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As a drummer who codes (or coder who drums), I feel qualified to comment on your analogy. Firstly, you can be productive -very- quickly on other instruments to

As a drummer who codes (or coder who drums), I feel qualified to comment on your analogy. Firstly, you can be productive -very- quickly on other instruments too. Guitar and piano are both "good enough" even if you can only play 3 chords. You can then learn more as you go. Secondly, being productive in coding from very early should be qualified with "for some definition of productive". Yes, you can write code, yes it meets the spec, but usually there's also an element of feedback in code review. Sometimes a lot of feedback. I concur with the grand parent, we get -better- at coding with practice and experience. As long as you are getting feedback in some way. The "practice" part might be in challenging your own solution. Rewrite it to go twice as fast. Or in half the code. Or not using that convenient language-provided data structure, or whatever. For the record I'd describe myself as an "excellent" coder (in my field) but my drumming as "enthusiastic". Competent amateur maybe, but far from "professional".

em-bee 3y ago
i mostly agree, but having had piano and guitar lessons in school, and later having learned playing the irish drum on my own, i don't share that experience. maybe the teaching methods were wrong (i kind of felt the teacher expected everyone to just naturally pick up notes and play). i certainly wasn't able to just grip a chord and start playing it. that alone would have taken me hours of practice. so i never learned even just one chord on a guitar nor did i manage to get any useful sequence of notes out of a piano, whereas the drum i practically learned only from playing in live sessions, and not from practicing myself at home (although there was some of that too, but not much). all i needed was an ear for rhythm.
- bruce511 3y ago
  I think you hit the nail on the head with 2 parts of your story. Firstly, playing with others is great fun, and a great way to learn and improve. Not to mention a good motivator. Like you, most of my improvement has been in that context. When I was just starting out we had "bands" of beginners (guitar, piano, bass etc) and there was a sense of progress learning just one chord or riff etc. So -how- you learn matters. Equally "starting young" is a common wisdom, but most of the people I play with now "started old". They started because -they- wanted to play, not because someone else wanted to play. I think method also matters. In school we "learnt" recorder, but it started with "reading music". That's like explaining virtual methods in object orientated design to someone who can't write a for loop. For both activities we learn better when it's fun.

em-bee 3y ago

i mostly agree, but having had piano and guitar lessons in school, and later having learned playing the irish drum on my own, i don't share that experience. maybe the teaching methods were wrong (i kind of felt the teacher expected everyone to just naturally pick up notes and play). i certainly wasn't able to just grip a chord and start playing it. that alone would have taken me hours of practice. so i never learned even just one chord on a guitar nor did i manage to get any useful sequence of notes out of a piano, whereas the drum i practically learned only from playing in live sessions, and not from practicing myself at home (although there was some of that too, but not much). all i needed was an ear for rhythm.

bruce511 3y ago
I think you hit the nail on the head with 2 parts of your story. Firstly, playing with others is great fun, and a great way to learn and improve. Not to mention a good motivator. Like you, most of my improvement has been in that context. When I was just starting out we had "bands" of beginners (guitar, piano, bass etc) and there was a sense of progress learning just one chord or riff etc. So -how- you learn matters. Equally "starting young" is a common wisdom, but most of the people I play with now "started old". They started because -they- wanted to play, not because someone else wanted to play. I think method also matters. In school we "learnt" recorder, but it started with "reading music". That's like explaining virtual methods in object orientated design to someone who can't write a for loop. For both activities we learn better when it's fun.