In this episode, Gerald engages in a fascinating discussion with Donald Robinson and Mike Rayburn. They discuss music, life, business, success and the critical importance of practice among other topics. To learn more about Donald Robinson Studios go to https://donaldrobinsonstudios.com/and to learn more about Mike Rayburn go to https://mikerayburn.com
Gerald J. Leonard:
Welcome to Workplace Jazz and How to Improvise, your trusted resource for creating high performing agile teams and learning the secrets used by today’s jazz musicians and their professional ensembles. I’myour host, Gerald J. Leonard.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Well, good afternoon, everyone, or good morning or wherever you are. My name is Gerald Leonard and I have Donald Robinson with me, and I have a guest, a good friend of mine, Mike Rayburn. Now let me tell you about Mike. I met Mike in 2015 at an NSA conference at a jam session.
Mike Rayburn:
That’s right.
Gerald J. Leonard:
And that’s where we first met each other and kind of played music-
Mike Rayburn:
And it was cool for me. I’m going to introduce you first, because I got in there and I’ve played with people at NSA right and left but all of a sudden there’s a bass player who can actually play, and I was like, “Wow,this is great, man.” I didn’t have to tell you, “Four chord, four chord.” You had it, man. That was very good.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah, we had a good time. It was a lot of fun and I think that night I met a ton of the guys. Jim Cathcard and yourself and a bunch of other guys. So let me tell you little bit about Mike. So Mike is atwo-time … not a one-time but a two-time TEDx presenter. He’s an innovative entrepreneur and he’s an NSA hall of fame speaker. Mike uses his world class guitar performing, really his virtuoso guitar performing and comedy to teach innovation and performance to corporations around the world. Mike’salso headlined at Carnegie Hall multiple times. Not one time but multiple times and has shared the stagewith the Beach Boys, Maroon 5, John Oates and many other musical guests. Mike’s also performed hispresentations over 5,000 times for organizations and including the Fortune 100.
Gerald J. Leonard:
And besides all of that, Mike is also headlining his own show in Las Vegas where he’s performed that anumber of times and performed over in 20 different countries, and you can regularly hear him on SiriusXM and the morning radio nationwide. Mike, thank you so much. I didn’t know all this about you until I read your [crosstalk 00:02:36].
Mike Rayburn:
[crosstalk 00:02:37] I heard that, I thought, “He’s old. He’s been around …” Yeah [inaudible 00:02:45]down here in Philly, yeah. John Oates, Hall and Oates [crosstalk 00:02:49].
Gerald J. Leonard:
Was that in Philly as well?
Mike Rayburn:
That’s where they’re from. I didn’t [crosstalk 00:02:54] different places.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Oh, okay, okay. I’m going to start this off with one of the questions I usually ask people. What do youthink’s made you successful throughout your career so far, Mike?
Mike Rayburn:
Well obviously there’s a lot of things that come into it for anybody. There’s the obvious things. Hey,you’ve got to practice. Hey, you’ve got to get up every day and do it. I would say the key, though, to all ofthat is consistency. I have a poster that’s just around the corner right there that says, “The race is notalways to the swift but to those who keep on running.” I keep on running, you know? I keep showing up,you keep trying to get better every day, a little bit every day, a little bit every day. You get up when theyknock you down and I just keep showing up, and I won’t go away. And so I think that’s a lot of it.
Mike Rayburn:
But the fundamentals, depending on who’s listening and what level they are in their life, career, art form,whatever it is they’re doing, I think the importance is … There’s two things that have to be there. Numberone, you have to have a knack for it, an ability, a talent for it. And everybody’s got an ability or a talent somewhere. It’s just not always in the thing you want it to be. But you’ve got to have a knack for it andyou have to have a passion for it. It’s something that you’re good at and something that you love.
Mike Rayburn:
And so there are things that I’m good at that I don’t love, and there are things that I love that I’m not verygood at, and I’ve found that one, and everybody’s like that. There’s finding that one thing that you bothlove and you’ve got a knack for. That’s the thing.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Exactly, exactly.
Donald Robinson:
That’s awesome.
Mike Rayburn:
Yeah.
Donald Robinson:
My motto is life is a journey, not a destination, you know? We focus so much, sometimes on just trying toget something done, but we’ve got to really enjoy the journey as we go through it, and what you just said,the purpose behind what we do and the passion, it really keeps us going, because, you know, as musicians we have our peaks and valleys. We have some great times and some times that just … we try to figure itall out.
Mike Rayburn:
Right. Do you find, Donald, I’m wondering, do you find that … Because yeah, we always have theseoutcomes we want to achieve, but if I’m not enjoying the process of achieving it, it’s not [crosstalk00:05:19]. That’s kind of what you’re saying.
Donald Robinson:
Yeah, it’s kind of like some people who get into the business, they see the fame of it and they think of themoney and they’re like, “Oh, that seems fun,” but they don’t realize it’s a lot of hard work that we have togo through [crosstalk 00:05:33]-
Gerald J. Leonard:
There’s a lot of work that we’ve got to do here.
Donald Robinson:
[crosstalk 00:05:35]
Mike Rayburn:
I tell you what, I tell you what, somebody … my pastor, actually, pointed this out to me and I hadn’trealized it. He said, “Mike, I know exactly why you’re successful.” I said, “Okay, I’m listening.” He said,”You fell in love with practicing.”
Donald Robinson:
Yes.
Mike Rayburn:
Eureka, he’s right and I didn’t even know it. I do. I love practicing but you’ve got to fall in love withpracticing, because it’s not about just the performance. It’s love getting up, doing your scales, love[crosstalk 00:06:02]-
Gerald J. Leonard:
I think somebody did a TEDx about that somewhere.
Mike Rayburn:
[crosstalk 00:06:05]
Donald Robinson:
We’re going through this period of COVID and all of this, and me being a musician and a producer anddoing a lot of things remotely, how are you handling a lot of this situation? Is that affecting what you’redoing right now? How is that working out for you?
Mike Rayburn:
Yeah, well other than the dismantling of my career and my income, [crosstalk 00:0629] … No. Well,everyone’s had to pivot, and so I’ve had to pivot, and so the pivot is to virtual. And so my presentations,yes, I’m a musician, yes, I’m a comedian, and yes I do whatever, but I’m first and foremost a speaker, andso I use guitar and comedy to teach innovation and performance, innovation and change, and so luckily everyone’s suddenly going, “We need to learn how to manage change,” and it’s like, “Well, that’s exactlywhat I do.” So I’ve just had to pivot to doing it virtually. So I built … The first thing I did was I broughtover a friend of mine who’s an engineer, and he’s everything. This is a guy who … He’s one of thosepeople who, you just say, “Could you do this? Could you do my real estate deal? Could you fix myrefrigerator?” And he can do it all. He can do anything. His name is Jake [Keck 00:07:22].
Mike Rayburn:
I brought Jake over and we built a virtual studio. And so it’s got two camera shoots, so I can do onecamera where I’m talking and it’s got a monitor next to me. I’ve got a wood wall as the background andI’ve got … So the main camera that I’m presenting and having this … slides are there right next to me, andthen I have another camera that gives me a closeup on the guitar, and then I have a third frame that’s justthe slides, nothing else in the photo, and I can do screen in screen, and I can do that all from a littleswitcher. If I can run it, anybody can run it, and I’m not kidding about that. I’m not a tech guy. I just[crosstalk 00:08:00]-
Gerald J. Leonard:
I’m so impressed because you have foot switches. You have food switches to change the camera andchange your slides.
Mike Rayburn:
Well, no, I have a foot switch that changes the slides.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Okay.
Mike Rayburn:
I have a hand switch that switches the switcher.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Okay, so you have a hand switch for the cameras?
Mike Rayburn:
Yeah, and the cool thing is it’s just off the camera, so it’s not in the shoot. So you don’t see me there with aswitcher. I mean, you could tell my hand went over there, but it’s like right now, you can’t see what myhand is doing, but … can switch the cameras that way.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Got you, got you.
Mike Rayburn:
So I built that. It’s really good. It’s not like you’re going to shoot Channel Three News from there, but it’sa really … But it’s broadcast quality [crosstalk 00:08:39] picture. But we all had to do that because … Andthen the other thing we have to do is educate our clients, because clients don’t know what they’re doing.They have no idea what’s going on. They’re as confused as we are. And so we have to go in and say, “No,you don’t need to push your event into 2021. Here’s why you need to have it in 2020, because right nowit’s never been more necessary.” So anyway, that’s the big switch, Donald, that I’ve had to do. And Iimagine you too. I mean we all had [crosstalk 00:09:08] …
Donald Robinson:
That’s what I’ve been doing pretty much remote using Zoom and found some other software that worksreally well. I’m actually surprised, I think it’s still going back to the passion and the drive, but I just dugin. I had this time free now and I’m like, “Hey, let me really dig into this remote thing,” and it’s been rewarding and I’ve been getting more clients than I expected. [crosstalk 00:09:40]
Mike Rayburn:
There you go. Yes. Yeah, and that’s the thing, man. I think we should not squander this opportunity, and Isay that with respect to the challenges that are going on in the world right now. I’m not trying to down play that, but we know that’s happening there, so the question is, in the meantime, if we’re not … Because I wastraveling all the time. I was on a plane. I would fly 125 to 150,000 miles a year, and all of a sudden it’salmost zero. So I’ve got this time at home. Well, what can I create with that time? What can I write? Whatcan I practice? How can I help? It’s an opportunity to build things that are either effective now for people within a virtual environment, or they’re going to be effective once we get out of this to a certain degree.Things are going to change anyway, but if we get moving on, to have an online learning program you cansell, or to have a new recording like Gerald’s been doing, to have a new book, to have a new whatever, touse this time effectively.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Exactly, exactly. So Mike, where you are right now, obviously you didn’t wake up one day and you justfound yourself there. So tell us a little bit about your story and your journey of how did you get fromwhere you started from, to quickly to how you got to where you are now? What was that journey like for you?
Mike Rayburn:
Okay, well quickly, I’m from a sports family, totally athletic. My dad was a football coach, a wrestlingcoach and a math teacher. So I played football and I wrestled. I also swam competitively and that was … I was an athlete.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Okay, so that explains the bike riding and the athletics, because I was starting to figure, “Where does thisguy become such an athlete from?” Okay, now, go ahead.
Mike Rayburn:
I just got back from the gym too. And then I throw on the jacket because you guys had to [crosstalk00:11:28].
Donald Robinson:
[crosstalk 00:11:28] Gerald.
Gerald J. Leonard:
It’s not my [crosstalk 00:11:34]-
Mike Rayburn:
Donald and I have decided to [crosstalk 00:11:36].
Donald Robinson:
I said, “He’s not going to embarrass me. [crosstalk 00:11:40] my jacket.”
Mike Rayburn:
Well and then I had to fall in line. Anyway, [crosstalk 00:11:47] but my dad gave me a guitar, or he had aguitar and I started messing around with it. We had an old upright piano that I learned to play, and musicmade sense to me. And so then with the guitar I just messed around with it and he gave me this little guitar when I was, I think … It was for a birthday. I think it was my eighth birthday. Eighth, ninth or 10th birthday, which means, I hate to say this but it was like 50 years ago, which means I should be a lot betterthan I am. But anyway, I just started messing around. My family, I mean, I have zero sob story. I’ve donemy work and my life but I had an extremely fatally dysfunctional family. Crazy dysfunctional and abusive, blah, blah, blah, all this stuff.
Mike Rayburn:
Done with them, good … But, the guitar was my escape. You hear Bon Jovi and different people I’veheard interviewed, “I learned to play guitar so I could meet girls.” It’s like, I learned to play guitar so I could live, so I could survive, so I could get away from my family, and so it was my escape. I started playing live and I liked that, and I knew in eighth grade that music was going to be my life. It just hit me,you know? There’s a strength to that to knowing what you want to do. Knowing the guitar’s going to be inyour hand for the rest of your life in eighth grade. That’s a good thing.
Mike Rayburn:
I still played all the sports and everything, but then in college I switched to … I became a classical guitar major and classical guitar, I had a double degree. I had a degree in classical guitar performance and then I had another degree in guitar and music business, and so [inaudible 00:13:24] the business side of it, which is … I say that to anybody. I’m the last guy in the world who wants to embrace business, but you’ve got to,because most artists’ financial plan is to out-earn their ignorance.
Donald Robinson:
You’re right.
Mike Rayburn:
That is what they’re trying to do. They don’t want to learn how to do finances so they hope to makeenough money that their mistakes don’t matter, and that’s a loser’s game. And so I learned about business and I learned about … To this day, the best class I ever took in college was marketing. I had a great teacher, that was part of it, but I use what I learned in that class every day of my life. Every single day Ilearn what I learned there … I use what [crosstalk 00:14:13]-
Donald Robinson:
That’s great.
Mike Rayburn:
Anyway, I went on with there and I started playing bars, and each time … I think one of the keys is to …There’s two things. One is to, every night, try to make it better, try to push a little bit. A lot of people just kind of lay back and just do their thing, and it’s like each night I would try to turn it into a concert environment, take a bar and try to make everybody listening and concert-ish kind of thing or whatever,and of course it didn’t work every time but I got better at that. And the other thing is to pay attention to what works.
Mike Rayburn:
Gerald and I know [inaudible 00:14:54] speakers who have … There’s good speakers but they have one section of their speech that’s awkward, it doesn’t work right or whatever, and then you see them three years later and the same section is awkward and doesn’t work right. It’s like, have you not realized that that’s not working? That joke isn’t funny, that story doesn’t work, it doesn’t make your point. So, develop a sensitivity for what works and what doesn’t. Is it coming across?
Mike Rayburn:
And so I went from that to playing colleges for 16 years. I played 1,800 college shows all over the US and Canada, and then … Now, keep in mind, this is all musician entertainer, and then at the same time though,my dad, whom I had a horrible relationship with, did two things amazing. He gave me a guitar, and in 11th grade he gave me a book called Psycho-Cybernetics by a guy named Maxwell Maltz, and it’s about the power of the mind, it’s about the power of focus, the power of belief, the power of if you believe something strong enough, how you can make it … Which is biblical, which is … you look at any religioustext or any whatever, they’ll all talk about this. So Maxwell Maltz kind of put science behind it.
Mike Rayburn:
And so I was doing stuff like visualization and goal setting and planning and objectives and things likethat all the time, but my artist friends didn’t get that. And so I just kept it to myself, and personal development and everything. So finally when I was about 40, 30, 39, just before I was 40, someone askedme about joining the National Speakers Association. Jana Stanfield.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Okay, okay, yeah.
Mike Rayburn:
You might know Jana. Yeah. Jana Stanfield asked me. She saw me at a comedy club. She saw me at a comedy club and I had this little motivational thing I did at the end. After the show she said [inaudible 00:16:46] … Oh, she’s a songwriter. She had written hits for Reba McEntire and other folks. Good songwriter and a good speaker too. She said, “Mike, you’re clean, you’re funny, you have a message.You’re a speaker and you don’t even know it.” And I said, “What’s a speaker?” I’m in the speaker hall offame and I didn’t even know what a speaker was back then. But anyway, so I joined and then I realized I could do a keynote presentation where I was teaching innovation, creativity, thinking, possibility thinking,innovative thinking. I could teach that, and that goes to … applies directly to change, which is what I teachnow.
Mike Rayburn:
I could teach that, but I would teach it using guitar and comedy as my delivery rather than PowerPoint and statistics. And so it made sense. It made sense to me. I had no idea if there would be a market for it,but I … This is the other thing about me. I love to do things no one’s done, and it’s hard to find things thatno one’s done. But I like to do things no one’s done. And so no one had created a keynote presentation using … I don’t mean to sound proud, but advanced guitar performance and comedy to illustrate the point.Luckily it hit a niche, and so things took off pretty quickly, and then … Which is why I get what you do, Gerald. I understand what you’re doing. It makes sense, the bass thing, but there’s a connection between that and business.
Mike Rayburn:
So anyway, that’s kind of maybe a little long winded but that’s basically what happened.
Gerald J. Leonard:
No, that’s great. Just the time that I’ve spent with you, I think one of the things that I’ve picked up is about goal setting and I always have set goals, but I think when I went out to Las Vegas to your What If Weekend and you talked about the writing of your goals on a daily basis, and I really took that to heart. I kind of came up with my list of goals and I started doing that, and it’s been like somebody put a power pack jet on my back and-
Mike Rayburn:
Boom, I love it.
Gerald J. Leonard:
It’s like I’m relaxed and I’m enjoying life but I’m writing out these goals every morning and things a restarting to happen really fast, and I’m going, “Wow, this is amazing.” But it’s just taking that concept of programming your mind every morning with your goals, and by handwriting them, you’re neurologically getting involved, your body’s getting involved, it stays with you all the time and it becomes what you think about, and what you think about and focus on all the time is what you start getting. And stuff starts coming together.
Mike Rayburn:
[crosstalk 00:19:24] which works great because you go, “Wow, I dreamed of that goal and I got it,” or yougo, “That which I’ve feared has come upon me.” It works either way. It’s a powerful tool. It will work to prosper you and it will work to destroy you, whichever way [crosstalk 00:19:40]-
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah, you’ve got to make sure you write down the right goals. [crosstalk 00:19:43]
Mike Rayburn:
And the problem is the default, if you don’t take control of that, in other words take control of what your thoughts are, take control of programming your mind in the morning, and I don’t mean in some weird way, but just writing your goals down, reading affirmations, reading something positive. If you don’t takecontrol of that, the default is usually a negative.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Exactly.
Mike Rayburn:
What you [crosstalk 00:20:05] easily, it’s more easy … It’s easier to gossip, it’s easier to think negative things about people, it’s easier to go to, “It’s never going to work,” or, “This world is screwed up,” or allthese kind of negative thoughts, and that’s what you get, you know? Or, if you take control of it and you think, “God is conspiring with the world to help me,” you think, “I am a man in full,” you think, “I am a money magnet, money comes to me freely and frequently and abundantly every day,” if you think things like that over and over again, they tend to happen.
Donald Robinson:
They do, yeah. That’s awesome. I’ve just got to say, I am motivated by just speaking right now, actually by the both of you [crosstalk 00:20:52] on the corner here … Well, [inaudible 00:20:56] I have my little whiteboard and I’m not [crosstalk 00:21:00] going to put up all the things that … my to-do list and thingsthat I want to do, but man, that’s some awesome stuff. I am really motivated just by hearing you speak.
Mike Rayburn:
I get jazzed … Your saying that feeds me. That’s why I do it. It’s like I know I’m in the right thing because I live for that reaction. See, I knew my gifts were music and comedy and entertainment. I understood that,but at the same time when I was about 38, 39 years old, I have a friend who said, “Mike, I think your gift is exhortation,” and I said, “What the world is that?” You know? I was like, “I have no idea, what’s exhortation?” Well, what it means is to strongly encourage, to inspire, to edify, to lift up. The way he saidit to me was, “It matters to you that the people around you do better.” And I almost cried because he hit it.I was like, “That’s exactly right,” and I didn’t even know it.
Mike Rayburn:
And so when you said that, Donald, I just went, “This is why I do it.” Yes, I want to shake the world and say, “You can do so much more than you realize. You have so much more ability than you realize. You are capable of creating this amazing life and you don’t even realize how … Not easy, it’s not easy, but it’seasier than you think, you know? It’s not impossible.
Gerald J. Leonard:
It’s possible. I think the word is it’s possible.
Donald Robinson:
It definitely comes through. It definitely comes through, just me … Your body language and everything. Iknow that’s your passion without a doubt. I get it right away. That’s great. So, I just had a question. Now,how do you combine comedy and playing guitar together? What does that look like? [crosstalk 00:22:39]But I’m just trying to understand how that works together. It seems like it would be very interesting towatch, so this is my first time hearing that concept. I’m just wondering how that works, if you can explaina little bit.
Mike Rayburn:
It’s a good question because, especially if you hadn’t heard it, what I do, or if you haven’t heard thespecifics on it, you go, “What is he talking about?” There’s a guy, first of all, obviously parodies and funny songs … I’ll take a boy band song and I’ll change [crosstalk 00:23:18]. The biggest thing I have on YouTube by a lot, the most views I have is I wrote a parody of Taylor Swift’s You Belong With Me, andit’s called You Need a Nerd Like Me. I shot a funny little video for it. It’s not viral, but it’s over six million views, so it’s pretty good. It’s got me a lot of subscribers. It’s a parody. So that’s one way. Number one,you write funny songs and you play them.
Mike Rayburn:
But what I wanted to do was I had a what if question, and What If is the name of my presentation. What ifyou could make somebody laugh without saying a word? Could the notes of music be funny? And I don’t know if you realize this, there’s a piece by Mozart which is called … the title of it, it’s in German but whatever German is for, it’s called A Musical Joke. And you listen to parts of it, not the whole thing, but parts of it are funny. They make me laugh, and you guys would too. You’d get it as a musician because he goes to this part and then he goes, instead of what you think, it goes to something different. And it’s funny, and I’m a nerd. I’m like, “Okay, psychologically how is he creating setup and punchline with just notes?”
Gerald J. Leonard:
Exactly, exactly.
Mike Rayburn:
So what I did was one of the first ones I came up with along those lines was, if you remember the old song Dueling Banjos, the little blue grass thing. The banjo would play a part, the guitar would play a part,and the banjo would answer back, and they’d go back and forth. I thought, “Well, I’ll play both the parts.”Well, what if the banjo player is from Baghdad? So, all Phrygian and Mixolydian mode stuff, okay? I’d dothe little drone strings and stuff like that, so it sounds [crosstalk 00:25:13], and it’s genuinely funny. Itworked, okay? And so people would laugh and there’s no lyric [crosstalk 00:25:23].
Gerald J. Leonard:
Now, Mike, the one I like the most that you’ve talked about and I think you’ve even done in some of yourshows is when you talked about playing in country clubs in Nashville and you’d run out of material, andso you’d start taking some of the popular different types of songs, even hip hop songs and then turning them into country.
Mike Rayburn:
Country songs, yeah. Country versions of hip hop. Yeah, yeah. When you hear a country version of Beyonce, that’s scary.
Donald Robinson:
Oh wow [crosstalk 00:25:57]-
Mike Rayburn:
And you’re laughing at the concept, right? So what I do is, yeah … (singing) And I do the dance. You just find a few of her signature moves and it becomes funny because [crosstalk 00:26:24]-
Donald Robinson:
Oh that’s very-
Mike Rayburn:
… you do not want to see me trying to dance like Beyonce, so [crosstalk 00:26:29] it’s funny. So anyway,I’ll do that, and yeah, doing-
Gerald J. Leonard:
Who Let the Dogs Out?
Mike Rayburn:
… country version of Ridin’ Dirty or Flo Rida, (singing) and that’s doing-
Donald Robinson:
Wow, yeah.
Mike Rayburn:
… Flo Rida to the tune of Beverly Hill billies. And so that whole one song fitting to another song’s melody[crosstalk 00:27:02] to me and so I would … So anyway, but they’re weird things, so they work. So yeah.
Donald Robinson:
That’s great, that’s great. And that’s it. Music is a universal language, right? [crosstalk 00:27:12]
Gerald J. Leonard:
It is, it really is.
Donald Robinson:
Everybody can understand it in one way or another, so that’s a great example of that. [crosstalk 00:27:19]
Mike Rayburn:
In fact I just did that. I just did that bit. I just had a showcase Tuesday morning. I prerecorded the thing,but I had a showcase Tuesday morning for meeting planners, people who put on events in Mexico and Latin America, and I can’t use everything. I do Led Zeppelin singing Dr. Seuss. Well, they wouldn’t knowLed Zeppelin or Dr. Seuss, so it wouldn’t be funny, but I did country versions of Beyonce and RickyMartin and Baja Men and they laughed because they get … Even though they don’t listen to country, theyget what country is. And so if you don’t listen to country and you think it’s kind of hokey or whatever, and you do that hokey version of something that’s not a hokey song and it becomes funny. You’re talking about international, most of them didn’t speak English yet they got that.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah, yeah, because they get the melody and the tone and where you’re going with it. Exactly.
Donald Robinson:
That’s awesome, that’s awesome.
Gerald J. Leonard:
So Mike, obviously to do what you’re doing requires a lot of practice and I want to thank you for the story that you gave me for the book as well, where we talk a lot about … it’s the chapter I talk about improving yourself in practicing. What’s your philosophy on practicing? What’s your thoughts about practicing?
Mike Rayburn:
I’ve got a bunch of them. First of all, you have to practice. You can’t not practice. So it’s not an option.Second of all, consistency. Consistency is a big word for me and it’s not a sexy word. Nobody cares about consistency, but consistency is the most powerful … I think it’s the most powerful human force on the planet. Here’s why. For instance, water and wind flowing over rock has done more to change the earth than all the blasting and earth moving equipment on the planet. Tucking a little money away each month has created more wealth than all the winnings in Vegas and lotteries combined. Exercising and eatingright foods on a daily basis has done more to change people’s health than all the pills and the most powerful pills in the world. It’s a matter of consistency. What do you do every day? Or what do you do regularly? Sometimes it’s not every day but sometimes it’s …
Mike Rayburn:
For instance, I don’t go to the gym every day, but I do it consistently [inaudible 00:29:45] every other dayor so. So, consistency in practice is huge. Consistency in everything. Consistency in thought. What youthink about, we just said this earlier, what you think about most often, you get, okay? And so that means consistency. You can’t just have a positive thought followed by a bunch of negative thoughts and say,”Well I had a positive thought.” Well, did you have it a lot? Because what you think about most often,that’s consistency. And then if you think negative thoughts consistently, that’s what you get. It’s a powerful force. Nelson Mandela and Adolf Hitler were both extremely consistent men.
Donald Robinson:
That’s true.
Mike Rayburn:
Okay? They were both consistent, and powerfully consistent. Mandela, how many years? 27 years? 28 years in jail? Consistently positive. The guards loved him. He was doing what transformed South Africa 28 years before he got out of prison. He was practicing the same thing. That’s power, okay? That’s power on a level we haven’t seen. Hitler was doing the same thing. Stalin was doing the same things long beforethey got into power. It’s what put them into power, and it’s horrible, okay? But you have to look at what was the power behind it. The power behind it [crosstalk 00:30:59] consistency. So choose what you wantto be good at and choose the practices that will get you there, and do them consistently. It’s almost likeyou can’t not do it. You’ll get what you [crosstalk 00:31:11]-
Donald Robinson:
Yeah, it’s true.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah.
Mike Rayburn:
So I believe that, and the other thing is … I think we talked about this, is what Anders Ericsson calls deliberate practice. Deliberate practice, okay? I have certain guitars … Okay, you guys are both musicians.You have certain things you love to play. Certain things you sit down and you know, “I just love to dothis. I like to picture myself on stage doing this. I like to picture just doing it in front of the girl that I’mafter. I want to picture myself …” And you just do that thing you love, and you can do that for 12 hours aday, every single day, and not get that much better. You’ll get better at that one thing but [crosstalk00:31:50].
Mike Rayburn:
So the idea of deliberate practice is to focus on the things within the context of what you do well, meaning, for me it would be guitar, bass, whatever you play. Whatever you do well, looking at the things that you know you need to improve. And so, let’s say, for instance, Bohemian Rhapsody, doing the classical guitar version of Bohemian Rhapsody is a big part of my show, and so I will practice that and I will practice it at half speed, at way slower than anybody would ever perform it, because if I can play it perfectly at slow speed, all I have to do is speed it up. But if you play it with mistakes at a faster speed, you’re just speeding through your mistakes. That doesn’t work.
Donald Robinson:
[crosstalk 00:32:34]
Mike Rayburn:
I’m preaching to the choir, but … So let’s say I’m playing that, and in fact I already know certain parts of itthat are … The part that goes (singing), so I’m playing the bass line and I’m playing the melody and then the piano part in two different [crosstalk 00:32:59] … Well, for some reason that’s difficult for me. Soalmost always when I practice that piece, I will stop because I know it’s … If I don’t get it when I’m playing it, if I don’t nail it, I’ll stop and I’ll go … over and over again, practice the mistake out, and then I’ll move on. And then another part I go, (singing). That part I have to play a bass line and then I go … that’sthe melody, and the piano’s going … I’m doing with false harmonics.
Mike Rayburn:
So those are all going at the same time and I mess that up sometimes, so I’ll go over and over and over again, and that’s the idea, is what Anders Ericsson identified is that people … studying virtuoso piano players. These are all on that world class level, but who are the ones who were the better of the world class, right? He found that the ones who practiced the piece all the way through and maybe made a mistake and they might have remembered to go back and fix it and they might not, were not as good asthe ones who practiced and when they made a mistake, stopped and practiced it out, played it over.
Mike Rayburn:
I heard Phil Keaggy, if you know who he is, is a guitarist … Phil Keaggy’s one of the greatest … Jimi Hendrix was asked one time, “What’s it feel like to be the greatest guitarist in the world?” And he said, “Idon’t know, ask Phil Keaggy.” Phil Keaggy is a monster. He’s a Christian guitarist, and I got him to playtwo songs on my last album. It’s scary how good he is and how first take he is. [crosstalk 00:34:48]
Gerald J. Leonard:
Because he’s the one that you interviewed for that mastery?
Mike Rayburn:
Master’s, yeah …
Gerald J. Leonard:
It was like a master’s program, video that you created.
Mike Rayburn:
[crosstalk 00:34:58] Yeah, the masters talk about master … Whatever. I forget [crosstalk 00:35:03]-
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah, yeah, something like that.
Mike Rayburn:
It’s my own DVD and I forgot the name of it. Anyway, but I interviewed him about that, about what he does and how he practices and things like that, and he’ll say that when he gets something that doesn’twork, he’ll … In fact he’ll do it … Those of us who play wound strings know the sound of your fingers across a bass string or a guitar string. He’ll practice till you don’t hear that, which is crazy, because I’m notthat good. But anyway-
Donald Robinson:
That’s amazing.
Mike Rayburn:
The key there is deliberate practice and that’s what … So deliberate practice is focusing on the things thatyou didn’t do well and working on them. For my speech I’ll give a last one example. For my What If keynote presentation there’s a woman named Chris Young. She loves my telling this story. She booked mein Minneapolis to perform for what was at the time ING corporation [inaudible 00:36:00]. Financial services is one of my big [crosstalk 00:36:04] that I present for them, and I did … Oh, it was a killer show.You guys know the feeling, where everything you do works and then they had me do an encore, and whenI was done I sold every piece of product that I brought to sell off the stage in the back and I am a rockstar.
Mike Rayburn:
And I go to sit down and this is … I don’t drink anymore but I was going to have a glass of wine with Chris afterwards and just get my due accolades. And I sat down with Chris and she said, I’m going to quote exactly, she said, “Mike, that was good. Would you like to know how you can be great?”
Gerald J. Leonard:
Wow.
Mike Rayburn:
I was like [crosstalk 00:36:42] … They just stood up for me. What she did was I said, “Yes?” And she said, “Your bike trip story.” I did the first ever cross country concert tour on bicycle back in the year 2000.Again, things that nobody’s done. So I rode a bike across the country and did 31 concerts along the way.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Wow.
Mike Rayburn:
Literally rode the whole way. So I tell the story of that, and the way I was telling the story, it was slow. It wasn’t working. It wasn’t as good as the rest of the show, and she told me that, and as soon as she said it, I knew she was right. I was like, “You’re right.” And audiences, on one hand, will forgive that especially ifthe rest of the show is really strong. They’ll forgive that and they’ll move on with it, but if you want tomove forward, you need to identify that and move forward. You know that people who hear you play and they’ll go, “Gosh, that’s awesome,” but you hear some of the mistakes you made and they didn’t hear the more they excused them or their minds just kind of went past them, but you as a musician know if you putthat on recording and you listen back to it, you’d hear that mistake and other musicians would hear it.
Mike Rayburn:
In which case it doesn’t mean you’re bad, it just means that’s your next step, is to [crosstalk 00:38:04]. Soif we want to get better, we need to identify those. I’m going to write a … My next What If? Weekly is going to be about this, or one of them coming up. What is it that makes you good but keeps you from being great? [inaudible 00:38:21]
Gerald J. Leonard:
That’s a good question.
Mike Rayburn:
[crosstalk 00:38:22]
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah, that’s a good question.
Mike Rayburn:
[crosstalk 00:38:24] because if I have a comedy show that’s good, if I want to get better, I’ve got to drop something that’s already working in hopes I can make something that works better. [crosstalk 00:38:35]
Gerald J. Leonard:
But that also means you’ve got to … It also means [crosstalk 00:38:36]-
Mike Rayburn:
When you know it’s working, you drop it and you move to something else.
Donald Robinson:
Exactly, yeah.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah, and it also means that you have to remember humble throughout this whole process and be open togetting feedback and listening to others and allowing people to throw cold water in your face but look forthe gold inside of the bucket that they throw the water from, you know what I mean?
Mike Rayburn:
Which Gerald, and I will say that’s something I always admired about you because you showed up … Like for the What If? Weekend, you showed up … I mean, you’re good. You’re great. I mean, I’m kind of going,”Why is he here?” You were there to learn.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Exactly.
Mike Rayburn:
My friend Dave Gordon showed up a long time ago when I presented for the National Speakers Association of Ohio and Dave Gordon is a long time established speaker. Everybody looks up to him, andhe showed up and he was in the front row of my presentation hearing me talk about speaking and Ithought, “What in the world is he doing here? What in the world could he learn from me?” And the factis, we can learn from … I mean, I remember one time … I used to do this medley thing at the end, and Iwas doing … part of the medley was Aerosmith’s Dream On, and that little … you know, the famous riff from it.
Mike Rayburn:
I finished the show and I was getting people telling me how great and all this stuff, and this kid had been playing guitar for maybe four or five years came up and said, “How did you do that Aerosmith thing?” I was ready to show him and everything, and he was like, “Wow, because I do it differently.” I’m open. I said, “Show me how you do it.” And he played it and he played it right, and I heard it and I went, “Thank you. I just learned something. Do what you’re doing because I’m going to as well.” [crosstalk 00:40:22]and I was wrong, and I learned. So you named it. The word there is humble. If you’re not humble, man,you’re not going to get anywhere.
Donald Robinson:
Yeah. As an artist, we have to be able to take constructive criticism, and I think a lot of people, the egos get all the way up here and, “What do you mean? These people loved me.” Just like you said, some people would have just brushed her off, but being able to, “Yeah, you’re right,” really being authentic withwhere you are and what you need to work on. That’s one other thing I appreciated with [inaudible 00:40:55] Watson and Junior. When we would do soundchecks … I mean, we just rehearsed all week before we went out on the road, and we would do these sound checks and he would go through the whole set and just play it like …
Mike Rayburn:
Who?
Donald Robinson:
[inaudible 00:41:06] Watson and Junior.
Mike Rayburn:
Oh yeah, yeah. Wow, yeah.
Donald Robinson:
So I was the music director for him for years, and I learned so much just by exactly all the things you’resaying. He would go through songs over and over and over. He’d get that part just right and I was just amazed because it’s a sound check, nobody’s here, and he would play it like there was a full audience. So,that consistency. I mean, the little by little principle, as you talked about. Practicing is so important [inaudible 00:41:39] that’s who he is. The mindset, all of that is so important. I’m learning a lot myself just listening to [crosstalk 00:41:47].
Mike Rayburn:
Well, and I’m interested to know how what I’m saying … Does it align with what you think, Donald? [crosstalk 00:41:56] but I don’t know you as well, Donald, so [crosstalk 00:41:59]-
Donald Robinson:
100%. It aligns 100%, the principles, and how … As you’re talking about, I’m thinking about different players that I … You know, being a keyboard player and being sidemen for a lot of jazz players, I just kindof [inaudible 00:42:15] and Kirk Whalum who played with Whitney Houston and played all those amazing solos that you hear. He was another one. He would come and he would just practice running upand down scales for an hour before the show. Everybody’s looking like … We’re waiting for him to playthis incredible sax lines and he’s pulling out a classical book, and we’re thinking, “Okay, but he’s notplaying like that on the record.” He’s just playing scales, but that’s what it was. That’s what he needed to do, really get that perfection and understand, “This is what I need to do to play the way that I play.”
Donald Robinson:
So it helped me by observing people like that to know that, okay, even in college, going past the piano room and hearing these virtuoso piano players who, for hours and hours, I would walk to lunch andthey’re still playing the major scales up and down the piano. Same thing, consistency, repetition.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Right. Yeah, it really is about mastering. Mastering your instrument, mastering the mindset and just thinking about mastery, we’re going to kind of land this thing because we’ve been going for a little whileand I won’t take up too much of your time, Mike and Donald, but Mike, you do something with a mastermind group. Do you want to share a little bit about that?
Mike Rayburn:
I do a few things. There’s sort of different grades of it, but I have something called the Gold Mine Zooms,which I know you were a part of it [inaudible 00:43:48] part of. Gold Mine Zooms are where, again, to create consistency, a monthly call with me and about five or six others. Like minded achiever people whoI created this because I do care. I do want people to do well, and so I thought we could do a monthly calland … I mean there’s a fee but it’s actually … It ends up being like … If you end up doing it every time forthe year, it’s like 20 bucks a time or something like that. It’s really pretty cheap. And what you get is youget a chance to … The idea is to achieve your goal within a year, whatever the goal is. I mean, obviously it depends on what the goal is, and it’s up to you.
Mike Rayburn:
It’s ultimately up to you, but what we do is we offer a chance to share, have you done the things that you planned to for the past month? What’s holding you back? How can I help with what’s in your way? Areyou not having enough time? Are you getting distractions? Limiting mindsets? Limiting beliefs? Do younot have enough money? Whatever it is. And then any other questions that you have. And so it’s what Iwould call kind accountability. We all need accountability but we don’t want any accountability wherewe’re all like, “You didn’t do what you were supposed to.” You know, that mean kind of thing. No, this iskind accountability. It’s uplifting accountability for you each month, and then you have access to me via email any time you want, because what if you have a question two weeks after the meeting? Well, email me. I’ll answer you.
Mike Rayburn:
So, I have that. And then I have … I’m working my way up. I have something that’s going to be happening called the Virtuoso Mastermind where we focus on things like … I mean, they’re really the intricacies of …It all comes down to … All the things we’ve talked about today are consistency, but we’re fleshing thoseout, really getting to what practices? What are your practices? If you do your practices every day, you’ll achieve your goal without even know what your goal is if you do those practices. But the idea is tobecome world class you have to embrace the law of diminishing returns, and that’s what I call it.
Mike Rayburn:
The fact is, as you get better, it takes more to achieve less. So, in other words, Gerald, where you are with your plan, and Donald, you as well … I’m just saying I don’t know your playing but if you’re music director for Grover Washington, you’re freaking good. And if you work with Gerald, you’re freaking good, and so I know that, and I’m hearing you talk. I have no doubt, okay? So, for you to get better nowtakes a lot more work than back when you were trying to figure out how to do a minor seven chord, okay? A minor seven chord, you do that now without thinking about it. You can do inversions of it. You can doit however you want to. You can do tritone substitutions of it and whatever.
Mike Rayburn:
But, to get better, to really move forward on that, to really get to the intricacies of what’s good, it takes you a lot more practice. I kind of look at it like stereo speakers, like the speakers in your … audio speakersin your studio. The difference in a $500 set of speakers and a $1,000 set of speakers is a hell of a lotgreater than the difference in a $1,000 set of speakers and a $2,000 dollar set of … It costs you a lot morebut you don’t get that much better. And then to get from a $2,000 to a $4,000, it’s still not that much better but you have to spend that much more because there’s not that much more room. And so, what people at Juilliard are practicing or the people in those practice rooms that you’re talking about, like over and overand over again, it’s those little intricacies that make them that much better and it takes a whole lot morework to achieve a lot less.
Donald Robinson:
That’s true.
Mike Rayburn:
But when you embrace that, that’s when you become world class. When you’re willing to put in all that extra work for just … Jerry Seinfeld will work a year to try to take an 11 word joke down to eight words because it’s funnier in eight words than it is at 11, and it takes a year to do that. Now, to write the original joke didn’t take much at all, but to hone it down to that take a whole lot of work. So that’s what we do inthe virtual mastermind, and that’s a by invitation, but if people are interested, I love to have them let me know they’re interested in it, and I’ll be launching that … It’s not launched yet, but I’m kind of putting that together.
Mike Rayburn:
Those are both just email me, [email protected] or go to mikerayburn.com for the Gold Mine Zooms. That’s very obvious on the bottom right of the page [crosstalk 00:48:35].
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah, we’ll put the web link of your website on the notes as well. Donald, did you have any other questions that you want to ask or anything else that you’d [crosstalk 00:48:44]-
Donald Robinson:
Oh man, I’m just absorbing all this. I’m enjoying it. Yeah.
Mike Rayburn:
You’re fine, man. You’re fine. [crosstalk 00:48:51]
Gerald J. Leonard:
Same here, same here. So Mike [crosstalk 00:48:54]-
Donald Robinson:
… question that-
Gerald J. Leonard:
Okay, go ahead.
Donald Robinson:
… I’m asking is that … You kind of touched on it a little bit, but-
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah, go ahead.
Donald Robinson:
… for the younger people that’s out here and who want to kind of get started into even some of the things that you’re doing, what advice would you give them?
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yep, that’s where I was going.
Mike Rayburn:
Okay, so people who are young and getting started, okay?
Donald Robinson:
Yeah.
Mike Rayburn:
Again, make sure it’s something you love and have a knack for. For instance I love cycling, I love endurance sports and I’m also flat footed, so that’s God’s way of saying, “Learn what you can from this butit ain’t your destiny.” So it keeps me in shape but I’m not going to be on the Tour de France. So somethingyou’re good at that you have a knack for. And then identify what you want to do and start practicing. Start learning. Also this is a kind of weird thing and I think you guys would agree with this, I know Gerald, emulate your heroes. Emulate your heroes.
Mike Rayburn:
I practice the solo on Hotel California all the time. I practice different artists’ stuff all the time, becausethe fact is I can’t do it. But what happens in the process of doing that is you end up with your own style.You end up [inaudible 00:50:20] because you listen to … On one hand I’m listening to … I grew up on Earth, Wind and Fire. I’m just a big Earth, Wind and Fire fan. And so I listen to the guitar players in there,I listen to the … The bass player’s a monster. Oh, and Bootsy Collins. I got him on my wall right here[crosstalk 00:50:43]. Bootsy’s over there, and Bootsy, oh …
Mike Rayburn:
So I listen to that stuff and try to emulate it, because I used to be a bass player too. I secretly follow you,Gerald, because I’m nobody’s [inaudible 00:50:52] a bass player today, but anyway, try to emulate, try to sound like and play like your heroes because you will get there, close, but you won’t get there. And what will happen in the process, because you listen to different people, a different combination of things that anyone else has listened to, you’ll develop your own style.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah.
Donald Robinson:
Awesome, awesome.
Gerald J. Leonard:
That’s great advice.
Donald Robinson:
[crosstalk 00:51:12]
Gerald J. Leonard:
Well folks, if you’ve been listening to this conversation, hopefully you can rewind it and listen to it again.There are so many gems and so many just great pieces of advice. Mike, thank you for your time and I know that-
Donald Robinson:
[crosstalk 00:51:28]
Mike Rayburn:
… awesome. You guys are fantastic, man. Thank you. Give me [crosstalk 00:51:31] I love it, you know?
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yeah, folks who are listening to this are going to enjoy it, and also that’s going to be uploaded eventually onto the Workplace Jazz YouTube channel. And again, thanks so much. If you want to learn more aboutMike, go to mikerayburn.com, and again Mike is a two-time TEDx, a multi Carnegie Hall performer anda hall of fame speaker. So Mike, thanks so much.
Donald Robinson:
Thank you, Mike.
Gerald J. Leonard:
I greatly appreciate it.
Donald Robinson:
Really appreciate you, man.
Gerald J. Leonard:
Yes.
Donald Robinson:
Thank you so much.
Mike Rayburn:
You guys are awesome, man.
Gerald J. Leonard:
You’ve been listening to Workplace Jazz with me, Gerald J. Leonard. How to Improvise. Thanks for listening.