Comedians and Entrepreneurs (and Pixar too)

Most people think of comedy as a performing art.

But consider the process:

  1. Think up something you think would be funny
  2. Tell the joke to an audience and get feedback
  3. Incorporate feedback to either scrap the joke or make it better.

Contrast this with what Clark Beckham describes as the process of art: having a clear vision, and then building the skills to express it so that you feel what comes out is true to your vision.

An artist would say whatever is in them, even if others don’t think its funny.

A comedian is more like a software developer building features for an audience.

Get feedback, tweak, deliver, tweak again. And once every part is working, ship it as a new product (a new comedy special).

Pixar does the same thing.

Like for Toy Story 3:

  1. First draft of script; shoot, edit, and produce actual animation of it
  2. Screen it (to a small group) and get feedback from the audience
  3. Repeat this process 7 to 8 times, until the final piece gets the reaction they desire.

Comedy (and the Pixar process) isn’t really a performing art. It’s a lot more like performing entrepreneurship.

What is AI's taste like?

The other day, I gave AI (grok) an excerpt from John Steinbeck.

It rated it a 6 out of 10 in terms of writing.

Steinbeck is a Nobel Prize, Pulitzer Prize, and National Book Award winner.

Initially, the AI thought that I had submitted my own writing.

But that’s besides the point.

(Even after, this it said 6 out of 10 is what you would expect from a high school level student).

Taste is subjective.

It’s okay that AI gave Nobel/Pulitzer/National Award-level writing a 6 out of 10.

Just realize, it may not have the same taste as you do.

Breakdancing as the Blues

A lot of people consider swing dancing to be the spiritual successor to jazz.

But consider breakdancing. Breaking:

  • Has a clear set of moves
  • Crafted to be executed at a high level (where each move makes you think “wow, how did they do that?")
  • That one curates into their own personal style
  • Performed improvisationally
  • With 4 categories of difficulty (toprock, footwork, power moves, freezes) that correspond to the 4 categories of difficulty of jazz (rhythmic, harmonic, technical, or tempo)

The process of development looks a lot like jazz (as defined by Wynton Marsalis):

  1. Improvisation as remixing (combining stuff you already know)
  2. Blues as a small set of meaningful vocabulary (as defined above)
  3. Swinging as in-time to the music

While tap and swing dance certainly have the musical lineage of jazz, breaking definitely has the blues.

Every Great Had An Injury or Episode

Exactly what the title says. Take any (okay, most) of the greats, and you’ll notice the pattern.

And not just “on the come up”. Once they were in full swing of their prime.

Athletes are overdone, so I’ll look at the artists:

  • Van Gogh, mental breakdown and hospital stay. During and after, produced his most well-known paintings, including Starry Night.
  • Matisse, intestinal cancer. After this, he created what are known as the best works of his career.
  • Cole Porter, ridding accident. After this, he produced many famous Broadway plays, including Kiss Me, Kate.
  • Adele, repeated vocal-cord hemorrhages, requiring tour cancelation and surgery. Still an incredible singer after.
  • Ernest Hemingway, World War I wounds (1918) happened before the great novels.
  • Stephen King, hit by a van in 1999. He later described the first session back as feeling like he had never written before. On Writing and the Dark Tower series (made into a movie) came out of that recovery.

The point isn’t that artists (or athletes) are cursed to have injuries.

And I’m not proferring platitudes about bouncing back.

Rather, here’s something more prosaic and mundane:

Accidents and setbacks happen; they are a part of life.

The greats just get back to work.

The Art of Writing Dialogue

One of the sub-arts of fiction writing is dialogue.

The art of dialogue is often confused with the art of character (what happens between the quotations).

I mean, specifically, how as an author you artfully frame the dialogue.

A few examples:

  1. Naked: “Let’s go to the movies.” “Yes.”
  2. Saidism: “Let’s go to the movies,” he said. “Yes,” she said.
  3. Adjectival comments: “Let’s go to the movies,” he offered. “Yes,” she sighed.
  4. Tom Swifties: “Let’s go to to the movies,” he said insightfully. “Yes,” she said affirmatively.
  5. Action tags: Tom stopped walking and turned to her. “Let’s go to the movies.” She almost bumped into him out of surprise. “Yes.”
  6. Body language: Tom’s hands trembled. “Let’s go to the movies.” Marie looked down, pulled her hair back behind her ear, and looked up. “Yes.”
  7. Microexpressions: A smile pulled at Tom’s lips. “Let’s go to the movies.” Marie raised her eyebrows. “Yes.”
  8. Eyes: Tom couldn’t stop blinking. “Let’s go to the movies.” Marie’s eyes widened. “Yes.”

I like action tags and body language.

Some people like saidism, or plain naked dialogue.

There’s no right answer. That’s what makes it art.

Innovations of Jazz (the enjoyable, rhythmic remixing of things that feel like home)

Jazz was, once upon a time, 4 things:

  1. Improvisation (the creation)
  2. The Blues (the content)
  3. Swing Rhythm (the pulse)
  4. Joy (the feeling)

Innovating jazz expanded one of those scopes.

No improvisation? That’s just classic swing (Frank Sinatra, Big Bands).

I different sort of Blues? Other base music with deep comfort, familiarity, and meaning? That’s world jazz (Hiromi Uehara, Jorge Luis Pacheco, Tigran Hamasayan).

No swing rhythm? That’s Rockabilly and Rock n' Roll, R&B and Modern Gospel.

Swapping out the feeling of joy? That’s cool jazz, modal jazz, smooth jazz, hard bop and free jazz.

Jazz isn’t only what you make it. But most modern forms of music have, at least, a little jazz in them.

Abstractions of Jazz

“Profoundly naive; unimaginably wise. They were spectacular. Everything I’d hope to find in the system…biodigital jazz, man.” — Kevin Flynn

Wynton Marsalis defined jazz as improvisation, the blues, and swing. But what does that mean, really?

Improvisation is spontaneous creation. Or, as the old saying goes, “composition is slow improvisation, and improvisation is fast composition.”

Blues is a feeling. Deeply emotional, deeply comforting. Everyone has their own set of the blues.

Swing is a type of rhythm.

So jazz can be any creative remixing, of deeply familiar and deeply emotional content, done with a consistent poetic rhythm, with an emotional tone of joy.

In that sense, anything can be jazz. If you play it right.

Innovations of Jazz (or, Jazz throughout the ages)

Jazz was, once upon a time, 4 things:

  1. Improvisation (the creation)
  2. The Blues (the content)
  3. Swing Rhythm (the pulse)
  4. Joy (the feeling)

Innovating jazz expanded one of those scopes.

No improvisation? That’s just classic swing (Frank Sinatra, Big Bands).

I different sort of Blues? Other base music with deep comfort, familiarity, and meaning? That’s world jazz (Hiromi Uehara, Jorge Luis Pacheco, Tigran Hamasayan).

No swing rhythm? That’s Rockabilly and Rock n' Roll, R&B and Modern Gospel.

Swapping out the feeling of joy? That’s cool jazz, modal jazz, smooth jazz, hard bop and free jazz.

Jazz isn’t only what you make it. But most modern forms of music have, at least, a little jazz in them.

A Technical Definition of Jazz

“You want a technical definition? Improvisation is in it, the Blues is in it, swingin' is in it.” — Wynton Marsalis

Lots of musicians improvise (shredding on the guitar). Improv doesn’t make it jazz.

Blues has some great improvising singers. Blues + improv doesn’t make it jazz.

Big bands can swing. But it can just be a performance. Without improvisation, its not jazz.

Spontaneous creation. Blues vocabulary. A swing rhythm. Anywhere all three are present, you’ve got jazz.

The 4Cs of Success Redux (or, how to define the success you really want)

You can figure out what sort of success you’re seeking by asking two questions.

Question 1: Do you want to be accepted by a tribe, or create a tribe?

Question 2: Do you care more about success now, or after you’re gone?

If you want to be accepted by a tribe, you’re looking at either credentialed success (acceptance by the governing body) or critical success (acceptance by the cool kids in your industry).

If you want to create a tribe, that’s either commercial success (lots of customers) or commercial success (lots of fans).

If you care more about success right now, that’s either credentialed success or commercial success. Nobody remembers a random marine biology Ph.D. from 20 years ago, and if Coca-Cola disappeared tomorrow, very few people would genuinely miss it.

If you care more about success after you’re gone, that’s either critical success or cultural success. Win an academy award, and you are enshrined in a long line of award winners, never forgotten. Make Rocky Horror Picture Show, and 50 years later people will still be playing dress-up to your film.

Of course, its possible to have different types of success in different areas.

C.S. Lewis received an Honorary Doctorate in Divinity (critical success), as well as creating enduring fiction with the Chronicles of Narnia (cultural success).

And of course, these are not mutually exclusive. You can experience success both now and after you’re gone.

But if you want to be a writer, you’d know:

  1. Credentialed = get a Creative Writing MFA
  2. Critical = win a Pulitzer Prize
  3. Commercial = write sleazy romance novels (they make the most money)
  4. Cultural = create the next Lord of the Rings

And that the skills and pathways to each of those types of success look very, very different.

Cross-Train Cousin Disciplines

When we want to get good at something, we know to practice the discipline.

A lot of people will also cross-train with sibling disciplines.

A few examples:

  • Saxophonists practice piano
  • Actors practice directing
  • A salsa dancer might practice ballet

Sibling disciplines are siblings because they come from the same family.

Which means they share the same culture.

Personally, I’ve gotten the most mileage out of cousin disciplines.

That’s my name for disciplines that share the same DNA, but have a completely different culture.

A few examples:

  • A public speaker taking theatre classes (the family of standing on a stage, delivering memorized lines, and projecting to the back of the room)
  • A singer taking voice acting training (tone production, vocal control, and range)
  • A fiction writer taking improv classes (scenes, idea development, character interaction)

I get the most mileage out of pairing a rigorous cousin with a non-rigorous cousin, or a technical cousin with a non-technical cousin.

If you really want to spread your wings (and learn new things), cross-train cousin disciplines.

The Third Skate

A couple weeks ago, I went recreational skating with a speed skating coach.

I was curious about skating technique, so we started from the ground up.

Most of it was intuitive, he said. Starting. Stopping. The illusion of two skates on the ground when you’re dancing and grooving to the music.

But one idea stuck with me, unique to speed skating.

When you’re on rollerblades:

  • put one foot forward and one foot back
  • tip forward the back skate so (that only the front wheel is touching)
  • tip backward the front skate (so that only the back wheel is touching)

When you do this, you create the third skate.

The third skate is controlled like regular rollerblading.

You can maneuver it, even accelerate with it depending upon your body position.

You maintain balance, because it keeps your center of gravity directly below you (between the first and second skate).

In vintage jazz dance, we have a similar concept: what is created between you and your partner and your relationship with the music.

I’m now tempted to call it “the third dancer”.

The pattern is pretty clear.

The third thing is the intangible thing that’s created as the outcome of the dynamic interplay between two tangible things.

Or, the “invisible” but very real relationship that comes from two parties.

In counseling, when they say both partners need to prioritize “the relationship”? That’s the third skate.

The relationship created between a business and customer, made up of either the warm feelings (or broken promises)? The third skate.

I’ve heard it said that a brand isn’t a logo, or typography, or a product. Or that a brand is the consistency you show in the marketplace.

Perhaps another way of looking at it: your brand is the third skate.

Finding Flow Like Jazz Musicians

Jazz improvisation is not a monolith.

If you want to improvise, you have multiple methodologies. A few:

  • Call-and-response
  • Guide-tone method
  • Goal-tone method
  • Vertical improvisation
  • Horizontal improvisation
  • Motivic development
  • Licks, riffs, quotes
  • Patterns
  • Bebop

I think that which method you gravitate towards tells you something about yourself.

That would mean the contrapositive is true, too.

Do you like using what you already know? You might like vertical or horizontal improvisation (scales and arpeggios, the stuff you already practice every day.)

Do you like to repeat the same idea over and over, with variation? You might like patterns (pentatonic), or perhaps even motivic development.

Do you know where you want to end your lines and phrases? Perhaps try the guide-tone or goal-tone methods.

Do you like to compose and polish small bits of brilliance, then show it off? You might like licks, riffs, and quotes.

Do you like the feeling and flow of poetry, or moment-by-moment decision-making? You might like call-and-response, or bebop.

An idea for finding flow: figure out which you can practice, for hours on end, that brings you joy.

Improv, Via Negativa

“Okay, but what is Improv really?”

In terms of creativity, it’s more useful to describe what it isn’t.

Consider a jazz saxophonist soloing over Giant Steps.

The architecture of the song is AABA. You don’t want to change that. You want it to stay the same. So that’s not where the improv lives.

The design of the playing (tone, timbre, instrument technique) is unique to the player. You don’t want to, on some notes sound like John Coltrane and on others sound like Charlie Parker. You want to maintain your sound. So the improv doesn’t live there.

What does change are the notes.

So every time you play Giant Steps, the architecture stays the same: that’s the song.

Your “sound” stays the same: that’s your style.

But the notes change. And that’s the improv.

Creativity Rhymes

An easy intro point to the creative process is rhyming.

Poetry is obvious.

Yet pretty much every creative discipline has a rhyme pattern. Here are a few:

  • contraction-release (modern dance)
  • shot-reverse shot (filmmaking)
  • high-low (fashion)
  • but-therefore (storytelling)
  • setup-punchline (standup) -call-response (jazz)
  • text-context (teaching)
  • text-subtext (drama)
  • event-interpretation (hermeneutics) -thesis-antithesis (rhetoric)
  • action-reaction (acting)
  • tension-release (architecture)
  • plant-payoff (narrative)
  • figure-ground (visual design)
  • straight man-comic (comedy)
  • real line-metaphor line (songwriting)

Even AI has picked up on this, in ways we don’t like:

  • it’s Not X, it’s Y

And sometimes, longer patterns are just back-to-back rhymes, like this 5-piece:

  1. Knock knock.
  2. Who’s there?
  3. Who?
  4. Who who?
  5. What are you, an owl?

If you want to engage your creativity, give rhyme a try.

Improv, Via Negativa

“Okay, but what is Improv really?”

In terms of creativity, it’s more useful to describe what it isn’t.

Consider a jazz saxophonist soloing over Giant Steps.

The architecture of the song is AABA. You don’t want to change that. You want it to stay the same. So that’s not where the improv lives.

The design of the playing (tone, timbre, instrument technique) is unique to the player. You don’t want to, on some notes sound like John Coltrane and on others sound like Charlie Parker. You want to maintain your sound. So the improv doesn’t live there.

What does change are the notes.

So every time you play Giant Steps, the architecture stays the same: that’s the song.

Your “sound” stays the same: that’s your style.

But the notes change. And that’s the improv.

The Art of War (and Chess and Fiction Writing)

“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles." — Sun Tzu, The Art of War

Sun Tzu gives us two states for success:

  1. Know thyself
  2. Know thy enemy

But in chess, this is not enough.

You also need to know your openings, know your principles, and know the game you’re playing (a one-minute bullet match online is a different game than a 3 hour classical over-the-board tournament).

Which together might be something like:

  1. Know the players (psychology)
  2. Know your point (plan)
  3. Know ideas (principles)
  4. Know the parameters (sport)

Fiction writing is like chess, in that knowing your strengths and weaknesses as a writer, and the challenge of getting published before you, is not enough.

You also need to know your characters, your genre, and the audience you’re writing for.

Which together might be something like:

  1. Authorial truth (what you want to happen)
  2. Genre truth (what the conventions expect to happen)
  3. Character truth (what feels true to those experiencing the story)
  4. Audience truth (what needs to be true for the reader)

The strategy of chess is the interplay between what you know about yourself, what time control you’re playing, what opening you’re in, and which chess principles apply right now.

The strategy of fiction writing is the interplay between the story you want to tell, the story your publisher wants to promote, the story your audience wants to read, and the story that does the characters justice.

From that perspective, strategy is, indeed, an art.

Improv

Once upon a time, there was a young boy that became interested in the art of improvisation. So he played in band(s) and learned to jazz. He competed nationally in swing and learned to dance. He practiced on stage and learned to improv. And finally, he wrote a book of poetry and learned to rap.

And that young boy was me.

After those experiences, here is how I think about improv:

  1. Dance teaches the art of the move
  2. Rap teaches the art of the rhyme
  3. Jazz teaches the art of the melodic unit
  4. (Theatre improv) teaches the art of the scene

But that’s not always very useful.

For my writing community, I talk about it isomorphically:

  1. Dance is the art of the sentence. Worrying over the exact right words.
  2. Rap is the art of two sentences. Setup and punchline.
  3. Jazz is the art of the paragraph.
  4. Improv is the art of the scene.

For my computer science community, I talk about it through programming paradigms:

  1. Dance = imperative programming
  2. Rap = functional programming
  3. Jazz = procedural programming
  4. Improv = declarative programming (And 5. Combat = object-oriented programming. Put that’s another conversation).

The interesting thing is that all approaches are present in all the art forms.

You can improv in dance by thinking in terms of rhyming your moves. You can improv in jazz by thinking about the scene (motivic development). You can rap in paragraphs by focusing on storytelling instead of punchlines. And on and on.

Why should you care?

Because the foundational style of improv defines the art.

Rap starts with rhyme. If it doesn’t rhyme, its not longer rap.

Improv starts with scene. If its not a scene, but just one-liners or setup-punchline, it becomes standup comedy, not improv.

Add the others, sure. But start with the right sort of improvisation.

What’s in it for you?

Maybe 3 things.

  1. Skill: which type of improv are you most practiced in? This comes down to your parent discipline.
  2. Enjoyment: which type of improv is the most engaging, naturally, to you? This might not be what you’ve practiced, but what you enjoy watching.
  3. Impact: which type of improv gets the result you’re looking for? In fiction writing, beautiful sentences makes for great novels, rhyme makes for great sitcoms, paragraphs make for great anecdotes and short stories, scenes make for great screenplays.

But perhaps the most important question: what do you want to make?

  • Great moments?
  • Great rhymes?
  • Great units?
  • Great scenes?

There is no “right” art of improv.

Only improv that is right for your art.