Playing Jazz

Comparing Playing Jazz to programming is not a trivial comparison, and it may have interesting implications to ExtremeProgramming.

RichieBielak made a good point in SoftwareAgeism, that:

"I think part of the problem is that somehow people think of programming as a sort of a sport, where you need to be young to be great. I like to compare programming to PlayingJazz. In general jazz musicians get better with age, as they learn more of what is important.

Of course, often a young gun comes along who can play real well technically, but still his playing, although impressive at the time, has no lasting power.

In the long run it is the older guys - Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis - that really change the world.

I think the same is true of programmers."

Jazz has several themes similar to programming:

1. Jazz relies on improvisation within a strict framework.
2. Jazz relies on individual effort fully integrated with communication.
3. Refactoring occurs in real time during the course of several choruses.
4. The UserStory is something that can be written on a 3x5 card (the lead sheet).
5. Jazz has been considered ExtremeMusic?.
6. Jazz is t3h 1337

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I beg to differ: Armstrong, Ellington and Davis all had great success in their 20s and 30s. Armstrong with his hot 5s and 7s in the late 20s (when he was in his late 20s), Ellington hitting his first peak of popularity at the Cotton Club when he was around 30 years old, and Miles Davis, who achieved his first success in the mid to late 50s when he was around 30.

Whereas someone can be an amazing programmer at a young age, how many prodigies in any field really have a long-lasting, balanced and successful career? Especially considering that most prodigies are in the most 'programming-like' arts like Chess, Classical Music, and Jazz. You very seldom see a prodigy in 'fiction writing' or 'painting' because those skills are so contingent on 'life experience'.

Jazz, combined with the environment of booze and heroin, has some spectacularly destructive flame-outs (Charlie Parker, Bix Beiderbecke). But there are just as many jazz players still playing in their 80s. Unrelated question: Where do the burned-out programmers go? -- SeanOleary

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This seems like a very forced analogy. Also "improsation with a strict framework" isn't necessarily applicable to jazz or programming.

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See also JazzMusicMetaphor, SoftwareDevelopmentComparedToJazz

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