Learning Music, Not Violin

Today's jazz class was the best we've had so far, which says a lot.  We did the most improvisation (rather than learning chords and scales) to date:  We did multiple rounds of three different tunes -- "Cherokee," "Now's the Time," and "Sonnymoon for Two" -- and had our drummer do solos for the first time!  It was marvelous.  I keep forgetting to take recordings to show friends and family.  But I will next time I get a chance!

Anyway, I left class today with the realization that I have never really learned music before.  I thought I was so "musical," having played the violin for x years, the piano for y years, played in an orchestra for z years...  But what I learned (or strived to learn) in all those years was how to play the violin well.  How to vibrato, how to move my bow, how to place my fingers, how to produce a clean tone and a perfect pitch.  How to pay attention to the conductor, how to quiet down when the cellos have the melody, how to count rests, how to help out a hopelessly lost standpartner, and, of course, how to find my way back while hopelessly lost but expertly faking.  I was trained to take the notes on a page and reproduce them exactly, to make it sound good without knowing why it sounded good.

Now I am learning how to create music, and create it instantly.  To let an idea flow directly from the jukebox and ears inside my head to my fingers and violin.  And in that process, how to shuffle a deck of notes and pull out the right cards.  How to shuffle the right deck of cards, when to pull out the cards.  It is as if I have been in Russia for years, cluelessly listening to everyone talk in Russian, and suddenly I can speak and understand it.  I am learning to actually own and use my musical instrument, instead of the other way around.

With every jazz class I attend, I get more inclined to ditch all of my other schoolwork and just practice improv all day every day.  I know that's not really what I want to do with my life, but man, how I love this!  After this semester, I will have to get some regular jam buddies from somewhere.