What made you decide to pick up the guitar?

**jazzbow** · 04-22-2017, 05:21 PM

Steve Jones of the Pistols and Mick Jones of the Clash.
You could say I've been jonesing ever since!

**wolflen** · 04-22-2017, 05:59 PM

music was fascinating to me..how people played an instrument was total magic..when I first saw jerry lee lewis I was sure I was going to learn piano..but after several lessons from a neighbor that put a hold on lessons..so years later I would hear local DJs say..Peter Paul and Mary singing a Bob Dylan tune..and the name bob Dylan conjured up an image of a songwriter in his mid 40's as that was a pop image on TV at the time..but PPand M sang another Dylan tune and the DJ again announced who wrote the song..so the name aroused my curiosity..

.
les crane had a local TV show in NYC in the mid 60's..it was young and hip..he had on folk singers..poets..actors and writers..so I saw judy Collins joan baez buffy saint marie ..allen ginsburg and others..and at the end of each show he would announce who was going to be on the next week.. "..ok..next week bob dylan will be here.." now all I knew was .. I HAVE to see this person..

.
and les crane said..."..bobby.." and I was spellbound..a young kid that sounded old..who didn't comb his hair-hell it looked like it was in a wind storm..played a harmonic around his neck while he played guitar..and sang this song "its all over now baby blue"..which I didn't understand any of it..but knew my life had changed-forever..he did a second song.."its alright ma.." which pushed me over the edge..I foolishly tried to tell my mother what I just saw..she looked very concerned..

not long after I learned several chords and bought a $40 electric guitar .. and that wave has not landed on shore yet..

**mr. beaumont** · 04-22-2017, 06:06 PM

I was 12. My friend bought a drumset at a garage sale and announced he was starting a band.

I didn't want to be left out. I knew my dad (a piano/organ player) had a guitar in our hall closet. So I announced "I play guitar."

Well, what a fucking celebrity I was that day at school. So I figured I better actually learn something.

My pops showed me a few chords, but he said, if you're gonna play, you're gonna take lessons. I eagerly accepted the offer/ultimatum.

I was hooked almost instantly. I literally knew a few hours after touching a guitar I'd do it forever. That was 26 years ago.

**mwcarr** · 04-22-2017, 07:26 PM

I was twelve years old, it was 1963 and the Beatles were exploding across
America. Myself and two other guys all started on the same Saturday, we were in 7th grade. One of us, Greg Nelson really took to it and was voted Cleveland's Guitarist of the year in 1998. He unfortunately died three years later. I've stuck with it and it's brought me so much pleasure. I've worked as a freelancer now for 30 years and still play some music every day. Eventually led me to the fiddle and mandolin as well. I was always shy and introverted so it gave me a voice and a place it social situations. I never dance but I'm almost always in the band.

**tonejunkie** · 04-22-2017, 07:37 PM

My dad gigged and played folk music all my life but I was much more interested in sports. My junior year in high school I asked him to show me something and he showed me the pentatonic scale... I was hooked! Improvising learning patterns! So fun:-)

**max chill** · 04-22-2017, 09:39 PM

I remember seeing Oscar Moore with the Nat Cole trio when I was 10, and that was it. I got a job shoveling chicken manure after school at Stashu Pulaski's farm till I earned enough money to get me a mail order guitar from the Sears Roebuck catalog. I've been loving and regretting it ever since that day.

**jazznylon** · 04-22-2017, 09:42 PM

Its kind of lame but what got me started was playing guitar hero (and Rock Band the video game). I was a video gamer first and foremost and those games led to me buying a real guitar at around age 16. I never played much real guitar until I went to community college and study classical guitar, thats when I realize I have to work my butt off..

Studying Classical guitar intensely for two years or so definitely got my technique together. Coincidentally Rock band 3 (the video game) came out and I play a real electric guitar that came alongside it so that greatly helped my technique too. I played with a jazz ensemble for a few times but not as much as I would liked to.

Now I'm trying to get the jazz thing together. Play by ear more and more and get ready to play with others as I look for a job. It all started with five button frets... !

**pingu** · 04-23-2017, 01:25 AM

Klaaaannnggggg ...

"Its been a hard days night"
(still can't play that chord right tho !)

Then Jimi and Carlos etc rock music
Did that for a while ...
I only started having jazz lessons
cos I wanted to learn/hear/codify /whatever
how music and songs work ...
My ears weren't good enough to just get it
on their own ... Still aren't damnit

I'm not a natural at music at all ,
I've worked very very hard to get a grip of the few things I can hear and play now , fought
for them like treasure or something ...

I love music tho , just the way a melody with a change can make you feel, you Guys know , what you gonna do ??

**ragman1** · 04-23-2017, 07:28 AM

In case anyone thinks I'm just being silly - I'm not - I used to play a trumpet. I have absolutely no idea why or how, I don't remember, but I did used to play it, rather unsuccessfully. That went on for a bit till one day I came into a room and somebody was playing folk guitar, doing the clawhammer thing very well, and I liked the sound. It touched the right spot.

The fact is that my memory's completely skewed on this, I actually don't remember what the timeline is. I had a nylon guitar when young from somewhere and played it at home from Bert Weedon's 'Play In A Day' book. I used to escape from school stuff, like compulsory church, by playing in the music rooms. I put records on 33 and 16rpm and learnt things that way. And I could play like the pros pretty quick. But, of course, they were much older and American, so it didn't really mean much. But I did lots of things then and later. I did classical, folk, blues, a bit of bluegrass and the older country styles, then got into jazz much later.

So I regret it had absolutely nothing to do with girls. Or being applauded, or anything else. I just did it because I liked it. Actually, I was also a singer and had a nice voice. That got me more attention but I didn't like the attention...

Is anybody really interested in all this? I doubt it!

There's a lot I'm not telling you too. I've done all the clubs, radio, had a record contract, won the talent competitions, written songs for films, scores for plays, had a band or two, taught, etc etc, but I didn't care . There was a 15 year gap at one point because other things in life were more interesting. I suspect music's just a sideline, if I'm honest. I really shouldn't say that here but it does account for the occasional silliness :-)

The other thing is I was actually quite embarrassed that I played guitar. I wished it was something more serious, like piano or violin, and I did classical music properly. Then I could hold my head up. As it was, I thought playing guitar made me look like some kind of dissolute hippy. But the truth is that kind of music was me and I had to be true to myself and my heart. So I'm stuck with it!

**jasaco** · 04-23-2017, 08:22 AM

The Beatles.

**snailspace** · 04-23-2017, 08:25 AM

Originally Posted by pingu

Klaaaannnggggg ...

I'm not a natural at music at all ,
I've worked very very hard to get a grip of the few things I can hear and play now , fought
for them like treasure or something ...

In a Beatles cover band I used to be in, the other guitarist once said, "Other people play the guitar . . . I just try to wrestle it into submission."

**Gabor** · 04-23-2017, 09:11 AM

I was 13 years old, and all my friends did, so am I.
It was fun, and added one more plus way to spend time together besides of the usual time spendings.

***

Nearly four decades left since, and now it seems that was one of the best idea I realized in my life (of course choosing my wife was the best :-).

Although I am not a professional musician, (I am an architect) playing guitar is one of the best hobby for me. Unfortunately, after four decades of listening music, and knowing many albums, many unbelievable wonderful musicians, my musical expectation is way ahead what I can produce myself in guitar, so I rarely enjoy what am I hear where playing.

Anyway, there is no choice. I must play the guitar.

**bob32069** · 04-23-2017, 11:33 AM

Really fun to read everyone's stories! Completely agree with jazzyjackrabbit's post.

I was 15 years old and went to a high school dance. This was in the 80's when California hair metal was big. Normally there was just a DJ but at this particular dance one of the seniors, who was a drummer, had his band play the dance. They were really good. As their finale they played Night Ranger's "(You Can Still) Rock in America" and they absolutely nailed it. The guitar player got both solos note-for-note perfect. That's when lightning struck. I immediately told all my friends that we were going to have a rock band and assigned them instruments. The only problem was that none of them nor I played or even owned any instruments. So that was a fail. One of the kids was pretty well off and his parents actually bought him a really nice G&L bass. I told my mom I wanted to buy a guitar and I had saved up about a hundred dollars from summer and winter break jobs. My mother, bless her, thought to herself that if her little Bobby got his hands on a guitar, his natural talent would propel him to rock stardom and her plans for me to become a doctor would go out the window. So she told me that if I waited a few months until the school year was over she would buy me a 100 dollar guitar with her own money. A very shrewd woman, she thought that the itch would go away if not scratched immediately. Alas, I am a master of delayed gratification. I bided my time and that summer she bought me a guitar. The rest is history - i.e. I had no talent, went to college and medical school, and 32 years later am still in love with guitar and the incredible things that other, far more talented people can do on the instrument. But playing guitar continues to keep me sane from the stresses of the day job.

**lammie200** · 04-23-2017, 11:50 AM

Originally Posted by jazzyjackrabbit

...

Although I am not a professional musician, (I am an architect) playing guitar is one of the best hobby for me...

Architect here as well.

Originally Posted by bob32069

...But playing guitar continues to keep me sane from the stresses of the day job.

Me, too.

**takku** · 04-23-2017, 02:07 PM

I am classically trained in piano and clarinet, but my mother did not consider guitar a serious instrument (not featured in a symphony orchestra and no such thing as Mozart's d minor guitar concerto I guess) so playing guitar was not an option. I played keyboard (Korg Poly 800, man I wish I hadn't sold it!) and taught me some bass to play in a high school rock band. So no guitar, and no jazz... until....

My classic rock obsession lead me to Jeff Beck's mid 70's gems Blow by Blow and Wired. It was like a trap door opened under me and I fell into jazz... I was like, what are these harmonies he's playing and where did he get these tunes - for a long time I thought Porkpie Hat was an original Jeff Beck tune. Then the dad of a friend who learned about my Beck obsession lent me a couple of Al Di Meola albums, at least Electric Rendezvous and uttered the feared label "jazz". I dug Al's playing but could not stomach the idea of actually listening to old men's music called jazz. But I got curious and went to my local record store, must have been the winter of 1991, and picked up the first thing with a name on it that I could recognize, being Inside Out by Chick Corea Elektric Band. In hindsight, a somewhat hardcore choice for a first jazz album, but I was hooked. Finally, a complex, abstract world I could get lost in and wander for hours, finding new and wonderful things on every listen! Later that year, I went to my local library and picked up two random CDs from the jazz section, namely In a Silent Way by Miles and Maiden Voyage by Herbie. I think you could have picked worse records... I still listen to them pretty much on any given week 26 years later...

I started obsessively plotting the "family tree of jazz" with Miles at the center, checking out all of his material and branching out to systematically exploring the works of Miles sidemen and band mates. You all know who I discovered on that journey: these paths led me straight back to Herbie and Chick of course, Trane, Hubbard, McLaughlin, the works.

I decided to turn my musical ambitions to jazz. I asked a piano player at a local jazz bar (this was in Europe so a 17-year old could sort of legitimately hang out at a jazz club) how to get good at jazz, and he recommended Berklee jazz books, which I started pounding for 3-4 hours every day after school. But still no guitar.

Fast forward 15 years, I wanted to get back to music. But this time guitar, which I now realize I really wanted to play all along but never got around to. Guitar also made a lot of sense as I needed an instrument I could play late at night without waking up the kids, and even travel with if needed. It started as a scratching a metal itch but evolved into chasing after my jazz dreams.

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**snailspace** · 04-24-2017, 07:40 PM

Overconfidence.

**pubylakeg** · 04-24-2017, 08:17 PM

1. Couldn't afford a saxophone.
2. Cliff Gallup.

**Gabor** · 04-25-2017, 01:59 AM

Originally Posted by pubylakeg

Couldn't afford a saxophone.

Even my simple acoustic guitar was way too loud for my father. I can imagine what he would say if I started to play saxophone :-)

**edh** · 04-25-2017, 04:16 AM

Hey Jazzy, you shoulda taken up drums!

**Gabor** · 04-25-2017, 04:54 AM

Originally Posted by edh

Hey Jazzy, you shoulda taken up drums!

History (even personal) repeats itself:

My son plays the bass guitar. When we are out with my wife, the kid plays amplified even at 2AM, not with headphones needless to say. Neighbors complain :-). When I asked him about this, he seemed actually really did not understand what's the problem with this :-). Well, that frequency goes though multiple walls like knife in butter, I wish he played the guitar instead ... :-)

**grahambop** · 04-25-2017, 08:10 AM

When I was about 9 or 10, someone gave my parents a portable record player and just 2 LPs - Holst's Planet Suite, and Beethoven's 3rd Symphony. (Apart from this, all we had in the way of music was a transistor radio.) So I used to lie on the floor and play these 2 records endlessly - I was spellbound and wanted to play an instrument, but I wanted to sound like the whole orchestra, so no one instrument appealed.

Then one day I saw Julian Bream and John Williams playing on TV, and the 'light bulb' moment happened - the guitar sounded like a miniature orchestra and could be played by itself. From then on I pestered my parents to get me a 'Spanish guitar' as I called it. Then I was lucky enough to have classical guitar lessons at school (from a very good visiting teacher), paid for by my parents.

So that's how I started on the guitar.

**Noah D'Innocenzo** · 04-25-2017, 08:43 AM

Originally Posted by pilotony

I guess I was about 7 or 8 years old when sometime in the mid 50s I saw Les Paul and Mary Ford on TV. A few years later I heard the Ventures' (Walk Don't Run) and Duane Eddy's (Rebel Rouser).

Instrumentals such as: The Virtues rendition of "Guitar Boogie Shuffle" (still one of the best jazzy/rock solos of all times); Jorgan Ingman's "Apache"; Lonny Mack's "Memphis" and; Joey Dee and the Starlighters "Peppermint Twist" (another great jazzy/rock solo).

Chuck Berry.

Started taking lessons in the early 60s (pre British Invasion) and came across an album by Tony Mottola called "Romantic Guitar". I then realized how great the guitar could sound. Listened over and over to Chet Atkins, Johnny Smith, Wes, Howard Roberts and a host of others.

Another important influence was that I grew up in an era when it was common to hear live music at local restaurants in New York City. Most times a solo guitarist.

Good thread. Thanks.

That's too cool! I love Howard Roberts. Nobody ever talks about that guy! It's also such a shame how things have becomes. Nobody wants to spend the honestly small amount of money to hire even a solo instrumentalist for a dinner set these days. And on that note it's a shame how many people don't even care live music is dying.

Sorry, I'm being depressing now.