MY VIEW
You’re never too old to learn an instrument
There are weird things that turn people on. For me, it’s the smell of rosewood when I open my classical guitar case. Or the way my vintage jumbo acoustic, which I bought used, looks like it was probably made for a cowboy named “Buck.” I even wear guitar picks as jewelry.
I don’t aspire to be a guitar hero, but every day I do practice at lunch. I keep a guitar by my desk at work and I faithfully go to my lesson every Thursday night. I hate it when someone stops me when I’m practicing, because I have only that hour to fit in my playing.
It’s even worse if someone reaches for my guitar and wants to play it. I should say no, but I never do. To me, taking someone’s guitar casually is like asking a man if you
can kiss his wife. It’s best if you wait for someone to offer stuff like that. Either that, or you better know them both very well!
Although I started my musical education from a classical perspective, after going nearly two decades without playing anything at all, I decided to take lessons on an electric. But instead of reading notes on the page, I started with tablature — a method relying on six lines to symbolize each string. Numbers on the lines denote the fret on which the fingers are placed.
While written music at first was the door that gained me entry to playing the guitar, it eventually became the obstacle that kept me from going very far with it. As long as I was reading music, I was reliant on what I was seeing and not able to develop what I heard into what I could play.
Written music kept me on a specific path. That can be a good thing. When I was in junior high, my teacher wouldn’t teach me Bach’s “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring,” and instead made me play Sor, whom another student referred to as “Sor the Bore.”
Not being able to play what I wanted was frustrating. As an adult, I had no one to stop me. So I got the music and learned the piece — tackling three bars each night.
But then the written note kept me from going very far, because I had just a basic ability and couldn’t go much beyond it. When I resolved to study again, I decided to try a less formal approach.
Starting in a new direction has taken me further than if I’d kept on my original track. Learning blues scales, and being exposed to a style of music that is not as correct, has given me a freedom that I’d never experienced before.
I can now hear things and play them — unfettered by confining notes on a page that are either right or wrong. Sometimes when I sit down to practice, I’ll go off on a tangent because a combination of notes suddenly fits a song I’d wanted to play in the past, but couldn’t fathom how without the notes written down in front of me.
Too often adults say they are too old to start playing an instrument. I hope that anyone who feels this way will overcome that misconception. Not every aspiring musician need be focused on a career or notoriety. Every so often I find someone I want to sit and play with. But mostly, it’s worth it just to get a little further each day.
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