Can You Play A Musical Instrument To A Reasonable Degree ?

kedge said:
The Piano can be cumbersome and would need to be tuned at least a couple of times a year. If you have access to a modern computer you can get setup for about £225, 88 keys £136, The Grandeur Piano £89, KONTAKT 5 player is free. If you don't mind none weighted or semi-weigthted keys and adjusting the octave you can get a 49 or 61 midi key controller for under £100 and often comes with free software entry level DAW and even a piano virtual instrument.
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Exactly. They definitely make keyboards as long as pianos, don't believe the teacher!


I play bass guitar and can play the (normal) guitar well enough. I sing too. I'm in two bands at the moment, which is awesome.
 
Completely untalented when it comes to music, cant play to save myself, which is heartbreaking considering how much music means to me, believe me I have tryed over the years, various different instruments, guitars, drums etc. I just don't have it.
So these days I resigned myself to playing and mixing other people's music to scratch the musical itch. I don't consider myself a Dj or anything, I just enjoy playing about with other people's creations in my own time to myself.
 
i bought a guitar when i was 15 and sold it a month later because i had no patience!
took me 10 years to buy another one and actually learn
very glad i did. i've never done anything more than sing in my room but it's just nice being able to play
 
Played trumpet since I was 8 when I was in a marching band back in the 80's. Took about 5 years off when my lad came along in the late 90s but have been playing since. In a couple of gigging bands in the Bristol area and gig on average once a month which is fine with me. No idea what level I am against the grades system although my sight reading is pretty rubbish. Actually thinking about playing more but not decided yet on if it will be something like dance band/ wind band/ another gigging band (which is the only one that pays you!)
 
steve45 said:
Completely untalented when it comes to music, cant play to save myself, which is heartbreaking considering how much music means to me, believe me I have tryed over the years, various different instruments, guitars, drums etc. I just don't have it.
So these days I resigned myself to playing and mixing other people's music to scratch the musical itch. I don't consider myself a Dj or anything, I just enjoy playing about with other people's creations in my own time to myself.
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Why don't you look into Novation Launchpad and Ableton Live? It's not strictly an instrument but you could have a lot of fun with that sort of setup... I've been tempted to get one myself for some fun.

eg:


Also this looks good: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=la-hW3GDe8Y
 
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Played guitar in bands since I was a teenager and been learning piano for the last 5 years which has pretty much become my main instrument now. Have dabbled with bass, clarinet, cello and the blues harp.

I'm on my second digital as I upgraded to a Yamaha CLP685 which I love. I will get an acoustic one day but my practice time tends to be before work so headphones essential!

Just moved to a new house so home studio to go in the spare room when I get 5mins....
 
I have played both the Piano and the Guitar. I wasn't bad (or great) at either one but I just found the theory bit on both to be very boring to me, although I did understand why knowing theory is important.

I think in the long run I "got" the Piano more, the keys and positions made more sense to me, the guitar where you skip between strings is a little more difficult for me to wrap my head around, and all the drop tuning you can do.

I'm looking at selling my guitar as it's sat unused for so long, I don't own a keyboard but in the future maybe I would buy a digital one for messing around on.

In general I also struggle with consistency. My brain knows what it wants my hands to do, but they can't always do it right. I would never want to play anything in front of an audience for this reason.
 
Used to dabble with guitar. Always enjoyed piano music so would be nice to be able to play some. Tiny hands though, which makes me somewhat discouraged as having big hands is apparently quite a large advantage in both guitar and piano (used to find guitar quite difficult for this reason).
 
TacticalFish said:
Used to dabble with guitar. Always enjoyed piano music so would be nice to be able to play some. Tiny hands though, which makes me somewhat discouraged as having big hands is apparently quite a large advantage in both guitar and piano (used to find guitar quite difficult for this reason).
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Plenty of great music that's easily playable with smaller hands, and even then, for the other stuff you can usually "cheat" by missing out or redistributing notes between the hands. Pedal can cover up a lot as well where you can't reach - a good teacher will help you overcome that sort of limitation. :)
 
CircleFaust said:
i bought a guitar when i was 15 and sold it a month later because i had no patience!
took me 10 years to buy another one and actually learn
very glad i did. i've never done anything more than sing in my room but it's just nice being able to play
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Yeah I love that. I'm not the best guitarist, but it feels great just to play a song and sing along. When you play bass, you never really get that feeling.

@Narj, the size of your hands really doesn't matter. I'm a competent bassist and I have distinctly average hands. I've never understood why big hands are needed. It's all about dexterity.
 
Drums, well enough to have been a studio drummer in London, and playing in paid bands with bookings regular enough that I bought a motorcycle with the proceeds.

Then again, I had a very good teacher...
 
TacticalFish said:
Used to dabble with guitar. Always enjoyed piano music so would be nice to be able to play some. Tiny hands though, which makes me somewhat discouraged as having big hands is apparently quite a large advantage in both guitar and piano (used to find guitar quite difficult for this reason).
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Don't let your tiny hands discourage you. There are 5 year olds out there banging out Chopin Etudes...
 
Narj said:
Plenty of great music that's easily playable with smaller hands, and even then, for the other stuff you can usually "cheat" by missing out or redistributing notes between the hands. Pedal can cover up a lot as well where you can't reach - a good teacher will help you overcome that sort of limitation. :)
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:p Good to know, I've been half halfheartedly keeping an eye on 2nd hand sites for a good keyboard, I should have more spare time soon, so perhaps now's the time to take the plunge!

McGray said:
Don't let your tiny hands discourage you. There are 5 year olds out there banging out Chopin Etudes...
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Haha, thanks man. You're absolutely right. And hey, Donald never let it hold him back!
 
McGray said:
Don't let your tiny hands discourage you. .
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Indeed, the only guitar chords you need a big stretch for ain't much used in rawk n roll, or get a 3/4 sized axe like John Lennon's
Rickenbacker.

Jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt had two damaged fingers on his left hand after being badly burnt in a fire but developed
a new way to play the guitar, as did Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi after losing a finger in a work accident.
 
Guitar here, been playing since I was about 14 (31 now) but never had any formal lessons save for about 1 month of lessons at school when I very first started (they were classical guitar lessons and I just didn't really enjoy them)... As a result I would say I'm pretty good but certainly nowhere near as good as someone with 15+ years of experience who wasn't self-taught. I've also dabbled in various other instruments over the years (mostly when living with someone else who happened to have them) so drums, keys, etc. and my wife plays bass so I have picked that up too...
 
Played French Horn from 7 until ~18, (well I played until I went to university but went back and helped my school wind band a few times after that). Was reasonably good at it (Grade 7, although could play the Grade 8 pieces just didn't have time to do the exam) helped by the school frequently not being able to find the French Horn music so having to transpose on the fly a lot of the time from either the Eb horn or saxophone parts. Played at the school, town and county levels which meant a few international concert tours, (which also technically means I can claim to be an international soloist :)). School and town levels I enjoyed ... county level I wish I had never agreed to audition for as I hated every minute of it.

Play the piano a little (enough to survive GCSE music) and still have a full size Technics digital one although I don't play it much. I do wish I was able to play it better.
 
If you can class OctaMED and pro tracker as a musical instrument then yes. Otherwise am fluffy fingered when comes to actual instruments. :p
 
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