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I've been a professional guitarist since I was a teenager, and switched to upright bass about 3 years ago (I'm 40). The biggest advantages to learning as an ad
by pcsanwald 9y ago
I've been a professional guitarist since I was a teenager, and switched to upright bass about 3 years ago (I'm 40).
The biggest advantages to learning as an adult is on average you are going to have money to pay for lessons and a decent instrument, and are probably going to be more organized in terms of practicing and all that.
The disadvantages are that it's harder to network and find others at your level to play with. And, to be clear, the way to get good at, and enjoy music, is to play with other people. Even one-on-one lessons are a form of playing with others, and many adults use lessons as a proxy for playing with others.
Playing with other people was a very easy thing for me to do when I was coming up, and I'd imagine it would be significantly harder for an adult. But, I believe it's critical to enjoyment and success in music.
- fenwick67 9y agoYeah it's been a real struggle for me to find people to play with as an adult. It's hard to find adults who aren't either A. really good, B. really bad, or C. too busy
- pcsanwald 9y agoI honestly think the best thing to do is to take lessons, and ask your teacher if they have other students who'd like to play with you. You can also go to jam sessions if you live in an area that has a good music scene; I live in SF and there are regular jam sessions for bluegrass/jazz/folk/country/blues nearby. But, the thing about jam sessions is that you have to be able to play at a certain level to really enjoy them. I think honestly the best solution is one that almost no one takes: hire really good musicians to play with you. When I was in music school, I had a professor that would literally say: "For all the money y'all pay in tuition, you would play better if you took that money and hired $famous_drummer and $famous_bassist to come play trio with you at your house". Obviously if you are a beginner you don't need to hire the best people in town, but most professional musicians in this day and age are going to be happy for a gig like this.
- zwieback 9y agoStraight to upright or did you play bass guitar first? I started playing upright in addition to bass guitar and it's a lot of fun but a lot of relearning as well.
- pcsanwald 9y agoI played electric bass for 6 months or so, then rented an upright for 6 months, and then bought an upright. I've been playing about 3.5 years, there's a recording of me here: http://paulsanwald.com/music http://paulsanwald.com/music Definitely a lot of learning for me, particularly regarding the bow. I went through the George Vance books and they were helpful with the basics. I was able to start playing professionally on it pretty quickly, though, played my first gig on upright after 6 months of playing. But things like higher thumb positions and soloing with the bow (I'm a jazz musician) are very much a work in progress. Luckily, in jazz you can get a long way just knowing a couple positions.