I'm not sure that nobody gives a crap about degrees. One can surely get along without one, but if you want to teach somewhere for instance, having a degree can help. Or if you want to teach privately it can justify charging higher fees.
Obviously, that's true about teaching at a school, but the highest paid teachers in my area are the professional drummers who play out a lot, and have lots of teaching experience...not the guys with degrees.
Also, I don't really agree about talent being the most important thing. It is very important of course, but these days you especially need guts and a certain sense of business affairs. Only being talented is not enough.
Talent is the most important thing. Period. Now, I agree that talent alone won't get you where you need to be to make it professionally. God knows there are more talented drummers than me who haven't made a career out of drumming like I have. Business skills are HUGE, as are guts. Attitude is also extremely important, as I have spoken about at great length in my posts in theads about auditions. However, if you have all the business savvy in the world, and all the guts of the entire Marine Corps combined, and are cooler than an ice cube, you still won't be able to make a living as a professional musician if you don't have the talent level to do it. Most people who make a living as a musician don't manage to do it by being in just one band. I actually did a study on this once, and while I forget the exact percentage of pro musicians who do, it's in the single digits. Most of us who make our livings this way do it by being in multiple groups, and also doing a lot of pick-up gigs, theatre work, teaching, studio gigs, etc. All of those gigs are landed through word-of-mouth, and the reputation that you establish by playing well with other people.
All in all, BatMat, only you can make the choice out of what you want to do with this, but those lessons will give you some very interesting and most probably helpful knowledge as a musician.
All the best,
C.J.
I agree that studying this stuff is extremely important. I have spent years on theory, taken courses, etc. However, with that said, if someone spends so much time studying music that they are unable to practice their primary instrument, and are hoping to make it as a performing musician (as opposed to making their main living off of teaching, etc), they are hurting themselves. You have to practice, and get as good as you can be, to make it as a pro. If someone said they wanted to be a welder, you wouldn't suggest that they step away from welding for four years to study how flames work. The most important thing that a drummer can do to make it as a professional is to play the drums.