Creative expression.

I was talking to my buddy Casey (snagglepuss to the right) the other day and stumbled upon something pretty big. We all love music in all it's forms, but live music created by musicians with instruments definitely has a special place for us. In our discussion specifically, we discussed Jazz and the lack of venues where you can lounge and listen to Jazz veterans those who've perfected their craft through years without mass promotion or radio play. I've been to a few places in DC that have a live acts come in and perform, but since I'm in the Baltimore Area now there are even less places to go fill this void. For those that don't understand, there are a million bands in Baltimore and you can easily checkout just about every genre except for Jazz. Now there are several reasons for this, but primarily, the popularity of this specific genre isn't big here so as an Jazz artist you're better off going where it is (further south) to keep the lights on. This is disappointing, because I've recently been getting reacquainted with Acid Jazz after much time straying further away from Jazz for electronic variants in years past. I love electronic based music; Hip Hop (real, not radio rap), Drum & Bass and Jungle for example, but the truest purity comes from creation. Creation can come from manipulation of music to make music like electronic variants, but creating sound by hand (or mouth) in unison is very special, as well as very good live when done well.

Albeit round about, this brings me to my main point; I feel like as with many things that are dying off in society, truly creative people may be going the way of the dodo as well. This isn't just about music, this is about the lack of art classes in public school pre-college and children not getting outside of the house. This is about many people out there that have abandoned their creative passions for work and (sometimes perceived) financial stability. Unfortunately, becoming a parent can easily take away from personal time as well. What I urge everyone to do it get out there and make something. If you aren't making whatever it is from scratch, that's fine, make something out of something. Please, everyone, take the opportunity to create on a weekly basis and/or help facilitate those that do; it'll go much further than just from your mind to a medium.

In the near future I'll be working to help plug some of my creative friends and associates. Stay tuned.