Lisa Mezzacappa: #FiftyQuestions
What one sentence do you hope describes how your art practice will be recorded in history, and why?
Her music was honest, original, and made with care.
Can you recall your first memory of bliss in self-expression?
When I was a kid, in middle school and into high school, I played in rock bands with my closest friends – we wrote music together, jammed, learned songs from records, rehearsed for hours and hours. We spent every spare minute making music together. I think everything I do as a composer and performer now was seeded by those early lessons in collaboration and the joy of playing music with other people.
Who has been your greatest mentor, living or dead, real or imaginary?
When I went to college, I thought I would be a biologist and had no plans to pursue music as a profession or career. It had always been my passion, but I had other ideas. But almost immediately, I met the jazz faculty in the music department where I was enrolled – the jazz ensemble/improvisation teacher John D’earth and the bass instructor Peter Spaar – and they flooded me with so much support and encouragement and guidance that all of my practical life plans were derailed, and I was swept up into the world of being a professional musician. I owe those guys the world.
Which would you prefer: to be a rogue artistic outsider or to fit within a community of similarly minded creators?
My artistic community in the San Francisco Bay Area sustains me, and I cannot imagine practicing art in creative isolation. Being engaged in my community provides a respite from the self-centered mindset that can plague a person as an artist. It is a huge relief and gift to be able help and support others, rather than always worrying about your own work or your own career. Being part of something bigger than my own artistic practice is comforting and energizing.
Describe the greatest gift someone has given to you that invigorated your artistic expression?
Collaboration is a wonderful gift when the process is honest and respectful and generous. I have been blessed to work with musician collaborators but also collaborators in other fields–film and video, visual art, literature, dance–and have grown so much as a person and as an artist from those experiences. I have found that in fertile collaborations, my best audience member is my co-creator, and the thrill of making work and having it received by and activated by and transformed by them is so rewarding and inspiring.