The Future American Economy

            For survival’s sake we as human beings have to be flexible.  I have found the older you get the more flexible you must become.  Actually in my life compromising my life long musical ambitions became the norm.  In music always one had to be competitive to stay ahead.  I learned this early or rather just worked hard because it was the thing to do.  You could either drink beer and smoke pot, or excel in some particular field.  Because I have been a musician since childhood it seemed normal to try to excel in music.  Luckily my background and training paid off and my diligent dedicated labor kept me ahead in the musical game.  I was able to begin playing “gigs” and making money from playing music.  I never made a conscious decision to be cocky.  You just had to be to be competitive.  When I moved to the Midwest from the American South, I received a rather rude awakening.  The acclimation that took place over several years was one that was socialist.  The musicians in Columbus were not concerned with being told how good you were.  They were honest and genuine enough to want you to be a part of their fraternity, because there was a common thread.  You all loved music.  That love was what allowed you to become a part of their community and thus “gig.”  I learned a gigantic lesson in sincerity.  Over the years it became boring to me to concern myself with self-promotion.  I had had so much of myself over the years, I was not interested in hearing myself tell anyone how well I played and that someone should give me a gig.  I begin to pursue music because it was the right thing to do.  What could that mean?  The right thing to do is part of the Protestant Work Ethic.  We work hard as men, because it was why we were put here on this earth.  Our job is to succeed.  It is right to continue to learn, be creative, and be productive.  That is why I do music.  I have forgotten in America the field of commercial music is a dog eat dog scenario.  I had been involved in academia for almost nine years.  I wasn’t having to compete in the “real world” for recognition as a musician.  I had paid my dues.  Now that I no longer immediately am involved with academia, the rules of engagement seem to have changed.  The game has changed.  Above all the music has changed.  The kind of music I was taught and to which I listened was personal.  It allowed for personal expression.  If the music performance didn’t have your soul in it, you would fold.  It would become very cold.  You no longer would be playing music in public.  Now the game is to be flexible.  The game is to compromise.  The game is to not play like we played by my learning.  If you do you become an outcast for not lowering yourself to the lowest common denominator.  Recently I have been trying to become re-motivated about music.  Because I have been a professional musician for over twenty years, I play well.  Because I have studied music at the doctoral level I know a lot about music.  I can’t help it.  When I play I feel like I am stepping on people’s toes.  Is this because of the weak economy?  Is it because people are too uneducated to get what I do?  Is it that people have become so self-centered that they no longer are able to stop what they are doing and listen to someone else’s opinion?  Karioke was the beginning of the end for professional music.  Whoever decided that people should try to perform musically, no matter how un-trained they were, should be shot.  There was a time when music attempted to be artistic.  It attempted to transcend.  With these efforts came communication and communing with the public.  Now music sucks up to the public and sacrifices its artistry in a lame excuse of entertainment.  It has been emasculated.  This trend must be a component of P.C., a premise that has become a joke, but stealthy still is dictating our lives.  Slowly in America the freedoms and ideals human beings have forged and prolonged are being replaced with communist ideals.  We are being manipulated over time to become mindless, soulless, money-spending androids.  The reason why the economy in America is in the dumps is because we have no product.  Moving money around, while it worked for a while for many who became rich, no longer is a viable source of income.  The money all has been received, and those who have received it certainly are not putting it back into the American economy.  It is laundered in some Grand Cayman bank and sent elsewhere.  America has been abandoned, and I for one wish those rich people with the money would shut the fuck up.  There is no way the economy in America can be re-fueled by the poor.  It takes money to make money, and  those small business loans and credit lines have been absorbed by those crafty rich.  Until people are employed, a product is produced sold and bought, and that money circulates, there will be no revitalization of America’s economy.  The Grassroots roots program that started America will have to return.  Maybe the disappearance of those crafty rich is what is necessary.  History shows what is to come.