GREAT MUSICIANS WHO ARE ALSO AWESOME PAINTERS

Talent is a strange thing. When it comes with the “genes-package” it comes in full force, diverse, ready to develop from an aptitude into an attitude in no time, but only if the person carrying it is not afraid of some work. Usually, talented people are multitalented, especially in the field of arts. Many good artists are also good sportsmen; great mathematicians are often solid musicians etc. There are a lot of actors that sing good or play an instrument, even have their own bands, and almost all great musicians are awesome actors. Some of those multi-talents have difficulty choosing between careers. One of them is Joni Mitchell, who said about herself that she is a "painter derailed by circumstance." She designed her own covers but, more importantly, she painted magnificent pieces, standing side by side with some of the best in the visual arts department. She has stated: "I'm a painter first ... and I apply painting principles to music." There is an interview with Wayne Shorter (also a musician/painter) in which he describes how Joni implemented her knowledge of and experience in painting into the field of music. He said that she explained the music and arrangements with painters terminology and that it was a unique methodology, which proved to be very inspiring and helpful. Shorter stated that “she had a sense of feeling that I was joining her as a painter. She likes to paint, and I majored in fine arts before music. And she said, ‘You’re playing like you have a paint brush, you know.’ It was like that kind of uh ... something that doesn’t even have anything to do with music.” Both Shorter and Mitchell approached music synaesthetically, and that’s one of the advantages multitalented people enjoy. This article is about musicians that are also painters (and vice-versa), and in addition to this intro, I present you the work of the most famous and most talented painters that made their career in music… or was it the other way around?

JONI MITCHELL