[Hmmm I emailed a reply to this earlier today but it didn't show up here where I thought it was going to... hope it doesn't show up twice now...]
Hi gang, I joined this list yesterday because my friend Chris said you discuss intriguing things. It is so. I like these kinds of questions. You all have interesting stories, all different from each other. I love the story about the broken guitar turning out to be a mandolin. My story - music was always part of growing up at my house. My mom used to play organ and piano and long before I was born she gave up playing cello. My dad was musical and played a tune or two badly but with feeling on several instruments. Both loved to sing, and so we kids sang traveling songs in the car, and hymns in the church, and funny songs on the playground. We also got piano lessons whether we wanted them or not (and I didn't). I liked messing around on an instrument, but not practicing, something that hasn't changed any. We also had a couple ukuleles in the house. One was a plastic Arthur godfery one, the other was a classic old koa one which I still have. When we weren't playing El Kabong with them, my brother and I tuned them to a little plastic pitchpipe and strummed them. But they were better as weapons! I gave up on piano after a while and then when I saw the cool guitar- playing kids in high school had girlfriends I figured to try that out. And I fell in love with guitar. And also with instrument modification and making. I got an electric guitar and prepared to impress the girls. Sadly that part of the plan failed initially. At some point I got a ukulele-banjo, (my grandpa saw it said "Haw! Looky there! A Peanut-banjo!" So I call it that still) I didn't like ukulele strings on it, so I put 4 mandolin strings on it. I tuned it to about D rather than G. I still play my peanut banjo tuned this way and I think it sounds great like that. And I taught myself a family of chords, wasn't much interested in playing melody. Started attending a jam with way too many guitarists, so I borrowed a mandolin and used my peanut banjo chord family on it, which worked just fine. found there was a lot more opportunity for mando than guitar at jams. Joined a band. Joined another band. Went to a music camp (which was where I met Mike C), went to more music camps, and now whaddaya know I am teahcing mando at a camp (not the same one). Learned to play melodies and fancier chords and stuff. Discovered that Jethro Burns wasn't just funny - he played in a style I really liked. Why do I love playing music? It's fun, it's social, I like musicians (most of them), I enjoy making music and instruments. People tend to like musicians. If you wank up to someone and say, "Hi there, I'm a lawyer" (or tax collector, or proctologist, or whatever) they may not immediately smile and start wanting to know about your job. T'aint so with music. Durn near everybody likes music and by extension they view musicians as cool. I enjoy that. Why do I love playing mandolin? Well, it's small - that is a huge advantage. It is logically tuned. It is versatile (though in my hands at least, not as versatile as a guitar). It is relatively unusual (haven't we all been asked, "what is that little guitar you're playing?" nobody askes a piano player that question.) What do I most enjoy playing? Hard to say, but I still really love funny songs. I also like jamming in whatever genre happens to be happening: swing, blues, rock, bluegrass, folk, whatever. I am very lucky to have tolerant friends who don't mind if I am not up on the "traditionallly correct" way to do things because that know what I like to do. There are people who focus and become amazingly good at a few things. And there are generalists like me who will never be expert at anything, but can hold on in many contexts. I love the variety! Sorry this is so long. I enjoy this kind of chatter. Happy to be here. Topher --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Taterbugmando" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/taterbugmando?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
