The Berklee $7,300,000 Zappa tribute band

[christianm77]

Maybe some are jaundiced but my point above is that it is possible to pursue what you love for far less than what academia demands. I quoted $5K per year and at a place like Berklee etc it is far more than that. That buys a lot of private lessons, theory books, CD' to lift parts from, shows to take in, instruments to buy... It is possible to self teach also with all the resources out there to help..say, a few basic theory books, some cds, a few technique books, time and some fellow musicians is all you need but, in a world of qualification inflation, that seems too far fetched for some.

I don’t think the experience of going to a place like Berklee can necessarily be summed up in those terms. But tbh you’d have to ask a graduate.

Every musician is the product of a wider community. That’s one important thing colleges provide.

[christianm77]

To be clear, Zappa was largely self-taught, roight? He'd didn't go to a music school.

Correct.

[pcsanwald]

Every musician is the product of a wider community. That’s one important thing colleges provide.

This is so important. I think there are multiple roads, but, certainly, going to university gives you a social network of hopefully very good jazz musicians that you will likely play with for a long time to come. I still play most regularly with a tenor player I met at music school 18 years ago. I know a bunch of other folks from school in that similar time and while they aren't the only people in my network, they are an important component. When I studied with Brad Shepik, he mentioned that he still plays with a lot of people that he met when he first moved to NYC.

[cosmic gumbo]

One of the best musicians I know is a bassist, low brass player (tuba!), he was a highly recognized high school musician and could have been accepted into any music school in the US, with plenty of scholarship help, he was recruited by many schools.But....

He went to Boston to study law, and spent every spare moment at Berklee jamming with anyone/everyone, people assumed he was a student there, but he didn't spend one minute in a classroom. Just...four years of jamming, little bit of gigging.

After graduating with a law degree, he went to work for the state prosecutor and gigged locally like a madman. No music degree, but did the Berklee hang and network. Very, very smart man.

[Litterick]

Zappa came from a comfortable middle-class family background.

[pcsanwald]

He went to Boston to study law, and spent every spare moment at Berklee jamming with anyone/everyone, people assumed he was a student there, but he didn't spend one minute in a classroom. Just...four years of jamming, little bit of gigging.

This is certainly a good approach, particularly if you're already a very good player. I play with several fulltime musicians who took this approach and majored in things like anthropology or philosophy, but went to schools with good music programs and gigged a lot. Joshua Redman basically did this, he didn't study music as an undergrad. I think maybe Miles Okazaki also didn't major in music undergrad maybe?

There's also folks that go to berklee, but do film scoring or education or something like that.

[BigDaddyLoveHandles]

This is certainly a good approach, particularly if you're already a very good player. I play with several fulltime musicians who took this approach and majored in things like anthropology or philosophy, but went to schools with good music programs and gigged a lot. Joshua Redman basically did this, he didn't study music as an undergrad. I think maybe Miles Okazaki also didn't major in music undergrad maybe?

Is majoring in anthropology or philosophy any better?

[pcsanwald]

Is majoring in anthropology or philosophy any better?

I have no idea. I do think there's a place in the world for studying something at college that you might love, that doesn't necessarily directly map into a profitable career. I studied computer science as an undergraduate because I deeply loved it, and it was the only thing I was good at besides music. I've been super lucky in that it's turned into a great career, but, I think someone who has the same love for another discipline should have that same opportunity.

[BigDaddyLoveHandles]

I have no idea. I do think there's a place in the world for studying something at college that you might love, that doesn't necessarily directly map into a profitable career. I studied computer science as an undergraduate because I deeply loved it, and it was the only thing I was good at besides music. I've been super lucky in that it's turned into a great career, but, I think someone who has the same love for another discipline should have that same opportunity.

Oh yes, I'm not telling anyone what to do. It was more of a "relative" question: is studying philosophy (say) rather than music showing you are more career-minded? I don't know.

[Tal_175]

This is like complaining that business schools charge a lot, but not everybody comes out to be the next Silicon Valley billionaire. Whaaaa. Plus - we could also point out that a lot of those guys are dropouts. (Gates, Dell, etc.) See - who needs school!?!?!?! It's so dumb!!

And what about Med and Law school? They cost a bundle and not everyone turns out to be a top partner in a top surgical practice or a top partner in a scum sucking class action lawsuit firm. How unjust.

The difference here is that if you have an MBA from an ivy league school (business equivalent of Berklee) or a Law degree or an MD, you don't need to be the next Silicon Valley start up hit or top partner in surgical practice to pay your debt and afford a middle class (or even upper-middle class living).
You can't compare the realistic average earning potential of a doctor or a lawyer with someone with a jazz studies degree.

[Tal_175]

Smaller colleges yes, but Berklee gives a ton of scholarships, especially to foreign students. It is a PR thing, and an investment for them. When I was there, practically every decent foreign student had at least a part time scholarship. Most of the better players from the years I was there have done a lot music wise since. Lage Lund, Lionel Lueke, Kendrick Scott, Walter Smith, Peter Slavov, Mamiko Watanabe, Gus G, Warren Wolf, Marco Panascia, Jaleel Shaw, Mark Kelly, so many others I can't remember now. Pretty much the 5-10 best players in every instrument have records to their name and a strong carrier going. That's a big percentage if you consider that there weren't more than 3-4 hundred students doing performance studies, and most of them left the states afterwards. Almost everyone I knew that was serious about playing then still performs music for a living today, almost 20 years later.

I know of some of these players you listed, they are very good. But I bet most of them (if not all) went to Berklee because it was free for them (with full scholarships). So it was crazy not to go there as a star student and get all the attention of the first class faculty, meet other good players, get gigs in NY (because they are good enough). But most of them probably even didn't need to go to Berklee to be where they are now. Some may not have even finished it.
The question is whether going to Berklee is still a wise decision for those students who aren't Lage Lund and have to pay full or most of the tuition and whose names won't appear in the lists like you put in your post.

[Tal_175]

Heck--there's plenty of people here who think education at our nation's Universities only serves as an indoctrination into the radical left.

That's because political views that would considered center-right in countries like Canada or Germany is called communism in the states. Like public healthcare and education. It's all relative.

[BigDaddyLoveHandles]

That's because political views that would considered center-right in countries like Canada or Germany is called communism in the states. Like public healthcare and education. It's all relative.

Well, c'mon! Zappa ... medley?!

[Tal_175]

I'd love to go to a jazz school for a few years and completely immerse myself in music and meet many musicians. But I'd consider that a long and very expensive vacation, not a career investment. As I'm not a Lage (Lund or Julian) which would leave me with things I have 0 interest in: teaching or having to do music gigs outside of my (relatively narrow) musical interests. But it'd be lovely to do.
To me it's like taking a couple of years off to go do diving expeditions around the world or something.

[Doctor Jeff]

Zappa was not exactly self-taught, though he didn't have as much formal education as a lot of people and certainly not as much as most folks who write orchestral music.

Did Frank Zappa learn about music theory? Why? - Quora

Not all jazz greats "came up from the streets" either. Miles went to Juilliard for 3 semesters and Coltrane went to music school until WW2 intervened.

[Alter]

The question is whether going to Berklee is still a wise decision for those students who aren't Lage Lund and have to pay full or most of the tuition and whose names won't appear in the lists like you put in your post.

Only a small percentage of students in Berklee are about performance (when I was there i'd say about 400 out of 4000), most do other, music or art related majors. Those who do performance, either are at a very high level and they go after a jazz career, or perform as musicians at various other styles, or have a good degree to fall back upon, be it teaching, music therapy, all the other majors, etc. If someone is not at the level to at least being able to hang with players like Lund,lueke,etc as a sideman, they have no reason trying to become professional jazz players to begin with, no school or anything else can fix that. Most US kids I found were very aware of that, the difficulty and crazy high level one has to have to consider professional jazz performance in the Us, and were very careful about the majors they chose. But in many other countries the level is not as high, and someone who wouldn't make it in NYC can still make a very good living there.

[Jazzstdnt]

The difference here is that if you have an MBA from an ivy league school (business equivalent of Berklee) or a Law degree or an MD, you don't need to be the next Silicon Valley start up hit or top partner in surgical practice to pay your debt and afford a middle class (or even upper-middle class living).
You can't compare the realistic average earning potential of a doctor or a lawyer with someone with a jazz studies degree.

Well you had to go pretty far to make a comparison. That's not apples to apples.

A bachelors in music vs. two degrees, and IVY league at that! And like I said earlier, a music grad can go earn their MBA or law degree as well (albeit after earning some additional credits most likely).

Furthermore, not all lawyers do that well, and the same goes for doctors and MBAs. Ask Doctor Jeff about being a family practice guy.

[Tal_175]

Well you had to go pretty far to make a comparison. That's not apples to apples.

A bachelors in music vs. two degrees, and IVY league at that! And like I said earlier, a music grad can go earn their MBA or law degree as well (albeit after earning some additional credits most likely).

Furthermore, not all lawyers do that well, and the same goes for doctors and MBAs. Ask Doctor Jeff about being a family practice guy.

I didn't really go very far. Not comparing with having two degrees but any one of the degrees with a music degree. You were comparing becoming a doctor, lawyer or having MBA in business with jazz studies degree. I think that's an extremely optimistic comparison for the prospects of typical music degree holder. I said ivy league (doesn't need to be) because the context is Berklee degree (one of the most recognised non-classical music degrees), so it wouldn't be fair to compare it with a no name MBA program. Yeah not every doctor or lawyer makes a lot of money. That doesn't mean earning potential is the same on average as having a music degree.
I'm in fact quite pleasantly surprised to learn that there are people out there who think being a doctor or lawyer is more or less the same income prospect as having a music degree. World is not such a bad place afterall

[Litterick]

Here are some people who dropped out of Berklee.

Al di Meola, Emily Remler, Kurt Rosenwinkel, Quincy Jones, Melissa Etheridge, Bruce Cockburn, John Mayer, St Vincent, Booker Ervin, Donald Fagen, Aimee Mann, Ben McKee of Imagine Dragons, Psy, Dream Theater's founding members John Petrucci, John Myung and Mike Portnoy.

There may be many others who haven't been discovered, as Tom Lehrer might say. But dropping could be a sensible strategy in financial and career terms, as discussed here in the Boston Globe.

[Jazzstdnt]

I didn't really go very far. Not comparing with having two degrees but any one of the degrees with a music degree. You were comparing becoming a doctor, lawyer or having MBA in business with jazz studies degree. I think that's an extremely optimistic comparison for the prospects of typical music degree holder. I said ivy league (doesn't need to be) because the context is Berklee degree (one of the most recognised non-classical music degrees), so it wouldn't be fair to compare it with a no name MBA program. Yeah not every doctor or lawyer makes a lot of money. That doesn't mean earning potential is the same on average as having a music degree.
I'm in fact quite pleasantly surprised to learn that there are people out there who think being a doctor or lawyer is more or less the same income prospect as having a music degree. World is not such a bad place afterall

I'm not saying that a music degree is the best idea, and agree that earning one of those other degrees - especially a medical degree or IVY league MBA is a better idea than earning an undergraduate music degree - unless one is a very special musician to boot. In fact, it needn't be an IVY league MBA to be a very sound investment.

I'm confident that a music major can approach the MBA degree, albeit with some additional courses taken in advance, depending on what their undergrad university required. They may not need anything other than a solid GMAT and references.

Cheers.

[Tal_175]

I remember reading in an interview with Al Di Meola that when he went to Berklee he realized that he already knew everything they were teaching at the program, he was way ahead of the curriculum. So they asked him to teach instead. He said that was because he had a really good private teacher as a kid.
Well, I'm sure he also soaked up the material like a sponge when he was taking lessons.

[zdub]

Nothing to say except that I liked the performance! (And also the blond guitarist grated on me. Good player, but found him quite pretentious. Yeah, I'm superficial.)

[sgcim]

A drummer friend of mine was teaching his HS student, a very talented kid drummer, who is now a jazz performance major at MSM.
He asked my friend, "I don't understand it Mr. D., you're a great drummer, you studied with John Riley (V V Orchestra drummer), Kenny Washington, you've played with every jazz musician I've ever heard of; why are you teaching music at a high school?"

My friend answered him, "Well I've got a habit that I need to pay for every day."

The student asked him, "Gee, Mr. D., what habit is that?"

My friend replied, " I've got this habit where I NEED TO EAT A FEW TIMES A DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!"

A lot of the posters here remind me of that kid.

[Roberoo]

Zappa came from a comfortable middle-class family background.

That picture is really something.... Serous or having some fun? I know some 1970s Italian-Canadian families that would fit this mold... although the furniture would be covered in plastic.

[FwLineberry]

Zappa came from a comfortable middle-class family background.

That picture is really something.... Serous or having some fun? I know some 1970s Italian-Canadian families that would fit this mold... although the furniture would be covered in plastic.

That picture is from the mid 1970s and was taken in Frank's living room at the time. Check the art on the wall. Do you think Frank's parents were really into Alice Cooper?

Here's a picture from Frank's adolescence:




.