Susan's Place Transgender Resources

what instrument do you play, and what's so awesome about it?

Guitar. Well, I don't feel much in the tip of my index fingers. It's intrguing I guess. :3

I play guitar primarily, but I have some drums, a tambourine, and a digital piano.

What's awesome about them is that they make music, and that I know how to use them to make music.

I'm not great. I'm adequate. But, I play them. And that's what it is to me: playing. I do it because it's fun.

It's the fun that's the most awesome.

I'm sure my parents would tell you that much of my practicing while I was in high school was little more than "experimental noise!"  :D

I played the Trumpet for 29 years. It's a great instrument when you want to jam out with a band when playing Jazz. Also, it was fun doing SKA back when I was part of a little SKA band in college.

French Horn for 15 years. It was a great alternative during the Spring in high school and college. You didn't not have to push as much force through it as you did with the trumpet. And the music that comes from a french horn can out the most strung out person in a trance.

Play violin currently for the last 15 years. Easy to learn and easy to play once you get your fingers accustomed to the frets and notes. Its one of those beautiful instruments where you can sit back and play from your heart. As long as you keep it in key, you can play pretty much anything and it will sound hauntingly beautiful. Spent 1000 dollars on a used handmade violin and it's one of the best investments I had ever made. Probably more so than Transgender Therapy and HRT put together. That violin has helped me through many dark nights of my soul.

I play a little banjo... or, rather, I dabble in some banjo. To a lesser extent, I also dabble with guitar. :P

I'm a DJ

Currently, I'm learning to play the mandolin. I play(ed) the clarinet and saxophone too - mostly from middle and high school years though.

'Played' violin, terrible. Played guitar, awful, played the fool, moderately successful.

One of my regrets is being non-musical.

Cindy

I have been playing some sort of guitar off and on, since I was a teenager.  I started on Bass and love paying it loud. I really like  the way it combines rythm and melody, and you can really get into a groove.  I have also started to look at Classical Cello pieces for sight reading practice. Bach's Cello Suite #1 is a good start.

I have also been playing Lap Steel for a while, both acoustic resonator and electric.  Great Bluesy feel to it, and very easy to work out stuff by ear.  If you use the right tunings you can play Minor Chords as well as the obvious Majors, so it is not as restricted as it might seem at first playing.

I have also picked up an absolute bargain Yamaha 12-string and being a fan of 60's Folk Rock enjoy the "jangly" edge you don't get with a 6 string. Old fan of The Byrds fom way back.

Karen.

i learned how to play guitar when i was little but my small mind was too impatient to learn all the cords, lol i just wanted to rock out, not know the fundamentals
so now i play drums, drumset, percussion, drumline stuff, pretty much everything
and i took piano lessons but every teacher i had was terrible so i gave up after my 6th teacher  :P

I play (or have played) accordion, piano, bassoon, oboe, flute, and cello.  But the only instrument that I play well (and regularly) is recorder.  I like baroque music.

Julie

I play acoustic guitar.
Over the years I've gotten better at playing, singing and having a conversation at the same time.
It's the "out of mind" part that I enjoy.

Quote from: justmeinoz on November 07, 2011, 03:46:33 AM
... Yamaha 12-string and being a fan of 60's Folk Rock ...

Yup, that's a great combo.
I'd like to own a 12 string but I'm too monogamous and my Taylor 110e would get jealous.

 :D :D :D

Quote from: justmeinoz on November 07, 2011, 03:46:33 AM
I have also picked up an absolute bargain Yamaha 12-string and being a fan of 60's Folk Rock enjoy the "jangly" edge you don't get with a 6 string. Old fan of The Byrds fom way back.

Karen.

Old Yamaha guitars can be really wonderful. Bought a 1970 Yamaha Nippon Gakki classical off eBay for £30 a few years ago, great guitar and totally wasted on my ability.

I played the cello in junior high and high school.  Now I play the tenor recorder and bass recorder.  Or I have them in my closet anyway I don't really play them.

fiddle, mandolin, acoustic guitar, banjo, uke, dulcimer, percussion... my first instrument as a kid was piano.

Z

I briefly played trumpet when I was younger. Quit because they stopped letting me borrow one from the band room, and my parents certainly weren't going to buy something they considered so frivolous.

Now I'm considering learning to play my daughter's guitar. She's not using it.

Quote from: Felix on November 07, 2011, 11:25:58 AM
Now I'm considering learning to play my daughter's guitar.

Go for it!
Guitar is one of the most accessible instruments out there.
Getting to the point of having some fun with it is pretty easy.
Of course, getting to be a legend requires 10 hours of playing per day since you were 8.

I inherited my grandfather's guitar.  It needs new strings.  I can play that a little, I learned in my early teens.

I played the viola in my HS orchestra and took a semester of clarinet so I could learn about woodwinds.  I have my other grandfather's Höhner concertina.  I can find my way around that a bit but I rarely do.  I used to have a violin and a viola but I sold them back in the 1990's.  My main instrument is the piano/keyboards.

I always loved music and have some talent but was never comfortable enough in my ability to make something of it so I remain an amateur.

i'm attempting to learn bass guitar right now. I think i'm going to get a tutor after xmas to help me progress properly.

I've always loved the sound of the bass and how it's took for granted yet it is the basis of all music. it just has a sexy funky sound to it that I love.

I "sort of" play the violin.  I'm also learning to play the hammered dulcimer.

Music is a wonderful tool to express emotion, but I've found that at my lowest points I can't play at all.  It is sort of a good tool to keep on track, but once I start a downward spiral it doesn't help anymore.

Piano, electric guitar, cello... I tried the violin when I was a kid (5th grade or somewhere around there) but it wasn't my thing. Mostly I just compose my own music, I don't bother learning songs someone else has written unless it's really awesome. One of these days I'll take the time to actually write down my songs, and publish a music book or two.

I play the keyboard, guitar, bass, and melodica.  I compose for whatever.  Unfortunately, I've gotten pretty far out there in music theory, so I haven't played anything in a while.  I'm actually trying to invent a new instrument to facilitate my ridiculous musical needs, but it costs money to do so and I need to get at least one key making sound the way I want it to before I am going to launch a Kickstarter for it.

I was listening to Clinic once, and trying to talk about a certain instrument but had no idea what it was. My boyfriend busted out his melodica and demonstrated, and ever since then I've been surprised to notice how many bands make use of it.

And lol I can't count how many friends I've seen decide to take music classes in college, for "easy" grades, and then watched them study just as much as I was studying for my "hard" classes.

I play a little guitar mostly for fun,I play mostly strats.

I played saxophone, flute, and clarinet when I was younger. They all had the same keying scheme sort of thing, so it was pretty easy. I forayed into the drums for about two weeks but the teacher didn't like me putting in all those extra beats  ;D

Clarinet from 4th grade through freshman year of college. I kinda want to pick it back up again. I also played alto/bari sax for a few years.

I tried to learn guitar. I just never had the finger coordination for it.

I played the piano off and on for about 10 years growing up, but have sort of wished I didn't stop.  I also experimented with the violin, flute, and clarinet as a kid, but think it would be cool to take up the violin again.  I think violins sound cooler than pianos.

I've played the piano for nearly 20 years and the drums for 10 years or so.  What's great about the drums is it's role in a band, as it is the glue to each song, keeping the tempo and adding that, simply put, awesomeness to each song.  What's great about the piano is it's ability to reach people emotionally.  It is a unique instrument that, simply by it's sound, can have people pondering deep thoughts, crying or celebrating.  My greatest achievement in playing the piano is the ability to write original material.

Well, I started taking guitar lessons in 1965 (thanks to The Beatles!!!) and in the later-1960s, I finally heard this:


Jimi Hendrix / Voodoo chile(Live) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2Gwp9qkoAQ&feature=related#)


Well, that made me quit my lessons.  What can I say.   Anybody play electric guitar?  Give this a try.

Peace    :D   Lacey

Ahh Sis

Thanks for that.

The best electric guitarist so far. Number two is Eric Clapton who is so far in the shade of Hendrix that it is embarrassing. And I'm not worthy to pick up a pick.

I met Hendrix at a party at Roger Waters apartment in London. How's that for name dropping ;D ;D ;D ;D. I was invited by accident, long story.

I remember him as very quite, very withdrawn person.  It is a very long time ago but he didn't seem to have a personality.  He was happy to be in the total background. His life and death are so sad.

Such a waste.

But what a musician.

Cindy

Nah, I think when you look at the total sum of their work, the best guitar slinger in Rock is this guy, and he's so good there is no second place.  Here he is doing Jimi's Little Wing, and doing something that Jimi could never do, well two things really.  One he stays in tune for the entire song (better equipment, better techs, better ability).  Second, he's tight, Jimi was sloppy most of the time he played live (too high?).  Eric?  Come on, You have to go back to 1970 to Delaney & Bonnie & Friends or Derek and the Dominos.  And that stuff is only OK next to the Cream - particularly the live stuff.  But that was a long, long, long time ago.

Little Wing-Jeff Beck Live At The 2011 New Orleans Jazzfest (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yex2iKJ_4I#)

Or, this... with the fantastic  Imelda May
Remember (Walking in the Sand) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nv9zJif2G8&feature=related#)

I play the Piano, Trumpet, Trombone, Tuba, and Sousaphone. the piano I learned growing up! i learned the other instruments in school while I was a member of the marching band!

I am principal cellist in the local symphony. I used to play electric bass in a soft rock band. That's what put me through college. I like to fool around with the guitar from time to time. It's all a little bit harder to do since a dog bit my left index finger off a couple of years ago. It was fixed but not quite. It's sort of in a permanent arch and it is pretty darned hard to bar a chord with it... I somehow manage though.

I'm with VM I've fooled around with guitars for 30 years or so.  Still suck.  Some people pack houses, I walk them.

Quote from: tekla on December 18, 2011, 02:13:20 AM
Nah, I think when you look at the total sum of their work, the best guitar slinger in Rock is this guy, and he's so good there is no second place.  Here he is doing Jimi's Little Wing, and doing something that Jimi could never do, well two things really.  One he stays in tune for the entire song (better equipment, better techs, better ability).  Second, he's tight, Jimi was sloppy most of the time he played live (too high?).  Eric?  Come on, You have to go back to 1970 to Delaney & Bonnie & Friends or Derek and the Dominos.  And that stuff is only OK next to the Cream - particularly the live stuff.  But that was a long, long, long time ago.

Little Wing-Jeff Beck Live At The 2011 New Orleans Jazzfest (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yex2iKJ_4I#)

Or, this... with the fantastic  Imelda May
Remember (Walking in the Sand) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nv9zJif2G8&feature=related#)

Sadly I am going back to Cream, it was possibly the last time he played with people who good push him. I hadn't forgotten JB yes better than EC but not JH. The difference in the smoothness or cord transition and well, just way out improvisation puts JH ahead. It is a futile argument/ discussion.

Imelda May. A voice to die for. Loved her hair. Totally gorgeous woman . Hmmm. The dress is so cute, looks as if she is enjoying wearing it, she looks so comfortable. Her eyes are so good as well.

This is getting off topic but ?

What do people think about Amy Whitehouse as a a musician?

Cindy

I almost bought a guitar today, my sister Virginia Marie  keeps telling me to follow my dreams. But I'm am tone deaf. Sometimes you have to give in. ;D ;D

She should have gone to rehab. 

She had a great soul voice (I loved ->-bleeped-<- Me Pumps), but you don't get very far burning the candle at both ends.  But hey, live fast, die young and all that.  It's sad, but hardly rare.

The other thing that Imelda May has is the kind of stage presence that can't be taught or coached.

Quote from: Cindy James on December 18, 2011, 03:19:53 AM
I almost bought a guitar today, my sister Virginia Marie  keeps telling me to follow my dreams. But I'm am tone deaf. Sometimes you have to give in. ;D ;D

Oh come on. You can be tone deaf and still strum a guitar. I think that you can get musical results on a guitar faster than any other instrument. An accomplished musician will take years to express great efficiency on any instrument. But anyone can learn to strum a few chords on a guitar. What have you got to lose?  A few bucks for a cheap guitar?  Go for it girl! Have some fun!  Don't worry about your talent. Just get one and have a blast with it. That's all most anyone else does, after all.

Chin up!

Cindi

I'm basically unable to play any instrumnet but I have a tubes wind chime beside the door and get some nice music depending on how fast I open the door.

You have been closer to a lot of these people maybe.

What does drive the idiocy ?

Is it just drugs and rock and roll? Or what?

You usually have to work damn hard to get to the top in R&R "sorry ACDC" so why throw it away?

I'm perplexed. Particularly now a days when people should realise the consequence of their actions.

Maybe I'm just getting old.

Cindy

Guitar and bass, piano, armonica, little drum, computer instruments and software... But my best part is not playing such as composing, tough I have a lot of road to do to develope it!

Yes! I've learned guitar, bass guitar, tin whistle, piano, great highland b->-bleeped-<-ipes (wow, that was a dumb idea), and drums. And, if computer instruments are counted, I suppose those as well! ;D

- Well fame is a hell of a drug, and I've often thought that all the other drugs were just ways of getting through the other 22.5 hours in a day when you're not on stage.

- You have all the money in the world and not a single person around (for long) who will tell you "NO!".

- The drugs are good, not in good vs. evil, but powerful.  They work (and damn few things do these days) 'as advertised.'

- I'd love to have the money, but the fame is garbage, everyone wants a piece of you, everyone is riding your gravy train, and it's hard to put up with.

- It's not just rock and roll, jazz cats were doing drugs long before rock rolled its first joint.  And I work with lots of classical cats too.  They do drugs, not the hard ones, not to terrible excess, but there is a decided hint of green bud in the air at the symphony. 

- Particularly now a days when people should realise the consequence of their actions. -- Oh, don't you know?  The rules are not for them.  Other people get in trouble, not them.  Other people get their lives caught up in it, not them.  They are special, and all the stuff that happens to the 'little people' will not happen to them (they think).

Quote from: tekla on December 18, 2011, 06:22:38 AM
- Well fame is a hell of a drug, and I've often thought that all the other drugs were just ways of getting through the other 22.5 hours in a day when you're not on stage.

- You have all the money in the world and not a single person around (for long) who will tell you "NO!".

- The drugs are good, not in good vs. evil, but powerful.  They work (and damn few things do these days) 'as advertised.'

- I'd love to have the money, but the fame is garbage, everyone wants a piece of you, everyone is riding your gravy train, and it's hard to put up with.

- It's not just rock and roll, jazz cats were doing drugs long before rock rolled its first joint.  And I work with lots of classical cats too.  They do drugs, not the hard ones, not to terrible excess, but there is a decided hint of green bud in the air at the symphony. 

- Particularly now a days when people should realise the consequence of their actions. -- Oh, don't you know?  The rules are not for them.  Other people get in trouble, not them.  Other people get their lives caught up in it, not them.  They are special, and all the stuff that happens to the 'little people' will not happen to them (they think).

We know that music industry isn't about music anymore from several years. Indeed very few real talents have something new to say, something original, and many just make good music, not the kind that really can change you. It's like there are many street painters overrated, they paint well, but really don't add nothing to your life, few artists, and maybe a picasso or two sometimes.

The fact that artists don't even have the time to improve like Amy whinehouse and do something more that eventually fall in the drug routine or hyper exxagerated consideration ( well if the comparison is with some plastique doll band it's ok ), and never become real artists or maybe who knows that pocasso.

Once it was drug and music

Now it s business and drugs i guess

Yeah, most of the people I know there in the wings grew up hating on the ->-bleeped-<- from the record company who makes $70K a year (back in the 1970s) and wants to be on the guest list, plus 10.  They were walking scum.  If they were not buttering you up with a bunch of fake sincerity they were stealing your wallet, your drugs, and your girlfriend.

However, they did (at least in retrospect) seem to know a lot more about music, and about how to make it good, or better, then the people from Apple, who - if your looking at the bands over the past 10 years, and particular the last 5 - have some of the worst taste in the world.  And at least the old record companies did put some effort into development.

But then again, maybe it's not their fault.  Rock is way, way - WAY past, it's 'sell by' date, by a decade or so.  80% of the people we get through the places where I work (1K, and 2.25K rooms in a major market) are pretty much either has-beens or wantabees.

Oh yeah.  Entertainment has always been a business.  It's the business of doing pleasure with you.  Not all the bands and cool musicians got that, but someone did, and they were the person who ended up with the cash.  'Twas ever thus. 

And since the rock was a given (no matter if you wanted it or not) that leaves 'drugs' and 'sex' (common in showbiz long, long before rock showed up, Franz Liszt laid pipe on just as many babes as any rock star ever did), and of those you really have to pick, as if you do enough drugs the sex ain't going to be happening.  And while the Crash 'N Burn of the occasional Amy gets press, mostly the people are out trying to out kink each other. 

"Hey, yeah, I can get you backstage, ask me how.  And lose the boyfriend.  And bring your mom."

I've been playing guitar for about seven years now; I also sing and write songs.

Sometimes I play mandolin and piano as well, but my playing is pretty mediocre...well, at least in my opinion.

Cindy James:

Girl, there are many, many, many people who would agree with you about Slowhand being #2.  Remember the slogan in the 1960s:   Clapton is God?   Eric certainly was capable of some righteous craftsmanship on the axe.  Gotta agree with Tekla that his work with Cream and Derek and the Dominos was tops for him.   What about with Blind Faith (just one album though)?   Honey, I LOVE Eric to this very day, but I prefer his work from the 1960s.  Agree with you all the way about Jimi.

AMAZING that you actually met him!!!   I've read many accounts saying he was shy and withdrawn in real life.   Imagine that (given his histrionics on stage)!   That is SOOO amazing!   WHAT an experience!   This is before you emigrated, no doubt.   That majorly rocks, Cindy!!!    :D    ;)    :D

Tekla:

Hey, man, MANY people agree with you about Jeff Beck!   Most accounts I've read about him have him at #2 after Jimi, but it comes down to personal taste anway.  Everything you say IS true, by the way.  Jeff was ALWAYS clean, crisp, controlled ... and masterful!   Very cool that The Strat and The Marshall Stacks were the tools of choice for both Jeff and Jimi.  Of course, they were from the same era.   To this very day, I'm a HUGE Jeff Beck fan!   I knew a guy in the 1970s (college) who agreed with you all the way and had Jeff at #1.   

Everybody:

There WAS another electric guitarist of the first rank ... a little ole boy from Texas ... who does not get nearly the credit he deserves.   He's a personal fave of mine.  I rate him shoulder-to-shoulder with Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton.   Just my personal preference, but I say THIS guy should, likewise, be considered a Rock Guitar God:

Stevie Ray Vaughan - Little Wing Live @ El Mocambo (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDRPazZySzE#)


Peace    :)   Lacey

Not to be too picky, but SRV was not exactly much of a rock player - he was good when he got around to it, but it wasn't his bag.  But I have no trouble listing him as one of the top white blues guitar players of all time.  And that's good, because blues was never about originality, but about playing with feeling, which he did very well.  He also used the thickest guitar strings I've ever seen on an axe outside of Dick Dale.

Yeah Jeff likes the '57 strat body with a '62 neck.  He has an awesome guitar tech, for sure on that.

And yeah, Blind Faith was what?  About 69, with Layla and Other Love Songs in 70.  Then what.  Even if I give you Slowhand, that's '77 - and then what?  35 years with not much?  That's a lot of not much.

But look at Beck.  From the Yardbirds, to his own band with releases in 68, 69, 71, and 72. Truth^* and Beck-Ola still sound great.  Then he gets together with what was left of the Vanilla Fudge and did Beck, Bogert & Appice in 73.  Then in '75 (this is right where Eric is starting to just go through the motions), he did another solo record, Blow by Blow with the awesome 'Cause We Ended As Lovers.  Now this was different.  It was not blues like the earlier stuff, it was much more jazz orientated - so, right there as 'jazz fusion' is being invented by Miles and other jazz cats, Beck is just about the only rock musician to go the other way.  Then he did the Upp deal, a little funky (as is befitting the person that Stevie Wonder wrote Superstition for.)  Then in '76 does Wired with Jan Hammer, one of the better fusion records, to be sure.

Then he does 10 more records between 1980 and today.  At least 5 of them (that's half) won Grammy Awards.  One was a tribute to Gene Vincent, and one that was more electronic, and then last year the tribute to Les Paul which is just a damn good, super listenable concert. 

And it's that dual threat of constant performances over 45 years, and a really diverse recorded output^** that helps Jeff rise above the rest - at least for me.  That, and he - not Eric or even Jimi - seems to be the pick for all the really good guitar players I know.


* - Truth is considered by many as one of the first and most influential records in the creation of Heavy Metal.

** - Hell, I didn't even list the people he did guest work for, including Roger Waters, Stevie Wonder, Morrissey, Kelly Clarkson, Kate Bush, Paul Rodgers, Stanley Clark, David Bowie, Rod Stewart, Tina Turner, John McLaughlin, Mick Jagger, Jon Bon Jovi, Herbie Handcock, and Buddy Guy - among others.  They rehearsed him for both the Rolling Stones and Guns 'N Roses.

'Cause We Ended As Lovers, by Stevie Wonder.
JEFF BECK LIVE Cause We've Ended As Lovers (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VC02wGj5gPw#)

Fantastic clip Tekla,

Lacey  Lynne

It was a total accident. I was at Uni and got involved with the people who organised the Saturday night bands.  At that time (and it may still be true) the UK  Uni's were very big on the circuits and bookings were keenly fought over. I happened to be a friend :embarrassed :laugh:: of the guy who ran the bookings, so I ended up going to some awesome parties. Many I have little memory of, but I survived.  To put it into perspective we had Floyd, Who, Wings (who gave us 48hrs notice and  we had to cancel someone, luckily a small act), and  Zepplin in the same term. How I got a degree I do not know.

Cindy

Kat,

I do know these arguments get futile, and a lot is based on the style of the music.

Slash is probably the greatest riff maker, but then you listen to Keith Richards. He writes some awesome riffs, which I think people find surprising as most people think he is brain dead. And he uses some beautiful tunings.

Dave Gilmour is a personal favourite. He has a style, and a look :embarrassed:, that is cute to my ear.

I hope this doesn't sound like laments from an old cow, but there seems a lot less emphasis on musical ability now. You do it in a studio, where the computers take over.

I'm sure I'm wrong, are today's groups and musicians as good?

As good as what? The R&R.

I really think modern music needs a big enema.  :laugh:


Cindy

Just to confuse the issue I'll throw the name of the late Tommy Bolin into the mix.   

As for the enemas Cindy, there'll be another Aussie pub-rock band along like the EasyBeats, AC/DC, INXS  or Jet soon enough to flush out the system.