NOT  for profit, it's music for music's sake. Welcome! This area of eddiecurrents.com is about YOU, a musician trying to further your craft and becoming better than you are. One route to improvement is practice and experience but in our new age quantum world we need something better and faster, right? Short of a mind-meld with Beethoven, how can we accomplish a true "quantum" leap forward? The answer is simple and a lesson my Father (an amazingly gifted musician) taught me when I first started out: "ALWAYS try to play with musicians that are better than you are or at least as good." Hmm, that sounds easy enough but as virtually any really good player in central Florida can attest, it's not that easy. In fact, it can seem nearly impossible! There are so many great and huge musicians lurking in their homes, virtually never venturing out into the world, that it is hard to imagine and you just can't contact these people. Some are recluses (hey, nobody ever said musicians are "normal" people), and for their own reasons, do not mix/blend with the rest of the world unless forced! "Doesn't play well with others" is oftentimes the case. Some just hate everybody and avoid all people. Some stay stoned to the bone all day long and are paranoid to set foot in the outside world and shun all contact. Some don't know how good they really are and could care less while some think they are the very best at what they do already and need no further proof (truly, they are likely just afraid of being shown up or "cut" as the old school players called it) but no matter HOW good you may be, there are always a few others lurking about that break no sweat and still blow you right out of the water - that's great and as it should be. Q=Who's the best? A=NOBODY. For whatever reasons, you always seem to find that the finest and most creative musicians are scarce as "hen's teeth". This is not to say that awesome players exist only at home. There are some amazingly great gifted musicians out actually playing - but ARE THEY playing with the best and therefore playing their best? If this is you, are YOU playing up to YOUR capabilities or are you handicapped in some way? Are you just "working", scratching out a living, not so worried about your eroding skills and comfortable NOT to be "pushed" into fits of creativity? Have these types of players become complacent and even lazy? Are they simply playing what needs to be played to get by because they are not inspired to do more than that? What ever happened to art for arts sake? Personally, the "dumbing down" of music that has occurred over the past 25 - 30 years has finally reached critical mass, in my opinion. To accomplish "music" that will be salable today, one really does not seem to need what one did in the past. Now you need bombast, flamboyance, auto-tune and you need to make words rhyme. It is sadly out of style to be the killer players we once felt we could be and are. It seems to parallel intelligence. Have you noticed that somewhere along the line it became hip to be stupid and suspect to be smart? Music often seems a direct by-product and victim of that very situation and thinking or lack thereof. Enough lamenting! This site is about solutions, not problems. So how DO you get better and more thoroughly enjoy your craft at speed? Have you recently jammed within a situation that made you play better than normal? WHY did you play better? Could it be something inspired you? Did you have fun? Did that make you happy? Sad? Ask yourself some fundamental questions such as these and you'll likely come to the conclusion that you enjoyed playing better and it was likely the result of the other playing going on, feeding and adding to your own in real time. Jamming in other words. What is so cool about jamming? Freedom? Not having to follow a "part" for a change? Being able to "stretch out" beyond what you normally do? Being able to "create" something instead of "reproduce" something? Leading and following for once? And if you are REALLY fortunate, you might experience what I like to think of as the "gestalt". Note: The other day a highly respected musician mentioned something to me: Players from different places call "jamming" different things. For example, nothern players get together, someone starts something and there you are, it morphs into the "jam". Southern players call a song and then jamming mostly consists of playing that song with essentially the same drums/bass and wailing original guitar solos. A point. Why not try BOTH ways? So rare, these are the moments many of us continue to play for and nothing moves you ahead in quite the same way. Some lucky players have experienced this advancing of abilities directly and first hand. If you're pretty good, have you ever been jamming with someone that challanged your skills and found yourself sort of teleported "out there" some where? The playing becomes effortless and seems to magically come from elsewhere? Is that you or is it the person(s) you are jamming with? The answer is "BOTH". A real case of gestalt or the total is greater than the sum of the parts. It is a feeling that some musicians live for, most may never achieve this music nirvana but if you should, you will always want more of it. You can't help it as it may just be a feeling "better than sex". Take the best high you've experienced, add in an orgasm or two and you are close. The Eddie Currents Music Consortium Here's the plan: via your submissions, we'll take your word for it that you are either an "Amateur", "Serious", "Professional" or an "Expert" musician. You select the "category" of player you think best describes your skills. If your air guitar is way better than your actual playing, you are an Amateur. Please participate though and have a blast as that's what it's all about. However, if you play at least twice a week and perhaps even earn money doing it, you are surely Serious and perhaps Professional. But then there are players that make the best of us bow our heads (it has always been my contention that there is no "best", just a conceptual image of who an individual THINKS is the best). If you are a player that really plays (and you know who you are), you're an Expert and we ALL want to hear you. Please be as honest rating your own abilities as you can. These abilities will, at some point, be demonstrated. Musician Karaoke in a way but if you suck and sign up to play with the big boys, your sucking will manifest itself for all to see and hear. Some people excel at sucking and find it entertaining somehow to suck. Should this be you, we just don't have the time to deal with you and will direct you to our firing squad out back. You will only hold up the show and slow progress while embarrassing yourself and others. Honesty is good. If you ARE good, rating yourself as such is important too as you'll again slow things up by not performing an honest critique of your own talent. No matter whom you may be and how good to great you are, you should fit into one of the 4 player types. We'll coordinate the player submissions into "hats" and draw random 3 or 4 member "groups" organized by instrument from each category. The idea is to mix the very best players of each type, regardless of genre or style and assign the "group" 4 songs to reproduce. The idea here is NOT to clone or copy the material, but instead to allow the "group" to interpret and arrange their OWN version of the tunes, having as much fun as legally possible in doing so. A sort of "southern jamming" style. No rules here, rock songs can become jazz songs while jazz might become country. The groups have 90 days in which to put together their versions at which time there will be a "Battle Of The Bands" where each group will come up on a stage and perform their 4 tunes + a 5th tune of THEIR own choosing, again, no rules. The performances will be digitally captured and mixed onto a CD, one which all participants receive a copy of along with a stylish and tasty TShirt. BTW, we hope that all participants wear their TShirt and jeans as the official wardrobe of the Consortium during their performances. In this way, we're all the same; music loving performers, not fashion gurus. Still, you'll want to be spiffy as closing finalists will likely be videoed as well as recorded and you need a TShirt (yes, you can remove the sleeves). Sound cool? I think so too as it's all good. You are NOT joining anything. There are NO obligations and you can drop out if you feel you need to. No pressure and you will expand your wardrobe! You get to meet, play with, and listen to high-quality players you would never otherwise get to know. It's an instant network and free. You can also just be surly and walk away, whatever works FOR YOU. It costs you nothing. You get to play with some of the best players around and create something new - NOT copy. As it's only 4 tunes, it won't take much of your time to put together and you just might have some fun along the way. Besides playing, I do computer work and have been an ISP. If that's Greek to you, as a participant, you will get a free email account on EddieCurrents.com that allows you to do some trick things, such as UPload and DOWNload files to/from other participants if you need to and some other way cool amenities. Practices (if you need them) can be easily set up on these "community" accounts and the whole thing can be more easily managed and organized. This is new, so watch for bugs and "flies in the ointment." The tunes to work on will always be available for DOWNload here as well. So, that's 3 months to get together 4 tunes to play. Any modifications, changes, whatever are legal. The idea is to see what will happen when you pair great players, similar tunes to begin with, and no rules. The goal is to produce great sounding music from a grouping of players normally not associated with one another. We'll end up with a "Battle Of The Bands" unlike any other, where we record each group's interpretations of the tunes live. We would like to think that Rockcrusher Canyon or the Rainbow Springs Park for the "Battle" would be most appropriate. If you choose not to participate, at least come out and see the show. It will be a boat-load of entertainment for sure.