Take any example you want - only ever eating ice cream, never having to do homework, playing video games all day or blasting nine-year-olds at basketball - eventually you need a challenge, variety and something to work towards. If not, even lobster starts to taste like soap. More than that, you'll never do anything great, and never have any real-for-true fun.

What every great musician and athlete knows - what every great person knows - is that hard work for the right cause is fun. 

Push yourself. Work hard. Accomplish something great. Make the most of your own unique talent and creativity. Achieve your potential.

Have fun!

*Sports or music? The answer, of course, is, "AND." But that's a topic for another blog post. 

I piloted a helicopter!

Part of my day job is to help facilitate clinician visits to school music programs (I have a good job, I know!). Last week I was able to accompany one of our top clinicians to a remote city in southwestern Utah. As a result of fortunate scheduling and some deep generosity, we were able to travel by helicopter.*

The clinic itself is worth at least a blog post, but for now I'll try to encapsulate what I learned from the flights out and back.

On the flight out, I sat in the back. Surprisingly, it was roomy and comfortable. The weather was beautiful, the pilot was experienced and we had absolutely no problems. I shot pictures and video, enjoyed the chatter - both radio and that of my companions - and just generally enjoyed myself.

The flight back was an entirely different story. I sat in the front and got a much closer look at how helicopters are flown. About fifteen minutes into the return flight, a question I hadn't even considered was shot my way by the pilot.

"Okay, you ready to fly this thing?"

What?! Me, fly?! I have to admit that about 99.9% of my body and soul was screaming, "NO! Of course I don't want to fly! What are you, crazy? We'll all die!" Luckily for me, the 0.1% that wanted to fly had a pretty strong argument - it was such a unique opportunity, I couldn't possibly turn it down. Besides, the pilot was there to keep me from making any serious mistakes. So, I took the stick and started to fly.

I was nervous, to say the least. From the moment I took over the stick, it felt like I couldn't put my eyes in enough places at once. We were only about 3,000 feet off the ground (compared to 25,000 for commercial airline flights), and there were what seemed like 50 gauges, meters, dials and other controls on the dash. It was a lot to handle, and it took 100% of my brain power.

The total duration of my piloting experience was only about 30 minutes, but it was amazing. It was a microcosm of any new experience, I suppose, because I viewed flight, helicopters, pilots and myself very differently at the end of that short time.

What does this all have to do with music? At least three things, and I'll try to briefly explain them below.

First, great musicians have the ability to focus - totally and absolutely. While flying the helicopter, there was nothing else in the world that seemed worth thinking about when compared to staying in the air, safe and on course. Likewise, in music, we need to develop the ability to block out any distractions or factors that aren't going to aid us in our music making. We can develop the ability in both practice and performance to, for a defined period of time, focus on nothing but music.

Second, I was impressed by the ease with which our pilot flew. He told us that over the years flying becomes, "second nature." His instincts, muscle memory and other mental and physical attributes and skills have been honed by hundreds and thousands of hours of flying, meticulous training and practice, and by never, ever allowing himself to be distracted by anything other than flying. As musicians, our course is similar.

Great musicians have honed their skills and musical senses over many, many years. Not only in practice, but in performance, we need to maintain the standard of only playing at our very best, highest levels.

As Aristotle famously opined, "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act, but a habit."

Third, and finally (for this blog post, at least), it couldn't have been more obvious that our pilot loved flying. He seemed free and ultimately happy in the air. As a result of his excellent preparation, trust in his helicopter, and years of experience, he enjoyed - even exulted in - flying. What could be a better example for musicians? The more you have control of yourself, your instrument - your craft - the more you will enjoy music.

At the end of the day both flying and music have many purposes, and both can take people to a higher place (literally and figuratively) in a way that nothing else can.

Make music. Be happy. Fly.

*This is a story in itself, but the short version is that we were flown by a pilot-owner who also happens to be a huge advocate for music education.

"Headroom" Addendum

In an earlier post, I talked about developing headroom. Headroom is the ability to do more than you need to do in a given situation. This post is part confession, part illustration of how I learned about headroom in my own playing.

While a college student, I studied with Jay Lawrence for a while. At a certain point he was putting me through some very complex, difficult exercises every week, and demanding that I play them up to a certain standard. One week, after having practiced particularly hard, but having not gotten up to par on an exercise, I got a little frustrated at the lesson. The conversation went something like this (I'm paraphrasing, but you'll get the point).

Keith: Jay, when would you use something like this in an actual performing or recording situation?

Jay: Oh. You probably wouldn't.

K: WHAT?! Then why are you making me learn it?!

J: (Laughing) Here. Let me show you something. See this groove exercise you were working on a few weeks ago? Was this one pretty hard?

K: Yeah, I hated that one. Super hard. 

J: Well, I want you to play it.

K: Wha..? Now? I haven't practiced it for like three weeks!

J: Just give it a try.

I then proceeded to play the earlier exercise. Not only was it much easier than I remembered, but it was immediately cleaner and clearer, and much more musical. Jay had made his point.

By constantly challenging me to play increasingly complex patterns and exercises, he was building my musical muscles, so to speak. What used to be hard became easier, and what seemed impossible at first became realistic.

Again, the whole point of headroom is to be able to do more than you have to, so that you can do what's required of you comfortably and with style. Then, instead of being at the edge of your abilities by default, you can choose when and how to push your own envelope while being more musical, engaging and sensitive.

Drumming - and all music - should be fun. And the better you are at it, the more fun it will be.

Happy drumming!

Lyric Translation: Fun's "We Are Young"

As promised, here's my take on a current pop hit.

Unless you have literally been living under a rock (or listening exclusively to NPR) you've heard the song, "We Are Young," by the band Fun. It is super catchy, and I caught myself singing the chorus at full voice the very first time I heard it.

I didn't give the song much thought until I was at a family event a few weeks ago and somebody had put "We Are Young" on repeat. (Crazy thing is that I didn't notice it was repeating until at least the fourth time through.) It wasn't until a 14-year-old girl was singing the lyrics that I actually listened to what I was hearing.

Yes, I realize that I'm about to offend some of you. And I'm not sorry about it.

We won't look at all of the lyrics, but I've taken the liberty of interpreting the first few lines of the song below. You're welcome to disagree!

Give me a second, I need to get my story straight.

Translation: I'm lying. And I haven't quite figured out what I'm going to tell you yet, so chill.

My friends are in the bathroom getting higher than the Empire State.

Translation: The people that I associate with, whom I'm like and whose behavior I emulate, are in the back doing illegal drugs. And not a little. They're doing a lot of them. They're getting absolutely, completely wasted. Did I mention that I'm like them, and that I like them?

My lover, she's waiting for me just across the bar.

Translation: I've abandoned the person I came here with, presumably my, um....date, to talk to you.

My seat's been taken by some sunglasses asking about a scar.

Translation: Presumably, you won't let me sit by you, and you're making reference to an injury that you received.

And I know I gave it to you months ago, I know you're trying to forget.

Translation: I'm the one who caused your injury. I might have abused you, or caused an accident or something, and now you're trying not to let it bother you.

But between the drinks and subtle things - the holes in my apologies - you know I'm trying hard to take it back.

Translation: We're drinking alcohol, and I'm hoping that my behavior and the environment will distract you, because I'm not really sincere about apologizing to you, but I really want you to tell me that it's okay and that you forgive me.

So if by the time the bar closes, and you feel like falling down, I'll carry you home. Tonight...

Translation: We're going to be here all night because we have nothing better to do than sit in a bar and drink, and you're going to drink so much that you pass out. Then I'll literally pick you up and take you home, presumably my home, and then we'll, um......talk some more. Right....

Do we need to go on? I'd rather not, because this is just too much "Fun" for me.

Again, I don't care what you're listening to, but you have a responsibility to yourself to know what your music is saying, and what you're saying when you sing along.

Happy listening!

Creating a reference point

In life, we all need a reference point or two. Because we can only judge circumstances and events by our own history and knowledge, the experiences that we have and observe are critical to our day-to-day mindset. That probably sounds a little clunky, so let me explain what I mean.

Before I started rock climbing and caving in early 2000, the extent of my outdoor experience was some hiking, mountain biking and horseback riding. That's it, nothing serious. But that year I became roommates with Matt, an outdoorsman extraordinaire.

The Story

Before I started rooming with Matt, my interest in climbing was absolutely zero. Somehow he convinced me to go with him one spring afternoon. He seemed to have a good time, and while I was an adequate belayer, I had very limited success with actual climbing. I just couldn't seem to get the hang of it.

On the third climbing trip, we worked on a route called Dream Realized, and I finished the route. Even though I had finally reached the top of a climb, I was bruised, scraped, tired and sore. As I lay in bed that night, I thought to myself, "I'm done. I've gotta tell Matt I don't want to go anymore. Climbing is hard and scary, and I'm not having any fun."


So, that was it. I was done. But as I lay there, my mind had a short, intense battle. Another, different voice - a voice I'd never "heard" before - spoke up. Not loud, but clear, concise and convincing.

Here's what it said:

"You're not climbing because it's fun. You're doing it because it's hard. You will keep climbing because it challenges you, because it is forcing you to grow, and because - in many ways - it is making you a better person. You will keep climbing, you will keep digging down inside yourself for strength, and you will refuse to quit."

I lay in bed for over an hour thinking about what I'd just heard. Immediately it rang true to me, and over the years I've been witness to the truth that I realized that night in bed. Rock climbing has become a sort of mental chess match with myself. And those who have the climbing bug will tell you that the sport is much more mental than physical. While you certainly develop physical strength, endurance and flexibility, you also develop the ability to think under pressure, stay calm when everything in your body is telling you to panic, and attempt the impossible while believing you'll succeed.

Most importantly, climbing forces you to eliminate all other thoughts. Oddly enough, your brain doesn't really care about a physics exam or a girl who flirted with you when it perceives that you're hanging by your fingertips, toes and teeth to the side of a sheer cliff with nothing but air underneath you.


That level of focus yields a clarity of thought, calm and relaxation - after the fact, of course - that I have come to expect and love.

In short, I have come to view rock climbing - as well as many other challenges in my life - as an opportunity for growth, and for practice, if you will. In my view, the harder I work right now, on the current challenge, the more strength, endurance and confidence I will have for the next challenge. And if I don't give up, I'll gain the reward of conquering the mountain, or whatever the challenge is.

Climbing can be extremely emotional. Even though you must maintain control of yourself to perform the movements and finish the climb, your emotions can certainly push you to work harder and keep from giving up.

One of my favorite moments: After a particularly tough climb, I got back to the ground, raised both fists in the air and let out a primal scream, followed by pointing at the top of the climb and yelling, "I own you!" The mountain had given me everything it had, and I had prevailed.

The Point
Life is hard. And you have choices. You can always take the path of least resistance - you can do what's easy, avoid challenges, and complain that it's not fair. (It isn't, by the way.) Or, you can challenge yourself to do what you, and only you, can do on this planet while you're here.

While music is rarely a life-threatening or hair-raising endeavor, it takes courage, tenacity, strength, endurance and focus to achieve greatness. Those who create great music are almost always those who have chosen to embrace the possibility of failure, to pursue the art with single-mindedness and continue to try and try and try.

Finally, let me leave you with this:

“Don’t die with your music still inside you. Listen to your intuitive inner voice and find what passion stirs your soul. Listen to that inner voice, and don’t get to the end of your life and say, ‘What if my whole life has been wrong?” - Ralph Waldo Emerson


In all sincerity, friends: Happy drumming!

Bag of Tricks: 12/8 Funk Groove

Another fun groove from the great Jay Lawrence. This might be a repost, but I came back to it this week and have been having a lot of fun with it. Lots of variations and orchestrations are possible, so experiment with it and make it unique.

Happy drumming!

The Gig Log: Lokalgrown at Zermatt

On Thursday, January 12th, Lokalgrown had the privilege of performing for Miro Industries, Inc. at the amazing Zermatt Resort in Midway, Utah.

The audience was comprised of company associates from all over the country, and they were very ready to be entertained. It was a very fun show, complete with wigs, mohawks, dancing, sing alongs, and even a guest drummer.....what?

Yep. The new idea to get an audience member involved in the show was for me to walk out mid-set on my "15 minute union break." With me gone, the band had to ask if anybody in the house played drums. It took less than 30 seconds to get a volunteer up, and he actually killed it! The band played Van Morrison's "Brown Eyed Girl" with the guest drummer, and even tried to get him to play a drum solo. It was...epic!

Overall, and from top to bottom, it was a great show. And I'd be remiss if I didn't give a huge shout out to our de facto crew for the evening, Jared and Jeremy. Thanks for all the hard work, men!