I think you totally missed the point here. Regarding the post you responded, to, it's a rhetorical argument pointing out the absurdity of your position. It's narrow-minded exactly because it's parodying your position. It's not actually arguing that that is the case.IvyBirds wrote: Thu Jun 25, 2026 7:50 pm It's crazy to me that musicians can have such a narrow view they think only jazz musicians could possibly improvise live music. That's the advantage of actually playing live music and not being stuck in a paradigm where you are forced to use sequencers and backing tracks where you can't improvise at all. How sad that view must be
That said, there's a huge difference between playing covers and writing your own music. A lot of people on here are actually writing their own music from scratch. I've played in cover bands, and even if we played the song in a different style, with different instrumentation from the original, we never kidded ourselves into believing this is the same skill as writing the song and lyrics from scratch.
When you play in a cover band, you are typically playing well-known tunes, that, even if they sound different, have a big familiarity bonus. People can sing along, they know the rough premise of the tune and basic structure. Deviate too far from what makes the original song that song - i.e. change the structure, the lyrics and the arrangement, and it's not the original song any more. It's how you typically lose these audiences, as the crowd at weddings etc. tend to have pretty diverse tastes and you are trying to find the common denominator that will at least check the familiarity box. Songs from when the couple were teenagers, old classics that everyone knows, that sort of thing.
Try writing your own music and then playing that live. It's typically a lot harder to win over the crowd when they don't know any of the songs and they need to stand on their own merits. Especially if you are playing for strangers. Obviously, good musicianship helps, but you can't polish the proverbial turd and being able to play an instrument isn't the same skill as writing a banger. There's clearly benefits to knowing your stuff and having experience playing other songs, listening to other music etc. But a lot of people really struggle to do this well. I've known people who are technically impressive multi-instrumentalists who can only play from sheet music; or can immediately play along and improvise over anything on the first time of listening; or write songs that are well played but ultimately neither exciting nor inspiring to listen to. And people who can barely play their primary instrument after 10 years but write excellent songs and lyrics.
You've confused two adjacent but still quite different skillsets at being the same thing. They're not, and you'd know that if you did write your own music (like most people here). Nor does everyone use synthesisiers and sequencers; or they might, but play several other instruments as well. Or they simply want to write the sort of music that gets its signature sound from the robotic way sequencers sound (e.g. rigid timing locked to the grid, no velocity variations etc.). As much as you deride that, they are perfectly valid choices and say nothing about the ability to create a good tune. Once again, you are anointing yourself as the arbiter of what is and isn't "the right way to be a musician". It's both arrogant and misguided.
I'd argue that the best all-round musicians are those who can play well, improvise well and compose well. And those who are open-minded and willing to step outside their comfort zone. You still - like everyone else here - have a lot of growing to do, especially regarding the last point. Which brings use nicely back to the post you responded to and what its message (probably) is. Now that you've essentially argued against what is your own absolutist stance, a little self-reflection is probably in order
