I completely understand what he means by this.I sat tiredly for years in the MDF stalls of lecture theatres doing my best not to put too much effort into getting my History of Art degree. Elderly professors with dishevelled wispy white hair and poorly hidden hip flasks showed us the traditionalism of the Old Masters, the sheer weirdness of Mannerism, the bounding innovations of the Early Renaissance. Younger, hipper, lecturing PHD students with glasses without any lenses in them told us about the clarity of Conceptualism, the ambition of the Constructivists, and pomposity of Post-post Modernism. The fact is, for me, skateboarding is better, more attractive, more packed with profundity than all of it put together. No piece of art I’ve ever seen moves me as much as seeing Ishod Wair effortlessly navigate the street furniture of Philadelphia, or watching Austyn Gillette float through the concrete banality of LA.
I think beauty is the thing that so many people miss in "silly" hobbies. Not that G.K. Chesterton is exactly my favourite person to quote, but "A man must love a thing very much if he practices it without any hope of fame or money, but even practice it without any hope of doing it well." I have so much respect for the older amateurs whom I've met over the course of playing and teaching. Those folks are the ones who keep the real spirit and purpose of music alive - To create beauty, and for that beauty to be enjoyed by others.