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Divas who are musicians?

MissySki

Angel Diva
So music reading 101 is actually coming along pretty well so far, for the notes I'm working on anyway. There are a suprisingly large number of kid songs I can play picking at the 8 or so notes I'm working on in the first few frets of the c, e, and a strings. I got a lot of practice in Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. I will get a bit more in tonight as well ahead of my next leason tomorrow. Hopefully it will translate in my lesson, I felt like I got a bit nervous and didn't play as well in my last lesson as when I'm practicing alone, but hopefully I'll get over the stage fright and my fingers will be more cooperative this week.
 

Lmk92

Angel Diva
I am not a musician, although my kids make me regret putting my flute away all those years ago. @captain_hug99 my youngest is a bassoon player; we're currently paying for an upgrade as well as lessons. He swears it will pay off in terms of scholarships, so I'm crossing my fingers!

The other two are flute and tuba/baritone. I wish I had known how important music would be in their lives when they were younger (I married a jock, so of course, we pushed sports). I'm so glad they showed us the way.

I think if I could start a new instument, it would be English Horn. A local university has Octoboefest every year, which my son attends. The culminating concert highlights double reeds, and I always love hearing the English Horn.
 

MissySki

Angel Diva
I am not a musician, although my kids make me regret putting my flute away all those years ago. @captain_hug99 my youngest is a bassoon player; we're currently paying for an upgrade as well as lessons. He swears it will pay off in terms of scholarships, so I'm crossing my fingers!

The other two are flute and tuba/baritone. I wish I had known how important music would be in their lives when they were younger (I married a jock, so of course, we pushed sports). I'm so glad they showed us the way.

I think if I could start a new instument, it would be English Horn. A local university has Octoboefest every year, which my son attends. The culminating concert highlights double reeds, and I always love hearing the English Horn.
I am not a musician, although my kids make me regret putting my flute away all those years ago. @captain_hug99 my youngest is a bassoon player; we're currently paying for an upgrade as well as lessons. He swears it will pay off in terms of scholarships, so I'm crossing my fingers!

The other two are flute and tuba/baritone. I wish I had known how important music would be in their lives when they were younger (I married a jock, so of course, we pushed sports). I'm so glad they showed us the way.

I think if I could start a new instument, it would be English Horn. A local university has Octoboefest every year, which my son attends. The culminating concert highlights double reeds, and I always love hearing the English Horn.

Do you think you'd ever take lessons now? Sounds like you could have quite the jam group in your house, so fun!!

I am so much more motivated now than when I was younger. Even though I was interested in music as a kid, I wasn't willing to put in the work or time required to progress because I was too consumed with other things I guess. I wish that hadn't been the case because boy did I have way more free time back then where I could have practiced, and now I could be great, or not, who knows! haha I am where I am now though, and I'm enjoying myself. It's never too late to start again! I have in mind that I'll learn more instruments down the road too, someday I plan to go back to guitar and I'd like to then do electric guitar as well. Hoping ukulele will be a gateway into more complicated string instruments, though right now I'm perfectly content with just the ukulele. I'm not in any rush to move on and assume it'll be a good long time before I'll have the ability or desire to add a second instrument because I haven't even scratched the surface where I am now.

In my lesson this week my instructor and I traded off playing the melody note line and the harmony chords for some simple songs together because the book we are using has both for most of the practice music (this is where it pays off that I actually know a few simple chords from my YouTube learning previously as we haven't gotten to chords yet but it was only C, G, F which I've actually practiced ALOT). This was soooo much fun!! It's at a super simplistic level right now, but someday I'd love to be able to jam with others in general, it's one of my goals. I just picture lounging around after skiing on a trip or sitting around a summer bonfire and playing around with others etc. Who it is that I'll be playing with..?? No idea!! lol Hopefully some musically inclined people will manifest themselves when I get to that point! :rotf:
 

Lmk92

Angel Diva
My son is encouraging me pretty strongly to start taking lessons. The problem is I'm not sure the cost of lessons + the cost of an English Horn is justifiable, especially with my bad ski addiction.

I was pretty motivated as a kid, but I wasn't goal-driven. I was also a pretty naive kid, the first in my family to go to college, or pretty much do anything, so I had no idea what options were available to me beyond high school. For instance, I had no idea I might be able to play in a college band or community band, because those people were so much better than me, lol.

It's so interesting what I have learned from my kids. They have truly opened my eyes as far as opportunities I have missed. I'm not ruling out picking up the EH - you definitely have me thinking seriously about it - but not for another year, probably, when my son's bassoon is paid off.
 

tinymoose

Ski Diva Extraordinaire
Hopefully it will translate in my lesson, I felt like I got a bit nervous and didn't play as well in my last lesson as when I'm practicing alone, but hopefully I'll get over the stage fright and my fingers will be more cooperative this week.

I have this same issue too. Even though my teacher is oh so very nice, and I've been taking lessons with her for over a year now, I still get nervous at my lessons knowing she's watching.

ETA: I'm finally on to Level 2 Piano.
 

MissySki

Angel Diva
My son is encouraging me pretty strongly to start taking lessons. The problem is I'm not sure the cost of lessons + the cost of an English Horn is justifiable, especially with my bad ski addiction.

I was pretty motivated as a kid, but I wasn't goal-driven. I was also a pretty naive kid, the first in my family to go to college, or pretty much do anything, so I had no idea what options were available to me beyond high school. For instance, I had no idea I might be able to play in a college band or community band, because those people were so much better than me, lol.

It's so interesting what I have learned from my kids. They have truly opened my eyes as far as opportunities I have missed. I'm not ruling out picking up the EH - you definitely have me thinking seriously about it - but not for another year, probably, when my son's bassoon is paid off.

I can relate to that having been the first in my family to do this stuff as well. I can only imagine how much more information most kids have access to today with the internet at their fingertips too.

Understandable on waiting a little bit, the pricing looks to be a whole heck of a lot higher for those instruments than my ukulele and beginner guitar!!
 

MissySki

Angel Diva
I have this same issue too. Even though my teacher is oh so very nice, and I've been taking lessons with her for over a year now, I still get nervous at my lessons knowing she's watching.

ETA: I'm finally on to Level 2 Piano.

@tinymoose I've now been to 4 lessons, and I'm amazed at how much more I can do already. The nerves in front of her have gotten a bit better, but I still feel like my fingers get a lot more jumbled there than at home! lol I definitely practice much more in anticipation of my classes, so accountability has been achieved!! Half hour lessons absolutely fly by, I'd like if they were an hour, but maybe for now it's good to do it in shorter bursts. She said we could do an hour, but I think more practice/repetition/progression is needed to justify the extra cost expenditure, perhaps it will be worth it down the road when we are doing more complicated things. The biggest strides so far are definitely with reading music and some music theory as well, though I have a loooong way to go!! It's already opened up a plethora of songs I can finger pick. The frustrating part is that my music reading skills are advancing quicker then my finger muscle memory which slows me down. Progress feels good though, I'm hoping I'm building a good foundation for future strides to come.

I was wondering what you've been up to with piano, haven't seen a video posted in awhile! :wink:
 

Jenny

Angel Diva
@MissySki - I was wandering around Banff today and at one of the churches here in town that have posted ukelele lessons at two different levels, beginner and knows 10+ chords, as well as ukulele jam sessions. So, total justification for a trip to Banff, which is awesome!
 

MissySki

Angel Diva
@MissySki - I was wandering around Banff today and at one of the churches here in town that have posted ukelele lessons at two different levels, beginner and knows 10+ chords, as well as ukulele jam sessions. So, total justification for a trip to Banff, which is awesome!

That's really awesome, and it's definitely on my list of places to visit!! Wish my church did that!
 

Lmk92

Angel Diva
I can relate to that having been the first in my family to do this stuff as well. I can only imagine how much more information most kids have access to today with the internet at their fingertips too.

Understandable on waiting a little bit, the pricing looks to be a whole heck of a lot higher for those instruments than my ukulele and beginner guitar!!
Oh, gosh, yes. We're talking thousands of dollars for a new bassoon!
 

diymom

Ski Diva Extraordinaire
An Unlikely Story in Plainville, MA has some "open strum sessions" coming up. Apparently there were also Earth Day ukelele jam sessions.
 

MissySki

Angel Diva
An Unlikely Story in Plainville, MA has some "open strum sessions" coming up. Apparently there were also Earth Day ukelele jam sessions.

Wow it also looks like they have group classes here!!! How cool! I used to work quite close to Plainville.. Now I'm in Cambridge, so not sure how easily I might be able to get there on an ongoing basis, but I definitely want to look into it further as it seems like a fun idea!

The open strum session would be really cool, and at least you don't need to commit to it every week. Thank you so much for this! I'm looking forward to trying to jam with a group soon, not sure if I am ready yet to be able to keep up, but worth checking into.
 

MissySki

Angel Diva
Something that really appealed to me about ukulele when deciding to learn is how mobile it should be, I dream of playing on the beach when I go wait for sunsets and outside in general. However, I found that once I got a uke I didn't really want to expose it to harsh environments like humid salty air at the water or leaving it in a hot car etc.. not ideal for a wood instrument! So I had been researching a high quality plastic option so I could do the outside thing without fearing ruining things, but still sound pretty good of course. My wooden uke is concert size, and I picked up a tenor sized Outdoor Ukulele last month that gets great reviews for durability and playability. I've played it inside a bit, but finally got to hang outside for some practice this past weekend, and it was so great, I'm excited to do so much more with nice weather coming!

IMG_9992.JPG
 

MissySki

Angel Diva
My ukulele instructor makes me sing now, I guess it's supposed to help me develop my ear. I secretly love it because I love singing, but usualky feel I sound too bad to do it in front of anyone else. She says I have extremely good pitch, but I maintain that I'm tone deaf! Lol I can hit notes quite well when I'm picking a melody, but when I go to strumming chords instead while singing I'm further off.. close, but can get a bit pitchy. (But I can't really hear it then, hence the tone deafness I claim!). She thinks I'm an alto, which she is as well. I wanted to take voice lessons once upon a time, this isn't that, but I am liking getting to wrap it into the overall experience with an instrument a bit since I like singing when I play.
 

MissySki

Angel Diva
Fender Play is offering 3 free months of membership right now, you don’t enter any payment info etc. This gives you access to guitar, bass, and ukulele lesson programs and song tutorials etc. I haven’t tried it out yet, but I’ve been wanting to start playing my ukulele again and thought this would be helpful. Figured others might be interested if you have extra time on your hands and want to learn or get help on an instrument.
 

Kimmyt

Ski Diva Extraordinaire
@MissySki I didn't realize you played uke, I picked one up a few years ago and have been playing more and more. Me and my brother (who lives across the country) have been having a fun song challenge where we choose a song and we each arrange and sing it and then send videos to each other. Its been great for me to develop my ear and learn different strumming patterns. I'm starting to play around with fingerpicking but I'm definitely not very good at it. This last week's song was Long Black Veil (traditional) and the week before was Shook Me All Night (AC/DC, rock).
 

DeeSki

Ski Diva Extraordinaire
I've been using Fender Play. I think it’s pretty good. I’ve owned a guitar for a good 20 years but never learned to play it properly. I play other instruments and had a basic understanding of how a guitar works so I flew through the early stages. It’s getting a bit trickier now but I’m really enjoying it, especially now that my fingers are a bit less sore. I think I can now proudly describe myself as a lousy guitar player, where previously I would have said I don’t play guitar. Unfortunately I think I’m going to have to take a few days off because I stabbed myself in the hand making dinner last night. :doh:
 

Jenny

Angel Diva
I took a guitar class in college and can still remember how much my fingers hurt!

How'd you manage the stabbing?
 

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