Who here plays a musical instrument?

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I'm just curious how many among the forum attendees play a musical instrument. My own education never included playing music. I am aiming to mend that hole now, in middle life.

With my stubby hands, any fretted instrument would be out of the question, and I have no interest in brass or woodwinds. Percussion seems too crass and limited. Besides, I like melody. So, for some unknown (and ungodly) reason, I find myself drawn to the concertina - a sort of shrunken (but pretty) cousin of the accordian. It seems simple enough that, with constant practise, I might get somewhere - and it would sound at least as good as a harmonica... right?

- What instrument(s) do you play now and how come you chose it?

- If you don't play, what instrument would you like to learn, if you were ready to pick one up?

-- Miserable SOB (misery@misery.com), February 12, 2001

Answers

OK hn hn

I like to put beans and rice in a coffe can and shake it all about

I do the hookey pokey and I turn myself about

oh yeah

that's what I'm talking about

music!

-- surfin' Sam (surfin'@the.net), February 12, 2001.


I love to play the skin flute.

-- Monica (good@at.blowing), February 12, 2001.

surfin' Sam, you remind me of someone I once knew. She was from around these parts. She'd've been good at the hokey pokey, I'm guessing. You got any cousins?

-- Miserable SOB (misery@misery.net), February 12, 2001.

I started to write a sarcastic reply about playing the radio, here's an honest answer, I like plinking away at the piano. I took some lessons as a kid and hated them. Too sissy! That was before Elton John and Billy Joel were big. Today I wish I had taken them more seriously. I bought a spinet from a neighbor who was moving and didn't want to haul it across the country. Not a bad deal for $600 and all her music. She had a lot of EZ stuff. I taught myself several songs. No way do I play in public, this is just for me. I think you should try to play whatever instrument you want, even if you're not good at it. Music allows me to say things that I can't always put into words.

-- (Weeble@Wee.ble), February 12, 2001.

Something that doesn't need tuning as I'm almost tone deaf !

-- Chris (enquiries@griffenmill.com), February 12, 2001.


Chris, I know what you mean. A foolproof instrument for you might be an electric organ. No kidding. Press a key and out comes the same note every time. Then all you have to do is hit the right keys in the right order and you're home free!

A concertina is a bit like that: press the right buttons and get the bellows moving in the right direction (at most there are two choices: push and pull) and you're going to get the expected note. With some concertinas the push-pull doesn't matter at all, but there are more buttons to keep straight. To tune one you'd have to tear it apart drastically or send it to a repair shop and let them tear it apart. They were popular on ships, and sea damp wrecks most instruments.

Hint: If you are tone deaf, avoid playing bagpipes.

-- Miserable SOB (misery@misery.com), February 12, 2001.


I played violin as a child. Boy do I miss it. I really should take it back up. Thanks for reminding me. =)

-- (cin@cin.cin), February 12, 2001.

Cin, over the weekend I met a couple friends of my brother. The one owns a violin shop. The week before they had worked on some minor restoration of a Strad. I figured it was worth a couple hundred thousand dollars. They laughed. Turns out the Strad was valued at several million dollars.

-- Rich (howe9@shentel.net), February 12, 2001.

Just my $0.02 worth.

I think that with any kind of music, whether playing a jews harp or a violin, singing opera or howling along with the radio in the privacy of your car, the real point is not viruosity, but making a joyful noise. We do way too little of it.

I sympathize with you, cin. Making the time for music is hard - don't make it any harder by worrying about making it concert quality. My kid loves my singing, even though my wife cringes a bit. Although I hate to offend my wife's ears, I go with my kid's judgement.

-- Miserable SOB (misery@misery.com), February 12, 2001.


My grandfather, who played both violin and piano, once said he much preferred the latter because it was like having an orchestra at your fingertips. I also play the piano, and recall deriving considerable pleasure from it very soon after I took it up.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), February 13, 2001.


I took piano lessons as a kid because my sister, brother and father played. They thought my hand-eye coordination would make me a natural. Uh, uh. I tried telling them that they needed to incorporate a ball of some kind and move the piano outside if I was to take an interest [grin]. My suggestion failed to make its mark, and so I withdrew my cooperation. The lessons stopped soon after.

A couple years ago a friend gave me a beaten down, duct tape covered harmonium. It's a keyboard instrument whose design uses a built-in hand-operated bellows to push air through reeds. It is used by some on my spiritual path to play devotional songs. I fell in love with it and last year acquired a brandy new one. Many of the songs are easy to play, as is the instrument itself.

-- Rich (howe9@shentel.net), February 13, 2001.


Rich, I looked up harmonium on the web and instantly recognized what it is. My wife and I have held season tickets for many years to a series of classical Indian music concerts. Not only is the music fantastic, but the tickets are a shameful bargain; if we attend every concert through the yearlong series it works out to about $4 per person per concert to hear truly world-class musicians live on stage!

Anyway, I have often seen and heard the harmonium in action. I can see why you would enjoy yours. It looks like a little organ, somewhat bigger than a bread box.

-- Miserable SOB (misery@misery.com), February 13, 2001.


I'm envious, M-SOB! That concert series cost actually fits even my microscopic budget.

The harmonium I have now is about 36" wide x 15" high x 15" deep or so. Quite a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. And a real bargain to boot. The first one I had was a small travel model. It bit the dust a few months after I received it, but it gave me a taste and I'm hooked.

-- Rich (howe9@shentel.net), February 13, 2001.


Well Im deaf, It that alright with you? well Im much music When I 11 to 13 I can't remember I took lesson of cornet so it too hard for me. So Im continue to play clarinet anfd trombone and French Horn I sell all three sell so Im want to play Bassoon Because bassoon is a woodwind instrument and deep lower of woodwind family from High than D and lower than C So I still love the music and would love touch the Bassoon too

-- martyn booth (ducati52@hotmail.com), September 23, 2001.

Oh, yeah! I highly recommend an instrument! Any instrument. I play the guitar, myself. And I have fairly small hands too. There was no small amount of pain to it, initially, cuz I was into Segovia, James Taylor, Clapton, and such as well as Santana and Led Zeppelin, etc, right from rhe start (I'm really datin' myself here). But it was well worth it. It does something for your soul. Since I have no voice my favorite artists also do not. Think Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson, etc..., so I can pass that off. Whenever I see people looking all long in the face I bust right into Subterranean Homesick Blues at full volume and with full body effects, with all my heart and soul in it, and people just start grinnin'. Everybody loves a fool. Try it, you can't go wrong...

I'm trying the violin, but with the guitar you stretch the strings parallel to the frets, with a violin you stretch or rock them perpendicular to the spot (fret), and I'm finding old habits die hard. I wind up in a brain-finger coordination lock and my finger tips want to go in circles, which doesn't make it pretty...we'll iron this out, tho. I think the important thing is just to do it because you want to...it's calling you.

-- Zzzzz (asleep@the.wheel), September 23, 2001.



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