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Burning Down · 04-01-2013, 12:36 PM

My Musical Journey, Part I

I got real busy with school since my last update. It's my last year and it's been filled with endless papers, other homework assignments, and practise hours. And work - lots of it. But I have a little bit of time to myself right now that I need to waste away. So here we go.

I thought I would start to tell you how I got started on my musical journey. When I was a kid, I never played any sports or took piano lessons like many of my friends did. I did do tap dancing though, but I lost interest in it when I was about 12 or 13 years old. However, I was interested in the flute. When I was about 9, I convinced my parents to rent one for me and sign me up for a block of lessons. It was very expensive for them to do that and I had to promise them that I would stick with the lessons they paid for and work hard at learning the basics of the flute. If I did well and was still interested in continuing, they would purchase a flute for me and invest in lessons for the long term. Of course, I was absolutely interested, and my parents went out and bought my first flute for a mere $600. I was ecstatic.

About a year or so later, I started middle school, and they had a band class there. I took that class in place of private lessons for the next two years so I could play music with my friends and learn about other band instruments.

At that point, I became really interested in other aspects of music. How it was made, what it meant (and what it meant to me), why people enjoyed it, and why they enjoyed some types of music but not others. I continued with the flute throughout high school, taking music class and learning theory, harmony, and history. I was still part of the school band, and our music class was a smaller band, and both groups put on a performance at the end of each semester.

During this time, however, I discontinued with private lessons in flute. I realize now that I was not learning proper playing technique for playing flute at an advanced level, nor was I being provided with solo music that would challenge me and force me to become a better player. Instead, I was in a band setting, learning flute from music teachers who did not play it themselves, and playing mediocre band transcriptions of movie themes and popular songs and classical repertoire.

04-01-2013, 12:36 PM	#30 (permalink)
Burning Down The Music Guru. Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Beyond the Wall Posts: 4,858	My Musical Journey, Part I I got real busy with school since my last update. It's my last year and it's been filled with endless papers, other homework assignments, and practise hours. And work - lots of it. But I have a little bit of time to myself right now that I need to waste away. So here we go. I thought I would start to tell you how I got started on my musical journey. When I was a kid, I never played any sports or took piano lessons like many of my friends did. I did do tap dancing though, but I lost interest in it when I was about 12 or 13 years old. However, I was interested in the flute. When I was about 9, I convinced my parents to rent one for me and sign me up for a block of lessons. It was very expensive for them to do that and I had to promise them that I would stick with the lessons they paid for and work hard at learning the basics of the flute. If I did well and was still interested in continuing, they would purchase a flute for me and invest in lessons for the long term. Of course, I was absolutely interested, and my parents went out and bought my first flute for a mere $600. I was ecstatic. About a year or so later, I started middle school, and they had a band class there. I took that class in place of private lessons for the next two years so I could play music with my friends and learn about other band instruments. At that point, I became really interested in other aspects of music. How it was made, what it meant (and what it meant to me), why people enjoyed it, and why they enjoyed some types of music but not others. I continued with the flute throughout high school, taking music class and learning theory, harmony, and history. I was still part of the school band, and our music class was a smaller band, and both groups put on a performance at the end of each semester. During this time, however, I discontinued with private lessons in flute. I realize now that I was not learning proper playing technique for playing flute at an advanced level, nor was I being provided with solo music that would challenge me and force me to become a better player. Instead, I was in a band setting, learning flute from music teachers who did not play it themselves, and playing mediocre band transcriptions of movie themes and popular songs and classical repertoire.