Changes for the Sponsor area (and a new Pro area)

[roweenie]

It is a place where you can go discuss stuff without the kids being disrespectful or telling you that your 35 years of experience is not as well informed as their one season of marching band. HAHAHA!!!

Yeah, and for the pros who really make their nut by teaching high school band and play 11.6 paying gigs a year...

[FarahShazam]

"This is not the forum you looking for. Move along."

I'm a geek. I'd love to hear musical tips from tuba pros.

[roweenie]

It is a place where you can go discuss stuff without the kids being disrespectful or telling you that your 35 years of experience is not as well informed as their one season of marching band. HAHAHA!!!

Yeah, and for the pros who really make their nut by teaching high school band and play 11.6 paying gigs a year...

Actually, that is not who posts in there at all.

Yeah, maybe so, but they can, because they're "professionals" too....

[Wyvern]

Upon request, we have changed the sponsor area to allow registered members to not only read the threads, but reply to them as well, and vote in polls.

That is great - thanks to the new moderators for making that enhancement!

[FarahShazam]

Yeah, and for the pros who really make their nut by teaching high school band and play 11.6 paying gigs a year...

Making comments like this make you look petty and small.

[roweenie]

Yeah, and for the pros who really make their nut by teaching high school band and play 11.6 paying gigs a year...

Making comments like this make you look petty and small.

I wasn't trying to be petty, and I certainly don't feel small, either.

Yeah, and for the pros who really make their nut by teaching high school band and play 11.6 paying gigs a year...

Well. List your accomplishments and your professional experience and get your own tag on here. (It is worthless you know)
No? Then don't be snide.

My comment was snide, but somehow, the following one isn't?

It is a place where you can go discuss stuff without the kids being disrespectful or telling you that your 35 years of experience is not as well informed as their one season of marching band. HAHAHA!!!

I'm truly sorry if anyone is offended by my comment (which, by the way, is not entirely incorrect).

It appears my point has been missed, so I'll try to be less oblique this time.

I'm just trying to illustrate that getting a "professional" moniker doesn't really mean anything (thank you, tuben) and that it is doled out in a seemingly arbitrary manner.

Furthermore, this is the only forum I've ever seen that divides people into categories in such a fashion.

[roweenie]

HOLD ON JUST A MINUTE HERE !!!

If there's any offendin' to do, that's MY job.

You AMATEUR offenders need to leave that stuff to us professional offenders.

L.O.L.

[FarahShazam]

Deflecting by commenting on other's behavior doesn't make yours better. You were petty, roweenie.

Your point about arbitrary assignments of the pro banner is noted. That is something I'll consider.

[roweenie]

Deflecting by commenting on other's behavior doesn't make yours better. You were petty, roweenie.

You are certainly entitled to your opinion, but I respectfully beg to differ with you. I am deflecting nothing, merely stating fact. Furthermore, comments on the behavior of others (right or wrong) is a common aspect of this forum (ie., calling members "kids" who are not labeled as "professionals" comes to mind).

I'll admit I was a trifle sarcastic (an attribute reserved for a select few on this forum, it seems), but did I say something that was untrue? I was merely trying to call attention to the fact that the "professional" moniker handed out on this forum is abused, and therefore rendered irrelevant.

Continually insisting on calling me "petty", especially after I've explained to you the motivation for my statement, makes you guilty of the same thing you accuse me.

Name-calling, however, is unacceptable in any event, and I refuse to take part in it.

Your point about arbitrary assignments of the pro banner is noted. That is something I'll consider.

You might be offended of how I made it (as is your right), but this statement goes to prove my point is accurate and salient.

[FarahShazam]

roweenie, as I stated earlier, I'm not offended and am pleased to being notified of ideas and issues. If I see a behavior I'd rather have curtailed, I will call it out--behavior =/= character. This is my forum and is not free of consequences. You may choose to continue this discussion if you wish but you will be disappointed. Taking the side of questioning and suggestions goes way further than snark as is discovered on this thread.

I will look at the issues of the pro status. As far as I'm concerned, anyone who makes their living playing music should get a pro status label--I'm more than happy to err on the side of giving more people access to the pro forums. Especially if local people (to general you) are looking for members here to fill out pro-bono musical groups. Remember this: this is a tiny forum. There are plenty of forums that elevate some members over others due to their responsibilities.

[roweenie]

Ms. Chisham, thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to express my opinion. I am reminded that this is, in fact, a private forum, and in that, all of us participate in the grace and favor of its owner(s).

Sometimes, especially those of us who live in the U.S., automatically take for granted that we have freedom of speech, and that there are in fact some places that this is not necessarily the case.

Also, please forgive my "snarkiness" - mine was a poor attempt, for sure. I was merely trying to emulate others on the forum who have elevated it to a perfect art.

I have no intention of recruiting professional players for pro-bono ensembles, so I won't be needing the professional forum for that purpose. In fact, I was a professional player in a previous life, and have no desire or need to return to that state.

Peace,

roweenie

[FarahShazam]

(need to upgrade the emoticons--here's a ((we'll work this out)) parenthetical)

I just posted a notice in the mod forum so we can discuss an appropriate FAQ definition for the pro labels. Your point was valid and it's hard to convey tone in written language.

[BMadsen]

So, how does one go about getting that Professional designation? I make over 75% of my income playing gigs, and the other 25% comes from teaching private music lessons - I haven't had a "day job" in 5 years, and that was teaching band (granted, I know you were avoiding giving them the professional destination, but as I mentioned, I'm far removed from that).

[Uncle Buck]

FWIW, I'd love to be able to peruse the pro area. I lurk here, occasionally post, and would enjoy being able to read what the pros write in threads that don't involve a lot of the silliness TubeNet generates.

Having said that, I agree with Wade on the reasons why I don't get to do that. I would be reading the threads for curiosity and enjoyment, not for professional development. I made the decision a few decades ago to take my life in a direction other than my music career that wasn't working out so well. Depending on music for your living (housing, food, etc.) simply creates a different perspective. Those who live under that perspective ought to have a forum to chat with others in the same boat. Like Wade said, it has nothing to do with playing ability. It has to do with life perspective.

The rest of us still have plenty of other threads on here to read.

I was, though, mildly annoyed a few years back when I sent a PM requesting a professional designation. I got no response, just was ignored. I would have thought a response telling me no would have been a little more, um, professional.

[bearphonium]

When I first joined TubeNet, I wanted a "rank amateur" badge for my name. Because I was one. I still am. I'm not mean, either.

[FarahShazam]

I'm on the bench of, "if you think you are a pro, you probably are." In fact, my sons former band teacher is a tuba player and I'd consider him a pro. If you're making your money in music, I'd like to hear your ideas as a peer.

[roweenie]

Wow, what a hornet's nest I stepped into here!

Elephant, I'm sorry I misunderstood your post; I've known you here for almost 9 years, and I should have known better.

I had absolutely no idea that there was such a controversy surrounding this whole situation, and that there were people who were so rude as to offend folks who had so much to offer. I guess since I wasn't particularly interested in those threads, I just never followed them.

And no, I've never applied for professional status; my professional playing days predate my participation in this forum, and maybe even the existence of it, as well. Furthermore, I'm perfectly content without the moniker, and even more content to consider myself a "retired professional".

I guess you could say I'm guilty of being too literal; when I hear the term "professional musician", I think "person who makes his living playing an instrument". Yes, at one time in my life, I made a living playing only the tuba, nothing else. I too, paid my mortgage, raised a family, and even had a stay-at-home wife, supported solely by income generated from playing the tuba, in what some folks would consider the most cut-throat, difficult, and most expensive-to-live-in markets in the country.

I took my craft very seriously, and never let a day go by without practicing, so that I could be 100% prepared for the next gig. Unfortunately, it seemed that sadly, many of the educators I worked with over those years only took their axe out of its case whenever they had a gig, which I found to be hardly professional at all (and it showed when they played, too!)

Should I have allowed these experiences to color my opinion? Probably not, but those were my experiences, for better or worse.

[FarahShazam]

Ironic:
--no one is posting in the new pro forum.
--no one is posting in the private sponsor forum.

Which is FINE, it's just shows how little the forum really matters.

[cambrook]

Which is FINE, it's just shows how little the forum really matters.

I don't think that's that case at all, it just shows how little the forum is used. There is no relationship between the number of posts and relevance of the forum.

It would be good to see some more traffic in the Pro forum, but the important thing is that the signal/noise ratio is excellent.

[hup_d_dup]

Professional musicians and music teachers are two groups of people with very different tasks, abilities and work conditions.

A professional musician cannot hang on to a job (or series of gigs) without maintaining a very high level of competence . . . he or she is just too easy to be replaced. Standards are therefore very high.

All of us know that a mediocre teacher (music or otherwise) can, almost always, finish out a mediocre career.

However, there are great teachers; we all have had our lives influenced by them. As much as I admire and respect professional musicians, none of them has helped or inspired me the way that my best teachers did.

I think about the life lessons I have received from teachers on a regular basis, many years after the experience. The great musical performances I have seen, well they were great at the time, but memory fades.

I think that one of the frustrating problems teachers must face is that they are all lumped together as one big homogenous group. They are not. The bad ones, by necessity, tend not to be weeded out, and that reflects poorly on the profession, and it reflects unfairly on the best of them.

Hup