How To Avoid The Renaissance Man Trap
This is the problem with being a jack of all trades
When I was a boy my mother enrolled me in classical piano lessons. Every Friday after school Mom dropped me off at the home of my piano teacher, Irma Hincenbergs.
Mrs. Hincenbergs was a Latvian refugee who lived in a beautiful Victorian house in downtown Los Gatos, California.
On the wall beside Mrs. Hincenbergs’ grand piano were several pencil drawings of famous composers, including Chopin and Beethoven. I often admired the drawings as I butchered my way through Debussy’s “Clair de Lune.”
Mrs. Hincenbergs knew that I loved to draw cartoons. Every Friday after my lesson she presented me with a stack of editorial cartoons cut out of her daily newspapers. She was a kind and thoughtful woman.
Despite my grumbling about lost Friday afternoons, I grew to appreciate classical piano. It created the foundation for my later experiences playing keyboards and singing in both high school and college rock bands.
I didn’t realize at the time how much my interactions with Mrs. Hincenbergs were shaping my creative predilections for music, drawing and cartooning. Further, I had no inkling of how much these diverse interests would complicate my life.
