A recipe is a clear set of instructions. It shows a process. It contains the necessary ingredients. It doesn’t leave out important information.
It can tell a story. It can share an experience. It can create a sense of trust with the reader.
A recipe can, and should be a trusted source of information that can be relied upon and also built upon. It’s clarity and consistent results will allow for creative extrapolation and risk taking.
But the recipe is not responsible for these creative variations. It showed you the way. It gave you confidence to explore. These new discoveries are on you, both great and grim.
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Music might be analogous. The song is repertoire, not a cheat code. What I do in my 64-bar solo in “Ornithology” is not Charlie Parker’s fault. If I pull focus from the song, it shows that I didn’t go deep enough into the repertoire. More work is in order!
Thanks for the blog! I’ve been reading for years.