Cohen Vs Dylan
There is an apocryphal story (though it really happened) of a meeting between Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen.
It was the mid 80s and they both happened to be on tour in Paris at the same time. The meeting and discussion that followed has achieved a mythical place for fans of both men and the events that took place have gone through numerous retellings.
But here is what happened in Cohen’s own words, as recounted in an interview in 1992:
“Dylan and I were having coffee the day after his concert in Paris a few years ago..and he asked me how long it took me to write ‘Hallelujah’. And I told him a couple of years..I lied, actually. It was more than a couple of years [it took him five].”
“Then I praised a song of his, ‘I &I’ and asked him how long it had taken him, and he said, ‘15 minutes’ “
Cohen wrote over 80 draft verses of Hallelujah.
“I filled two notebooks”, he said, “and I remember being in the Royalston Hotel [in New York], on the carpet in my underwear, banging my head on the floor saying, ‘I can’t finish this song.’”
His songs come to him slowly he says, “It comes kind of in dribbles and drops. Some people are graced with a flow, some people are graced with something less than a flow. I’m one of those.”
This essay is about the process of bringing creative work into the world. And by creative work, I don’t necessarily mean songs or paintings but any work that is bold, personal and intended to change the recipient for the better. Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen are both rightly regarded by their peers and the world as great songwriters. What they also represent are two archetypes of the creative process.
The Conceptual and the Experimental
“I seek in painting” — Paul Cèzanne
“I dont seek, I find” — Pablo Picasso
David Galenson is an economist whose main focus has been the economic mobility of immigrants in America. During a break in writing his honours thesis, he took a course on the history of modern art. This course fascinated him to the degree that he undertook a systemic examination of the important artists and how the prices of the paintings bought at auction were affected by the ages of the artists when the paintings were produced. This study led to a new understanding of the lifecycles of human creativity..that he then outlined in his wonderful book ‘Old Masters and Young Geniuses’
The behaviours he discovered in modern painting were general characteristics that could be extrapolated to most intellectual activities. According to Galenson there are two distinct types of artist. Both types are prominently represented among the greatest and most influential artists of the modern era. They are however distinguished by the methods by which they arrive at their major contributions. The methods arise from a specific conception of artistic goals and specific practises in creating art. He labels these methods aesthetically motivated experimentation and conceptual execution
Or the Experimentals and the Conceptuals
The Conceptual
A fundamental characteristic of a conceptual innovator is certainty. As Picasso once mentioned to a biographer “The key to everything that happens is here”, he says pointing to his forehead, “Before it comes out of the pen or brush, the key is to have it at ones fingertips, entirely without losing any of it.” History has been kind to the conceptual innovators as they are the ones most likely to be described as geniuses. They embody an irreverence and a lack of respect for earlier work in their respective disciplines. They make their most important contribution not long after their first exposure to a discipline. Ideas come to them in flashes of inspiration and are actioned and communicated very quickly. And they are blessed with great confidence..confidence in the validity and significance of their creations. Conceptual innovations appear suddenly..the new idea producing a result different from other artists’ work. As a result conceptual innovators breakthrough at a young age. Picasso was 26 when he painted Les Demoiselles d’Avignon launching Cubism. Dylan was 24 when he wrote ‘Like a Rolling Stone’ ranked #1 by Rolling Stone magazine in their poll of the 500 greatest songs of all time.
The Experimental
Experimental innovators need time to develop their art. They often struggle with having a clear vision and their goals are imprecise, probably unachievable..so they rarely feel like they have succeeded. They spend their whole careers chasing a single objective and are often plagued by frustration at their inability to feel a sense of accomplishment. However they build their skills gradually..their major contributions reflect effort and experience acquired over the course of their long careers. They are celebrated for their wisdom and depth of understanding. They use their uncertainty as a lure to gradually progress their ambitions through cautious experiments. Because of this, appreciation of their work comes more slowly and late in their lives,
A critic described the artist Paul Cèzanne’s work as ..”an asymptote toward which he was forever approaching without ever quite reaching it; it was a realty incapable of complete realisation”
Leonard Cohen was 50 by the time he finished and recorded Hallelujah. It took another 20 years before it was permanently launched into the Zeitgeist (thanks to versions by John Cale, Jeff Buckley, Rufus Wainwright..and the movie Shrek). He had his first #1 album in 2012 at the age of 77. He was inducted into the Rock n Roll Hall of fame in 2008 and the Songwriters Hall of fame in 2010.
Conclusion
This essay is about the creative process and what it takes to put creative work into the world; this isn’t just about painters or songwriters. But for anyone. The way we think about the creative process has been hijacked by the Dylan’s (in his case for very good reason) of the world. We tend to label creative innovators those who are highly conceptual and are blessed with the confidence and certainty of their ideas…and the quickness of bringing them into the world. It’s the young guns who emerge guns blazing and disrupt the status quo (where have I heard that before)
But who are the true innovators? It is not those who garner short term success and then whose work is soon forgotten. It is those whose work in some ways changes the practises of their successors, gains the respect of their peers and whose work has significance in the long term. And this is true of the Conceptuals and Experimentals..of the Finders and the Seekers
For most of us in the business or entrepreneurship world the same framework exists; for every Zuckerberg there is a Ray Croc (who opened his first McDonald’s franchise in his 50s) for every Steve Jobs there is a Katherine Graham (who took the helm of the Washington Post age 46). Unfortunately our culture immediately exalts the former and takes time to catch up to the latter.
If you are in the Experimental camp it is important to know that appreciation if it does come, will come later in life compared with your ‘conceptual’ peers. Appreciation should not be the ultimate goal, but working toward a purpose, gaining meaning in the process and a growing mastery in your work as you grow older. So to paraphrase Steve Jobs (who set the template for a conceptual innovator in the business world) it just gets better and better as the years roll on..So keep working on it. Don’t Settle.
References
1. This post was inspired by the podcast Revisionist History by Malcolm Gladwell. In particular this episode here
2. The stories about Dylan and Leonard Cohen are mainly from the book: The Holy or the Broken by Alan Light
3. The thinking behind Conceptuals and Experimentals is from the book: Old masters and Young Geniuses by David Galenson
