People become known for their signatures: Chef’s have that dish. Directors have that look. Athletes have that move. Musicians have that sound.
The formula for a signature is: technical mastery + point of view.
And it takes a long, long time to develop a good signature. Lately, I’ve been thinking deeply about my own signature (or lack thereof?) as an artist. I can thank a lot of this thinking deeply to my friend Kyle and our two-person book club for Julia Cameron’s brilliant The Artist’s Way.
There is my life before that book and my life after that book.
Before that book I was the kid whose high school chorus teacher stuck me between two trained singers and said, “just do what they’re doing.”
Before that book I was the guy whose dad heard me sing Elton John’s Your Song and said, ““.
There’s nothing in the quotes because after I finished singing, he didn’t say anything.
Before that book, moments like that were devastating. In their defense, I wasn’t a great singer at the time.
After that book, fuck them.
No seriously, fuck them.
I believe it is the responsibility of adults to pay attention to a kid’s potential and offer them the space and resources to hone that potential.
I didn’t have that as a kid.
Anyway CUT TO: 23 YEARS LATER and here I am, rediscovering my potential at middle age, and you know what? All of it is still there.
A few weeks ago, I was at a party chatting to a friend and his wife and I didn’t know the wife, but I said something that made them both laugh pretty hard, and the wife suddenly looks at me and says, “wait a second, you’re the guy my husband watches on Instagram. I hear him from the other room, cracking up at your videos all the time. You’re that Jesse?”
“That’s yeah, that’s me. What made you realize I was that Jesse?” I asked.
“It’s just… something about you and how you speak,” she said. “It’s just so funny and so specific.”
This stranger that I did not know… stood in my presence and just… felt… my artistic signature.
I was speechless.
I believe it is the responsibility of adults to pay attention to a kid’s potential and offer them the space and resources to hone that potential.
I didn’t have that as a kid.
But I’m that adult now.
“All of it is still there.”
Hell yeah it is!