Last night at our local session I was getting a pint at the bar, when a fairly inebriated punter came up to me and asked if he could pick up my fiddle. Not play, mind you, just pick it up.
"Its been a long time," he says, wistfully.
I took a deep breath and told him he could, until my perfect Guinness was ready, so he picked it up, looked at it for a second, then put it down again.
"Its been a long time," he repeated.
"You should start playing again," I suggested.
"Its a lot of fun, really."
"No," he said, "it ruined my childhood," and shaking his head, he walked away.
So my question is, has anyone had bad musical experiences as a child that discouraged them from playing later on in life?
I used to hate piano lessons, but that didn't stop me from playing other instruments, when I got old enough to be exposed to other kinds of music.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I played recorder when I was little, and enjoyed it, and got rather good at it despite being one of those kids who was in and out of hospitals all the time with respiratory illnesses. When I was eight, my recorder teacher moved away, and my mother declared it was time for me to learn a new instrument. She asked me what I wanted to play.
"I want to play the violin," I told her.
"That's too hard," my mother said. "You'll learn to play the piano."
I took piano lessons for the next eight or nine years, and I became a competent, if not terribly skilled or enthusiastic, piano player. Then I left home for school, and didn't touch another instrument for a decade.
I took up the fiddle this past summer, and my childhood intuition that the fiddle was the instrument for me proved correct. No one has to frorce me to practice now.
Playing piano certainly didn't ruin my childhood, but playing an instrument I wasn't interested in playing did set me back two decades when it came to playing an instrument that I loved. But I'm quite grateful that I had some musical experience as a child: while I didn't become a very good piano player, I learned a lot about music that's helped me a lot on the fiddle. (When I approached my teacher for lessons, the first thing he asked me was whether I'd played a musical instrument before. "Piano, ages ago," I said, somewhat dismissively, because how relevant could it be that I'd spent years, a decade and more earlier, on an instrument that I'd never connected with? But he seemed to think that my piano experience counted, and he was right.)
Also, I oscillate between wishing I'd taken up the fiddle twenty years ago and being thankful that I waited: I was a competitive child who had to be the best at everything immediately, and I might have quit playing entirely, never to start again, when I figured out that I wasn't going to be an expert fiddler right away.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Never did music in school and i found out recently that the school i went to got rid of music . but im enjoying music now and sometimes get a bit embarrassed about how obsessed about it.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
you could say that if you are forced to practice or take up an instrument. you simply dont learn if your being forced to.
somtimes its is nessecary to give kids that little extra push.....
one thing to note..... do measure practice by time.... measure it by improvement.
its also important that you know how to practice properly. otherwise you can NEVER improve. this is often what makes ppl quit an instrument or even loathe it. if you are not improving youll never get to that stage where you enjoy playing.
for example, i can competantly play my saxophone. but struggle on organ. if i dont practice the organ and get good at it and will never enjoy it. making music is one of the best things i ever did.
ANYONE WHO IS CAPABLE OF READING AND WRITING IS CAPABLE OF LEARNING TO READ MUSIC AND PLAY AN INSTRUMENT. IT ALL WEARS DOWN TO BASIC MECHANICS INTHE END....
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
No. Quitting music in childhood did a bit.
After achieving what is euphemistically called "adulthood", I grew to appreciate things like spinach, garlic, black and white pud, opera and Real Music-trad of all kinds.
Unfortunately reestablishing the synapses (or creating the ones I never developed) has been much harder.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I never really got a chance to play an instrument when I was young, other than play the guitar. However, my teacher wasn't around long enough to make it stick.
Now, my sister had to take violin in school. She HATED it. Her teacher made her learn how to play right-handed, when she is left-handed. Also, it wasn't the instrument she wanted to play -- nor is it the style of music she wanted to play. So, she grew to hate the violin and classical. Now, she hate Celtic music and folk music because of the fiddle.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
No. Playing music enriched my childhood. However, my childhood obsession with music and little else led to me lacking confidence in other areas of life. I was very much a volunteer when it came to learning music! However, at about 10, when piano was still my only instrument I went off it big style because I really disliked my piano teacher. (She wasn't mean, just dreadfully boring.) Fortunately my parents let me stop my lessons with her and after a little break music really took off for me.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I never did music at school, or had lessons, but I was allways facinated by some of the "musical families" who opperated in our area. With a few scarce exceptions, all of them looked to me like they HATED it with a passion, and only did it because they were coerced into it.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Whenever I would start at a new school I would come early the first day with my fiddle, and play until school started. Lots of the other students that were musicians would come and listen, and then we would have something to talk about once school started. Since I am much more comfortable playing than I am speaking, I'd say that playing the fiddle helped my childhood social life.
Too bad I'm homeschooled now.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Didn't stick with the trumpet (my childhood instrument) but always had fun in band and such, in fact, liked it enough to use paper route money to pay for lessons the family couldn't afford. Don't play trumpet any more, and there have been periods in my life where I didn't play much, but I always listened, and music has always been a joy to me.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
McBriss,
Too bad you didn't get to ask him how fiddle lessons ruined his childhood...
I'll bet that coercion had everything to do with it!
Some children are delighted with the possibility of making their own music......
that excitment is a flame that should always be fanned, never to have water thrown on.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Not playing an instrument almost ruined my childhood. My brother tried to teach me to play the violin when I was 10 and he 12. It was disaaterous. A few years later when I was allowed to take music lessons my mother strictly prohibtted me from learning the violin. For many years I suffered fiddlephobia, till I joined a band.
When we first started out our musical director insisted that everyone in the band had to play a musical instrument and not just sing. And no tamborine! A week after declaring this she brought in a fiddle she bought years ago but couldn't learn to playdue to a childhood injury that left her thumb deformed and unable to hold the bow correctly. She brought the fiddle in to see if anyone could play or wanted to learn.
I just stared at it and rembered my fiddlephobia. Then I said to myself I need to get over it, so I took the fiddle. An arrangement was made that I would have the fiddle on loan, find a teacher and if I took to it make payment arrangements.
A few days later and ex co-worker stopped by work. Knowing she played fiddle ( second violin in a communityorchestra and Irish/Scottish in a duo) I asked if she knew any teachers. She said she was now teaching. After rehairing the bow and chaning the bridge our musical director decided to just give me the fiddle.
That was little over 2 years ago and I have not regretted it a bit. Sure I sounded like crap to begin with but with practice and better strings I've improved. I'm still not playing with the band yet (still get nervous playing infront and with people) but I'm working on it. I love playing the fiddle! I practice and play everyday!
I feel sorry for the man who wouldn't even touch your fiddle. He let himself not have the joy of overcoming a bad experince and replacing with a joyous one. Off to a fiddle lesson tonight!
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
it didn't ruin my childhood, but i kinda wish that the parent who chose an instrument for me and put me on lessons had stayed out of it........i wasn't meant to be a pianist, being a linear, one-thing-at-a-time sort who was meant to play a meloday instrument....
when i quit taking piano, my very serious classical teacher said, sadly....when you come back to it---and you WILL come back to it.......
but i don't think button accordion and concertina were quite what she had in mind when making that prediction! ha!
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I did 8 years fiddle at school, put it on the shelf when I left and have never touched it since.
It did no harm to my childhood but a lot of harm to my liver as I found out immediately I left school that if you played in the pub you got free beer. The novelty has not worn off 40 years later.
It is the musical education and exposure to music in general that makes all the difference in your early years, not what instrument you play. Neither is it ever too late to learn a new instrument.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
All the replies have indicated to me that childhood is not wasted on learning music. This, in my opinion is completely true. Time spent learning an instrument is time spent in the company of people who will become life long friends and also of adults who will respect you for being able to play an instrument or if you give up at least you will have had the oppertunity to meet these people and to share a few tunes with friends. Remember also that learning an instrument also increases accademic ability and relieves some of the pressures of school and college. Not such a waste of time after all. Me thinks your friend had forgotten all the wonderful benefits of learning music and had only concentrated on the negative.
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I took piano lessons when I was eight years old for two years. I had a TERRIBLE instructor. She was mean, horrible and scary so I didn't hate the piano I was just scared of her. As a result I progressed very, very slowly I wanted to play I really did but I was scared of learning something challenging because I was scared of her. I took some years off and then this desire to play again begain to sink in.I take lessons now from an excellent instructor and I am enjoying myself. I wouldnt say music ruined my life but I would say taking lessons from a horrible instructor actually lead me to taking years off,.
DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Last night at our local session I was getting a pint at the bar, when a fairly inebriated punter came up to me and asked if he could pick up my fiddle. Not play, mind you, just pick it up.
"Its been a long time," he says, wistfully.
I took a deep breath and told him he could, until my perfect Guinness was ready, so he picked it up, looked at it for a second, then put it down again.
"Its been a long time," he repeated.
"You should start playing again," I suggested.
"Its a lot of fun, really."
"No," he said, "it ruined my childhood," and shaking his head, he walked away.
So my question is, has anyone had bad musical experiences as a child that discouraged them from playing later on in life?
I used to hate piano lessons, but that didn't stop me from playing other instruments, when I got old enough to be exposed to other kinds of music.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by McBriss
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Never did music at school, the entire family bar me was sent to piano lessons, so music certainly didn't ruin my childhood
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by bodhran bliss
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Im in secondarey school at the moment and no one say's anything to me about it not being "cool".
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by dinn2
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I played recorder when I was little, and enjoyed it, and got rather good at it despite being one of those kids who was in and out of hospitals all the time with respiratory illnesses. When I was eight, my recorder teacher moved away, and my mother declared it was time for me to learn a new instrument. She asked me what I wanted to play.
"I want to play the violin," I told her.
"That's too hard," my mother said. "You'll learn to play the piano."
I took piano lessons for the next eight or nine years, and I became a competent, if not terribly skilled or enthusiastic, piano player. Then I left home for school, and didn't touch another instrument for a decade.
I took up the fiddle this past summer, and my childhood intuition that the fiddle was the instrument for me proved correct. No one has to frorce me to practice now.
Playing piano certainly didn't ruin my childhood, but playing an instrument I wasn't interested in playing did set me back two decades when it came to playing an instrument that I loved. But I'm quite grateful that I had some musical experience as a child: while I didn't become a very good piano player, I learned a lot about music that's helped me a lot on the fiddle. (When I approached my teacher for lessons, the first thing he asked me was whether I'd played a musical instrument before. "Piano, ages ago," I said, somewhat dismissively, because how relevant could it be that I'd spent years, a decade and more earlier, on an instrument that I'd never connected with? But he seemed to think that my piano experience counted, and he was right.)
Also, I oscillate between wishing I'd taken up the fiddle twenty years ago and being thankful that I waited: I was a competitive child who had to be the best at everything immediately, and I might have quit playing entirely, never to start again, when I figured out that I wasn't going to be an expert fiddler right away.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by Tall, Dark, and Mysterious
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Never did music in school and i found out recently that the school i went to got rid of music . but im enjoying music now and sometimes get a bit embarrassed about how obsessed about it.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by Saint
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
you could say that if you are forced to practice or take up an instrument. you simply dont learn if your being forced to.
somtimes its is nessecary to give kids that little extra push.....
one thing to note..... do measure practice by time.... measure it by improvement.
its also important that you know how to practice properly. otherwise you can NEVER improve. this is often what makes ppl quit an instrument or even loathe it. if you are not improving youll never get to that stage where you enjoy playing.
for example, i can competantly play my saxophone. but struggle on organ. if i dont practice the organ and get good at it and will never enjoy it. making music is one of the best things i ever did.
ANYONE WHO IS CAPABLE OF READING AND WRITING IS CAPABLE OF LEARNING TO READ MUSIC AND PLAY AN INSTRUMENT. IT ALL WEARS DOWN TO BASIC MECHANICS INTHE END....
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by saxwhistle
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
No. Quitting music in childhood did a bit.
After achieving what is euphemistically called "adulthood", I grew to appreciate things like spinach, garlic, black and white pud, opera and Real Music-trad of all kinds.
Unfortunately reestablishing the synapses (or creating the ones I never developed) has been much harder.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by zippydw
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I never really got a chance to play an instrument when I was young, other than play the guitar. However, my teacher wasn't around long enough to make it stick.
Now, my sister had to take violin in school. She HATED it. Her teacher made her learn how to play right-handed, when she is left-handed. Also, it wasn't the instrument she wanted to play -- nor is it the style of music she wanted to play. So, she grew to hate the violin and classical. Now, she hate Celtic music and folk music because of the fiddle.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by TheBloodyIrish
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
No. Playing music enriched my childhood. However, my childhood obsession with music and little else led to me lacking confidence in other areas of life. I was very much a volunteer when it came to learning music! However, at about 10, when piano was still my only instrument I went off it big style because I really disliked my piano teacher. (She wasn't mean, just dreadfully boring.) Fortunately my parents let me stop my lessons with her and after a little break music really took off for me.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by kris
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I never did music at school, or had lessons, but I was allways facinated by some of the "musical families" who opperated in our area. With a few scarce exceptions, all of them looked to me like they HATED it with a passion, and only did it because they were coerced into it.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by Backer
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Whenever I would start at a new school I would come early the first day with my fiddle, and play until school started. Lots of the other students that were musicians would come and listen, and then we would have something to talk about once school started. Since I am much more comfortable playing than I am speaking, I'd say that playing the fiddle helped my childhood social life.
Too bad I'm homeschooled now.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by girlwiththegreenfiddle
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Didn't stick with the trumpet (my childhood instrument) but always had fun in band and such, in fact, liked it enough to use paper route money to pay for lessons the family couldn't afford. Don't play trumpet any more, and there have been periods in my life where I didn't play much, but I always listened, and music has always been a joy to me.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by AlBrown
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
McBriss,
Too bad you didn't get to ask him how fiddle lessons ruined his childhood...
I'll bet that coercion had everything to do with it!
Some children are delighted with the possibility of making their own music......
that excitment is a flame that should always be fanned, never to have water thrown on.
# Posted on April 3rd 2007 by morning star
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
Not playing an instrument almost ruined my childhood. My brother tried to teach me to play the violin when I was 10 and he 12. It was disaaterous. A few years later when I was allowed to take music lessons my mother strictly prohibtted me from learning the violin. For many years I suffered fiddlephobia, till I joined a band.
When we first started out our musical director insisted that everyone in the band had to play a musical instrument and not just sing. And no tamborine! A week after declaring this she brought in a fiddle she bought years ago but couldn't learn to playdue to a childhood injury that left her thumb deformed and unable to hold the bow correctly. She brought the fiddle in to see if anyone could play or wanted to learn.
I just stared at it and rembered my fiddlephobia. Then I said to myself I need to get over it, so I took the fiddle. An arrangement was made that I would have the fiddle on loan, find a teacher and if I took to it make payment arrangements.
A few days later and ex co-worker stopped by work. Knowing she played fiddle ( second violin in a communityorchestra and Irish/Scottish in a duo) I asked if she knew any teachers. She said she was now teaching. After rehairing the bow and chaning the bridge our musical director decided to just give me the fiddle.
That was little over 2 years ago and I have not regretted it a bit. Sure I sounded like crap to begin with but with practice and better strings I've improved. I'm still not playing with the band yet (still get nervous playing infront and with people) but I'm working on it. I love playing the fiddle! I practice and play everyday!
I feel sorry for the man who wouldn't even touch your fiddle. He let himself not have the joy of overcoming a bad experince and replacing with a joyous one. Off to a fiddle lesson tonight!
# Posted on April 4th 2007 by Pirate-Fiddler
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
it didn't ruin my childhood, but i kinda wish that the parent who chose an instrument for me and put me on lessons had stayed out of it........i wasn't meant to be a pianist, being a linear, one-thing-at-a-time sort who was meant to play a meloday instrument....
when i quit taking piano, my very serious classical teacher said, sadly....when you come back to it---and you WILL come back to it.......
but i don't think button accordion and concertina were quite what she had in mind when making that prediction! ha!
# Posted on April 4th 2007 by ceemonster
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I did 8 years fiddle at school, put it on the shelf when I left and have never touched it since.
It did no harm to my childhood but a lot of harm to my liver as I found out immediately I left school that if you played in the pub you got free beer. The novelty has not worn off 40 years later.
It is the musical education and exposure to music in general that makes all the difference in your early years, not what instrument you play. Neither is it ever too late to learn a new instrument.
# Posted on April 5th 2007 by geoffwright
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
All the replies have indicated to me that childhood is not wasted on learning music. This, in my opinion is completely true. Time spent learning an instrument is time spent in the company of people who will become life long friends and also of adults who will respect you for being able to play an instrument or if you give up at least you will have had the oppertunity to meet these people and to share a few tunes with friends. Remember also that learning an instrument also increases accademic ability and relieves some of the pressures of school and college. Not such a waste of time after all. Me thinks your friend had forgotten all the wonderful benefits of learning music and had only concentrated on the negative.
# Posted on April 9th 2007 by ennisman
Re: DId playing an instrument ruin your childhood?
I took piano lessons when I was eight years old for two years. I had a TERRIBLE instructor. She was mean, horrible and scary so I didn't hate the piano I was just scared of her. As a result I progressed very, very slowly I wanted to play I really did but I was scared of learning something challenging because I was scared of her. I took some years off and then this desire to play again begain to sink in.I take lessons now from an excellent instructor and I am enjoying myself. I wouldnt say music ruined my life but I would say taking lessons from a horrible instructor actually lead me to taking years off,.
# Posted on April 10th 2007 by becibu