Making It

 MY SISTER AND I grew up in a musical family, on my father's side. He was a decent amateur keyboard man, my grandmother had a beautiful voice, so I hear. Sister and I both played in the high school band, she the flute, I the trumpet. she was three years older and much better than I. She pursued music as a career, playing in the army band after earning a degree in music. She still plays today, in retirement, with several local bands and orchestras.We both sing well, both in gospel groups. I gave up the trumpet after ninth grade, interested in other things;sports, girls,anything but school. Notwithstanding her ostensibly superior musical ability to mine, I firmly believe than my natural talent in music is as great as hers, but that I never fully developed it. The question of talent, who has it, who has it not, and why a select few artists of various sorts achieve tremendous success while others of equal ability do not is the subject of a fascinating new study by Harvard law professor Cass Sunstein, in a monograph titled "How To Become Famous: Lost Einsteins, Forgotten Superstars, and How the Beatles Came To Be" He focuses on the Beatles, What if they had never existed, but some bloke on the streets of London, busking for pennies, started performing the entire Beatles songbook as an anonymous nobody? Would he and the songs become famous as the Beatles? Maybe, not. Sunstein argues that natural ability is indeed a seminal factor in achieving widespread artistic success and fame, but that talent alone is simply not enough. Fame and success, in almost any area, business, the arts, athletics, derives form a perfect storm of coinciding circumstances. Of great importance are a champion of your cause, a benefactor, a promoter, and a network of supporting friends and helpers. A "cascade of enthusiasm",  as he calls it, to get the ball rolling, to establish the necessary momentum for success. Taylor Swift is beautiful, talented, a gifted song writer, with a good singing voice. So are many other people, who never "made it" in terms of commercial success. A contemporary of Bob Dylan was a highly talented singer song writer named Connie Converse, whom, when rarely heard, obviously possessed he necessary talent to become a celebrated star, only she didn't. Persistence plays a part, perhaps the most important part. Dylan gigged himself half to death in Greenwich village in the early sixties, Connie Converse did not.Elvis was driving a truck in Tupelo until he got connected with Sam Phillips at Sun Records in Memphis. Sure, he was handsome, had a great voice, charm, all that.  Even became a decent actor when cast in the right roles, aka fluff romance movies, (He always thought he was qualified for more serious work). He played acoustic passably well, but no better than your average local guitar player.  Also, he never wrote a song in his life. Elvis Presley was far from a "self made man. For every Einstein there are undiscovered Einsteins, working in factories, Ditto Taylor Swift, Elvis, even the vaunted much celebrated immortal Beatles. Einstein once famously said: "I have no special talent. I am merely extremely curious". Perhaps we should take him at his word.