A Message from Chick Corea
Chick Corea, legendary jazz composer and pianist, has been nominated for 31 Grammys and is an 11-time Grammy winner. Corea�s rendition of Bud Powell�s music was produced in an album entitled �Remembering Bud Powell.�

An artist usually spends the whole first part of his life just developing his art form. Practicing, applying, apprenticing, delving into uncharted areas, learning by whatever method or methods he can. There�s no pay for this dedicated work. This is his investment into future dreams.

Successful artists have a quality of persistence that ignores setbacks, downfalls and difficulties with basic survival, like food and shelter�they just keep going toward their original creative goal. They keep true to the kind of effect they want to create with their art�they just keep going, no matter what.

The artist must reach people with his art, no matter how hard the existing environment works against him. He must learn to keep his integrity whole, yet at the same time make sufficient money to keep the rent paid. Quite a trick.

It�s far from an easy path to follow, as any successful artist will tell you. In this, a very few stand out from the crowd and create a legacy of powerful and uniquely creative work which rightfully earns them the title of genius.

More often than not, however, a heavy price is being exacted for such artistic success�a price that has nothing to do with art, and everything to do with the deliberate manipulation and destruction of artists across all mediums. Bud Powell, an innovative genius in my field, is one who tragically paid this price.

I write briefly here, not of his formidable artistic gifts, which I have acknowledged elsewhere, but of the unnecessary and brutal psychiatric treatments, which increasingly threatened his most creative years, and finally extinguished the essence of his creativity.

The true story about the pain, the confusion, and the crushed artistic dreams that psychiatry (and its cousins psychology and psychoanalysis) have brought to the artistic community is one that must be told and recognized. Having no understanding of life or art, they cannot cure or truly help, and are extremely dangerous to your artistic health and growth. Seeking their brand of �help� to better deal with the inevitable pressures and stresses of being an artist, will only further confuse, weaken, and ultimately destroy your creativity.

I sincerely offer this advice to anyone who is in some way artistically active, and who is concerned for his or her own better success or survival.

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