Too young to start..........

[The Funk]

Hi L-Mac. Received and replied. I wasn't trying to imply it was for sale unfortunately. But I'm sure you could pick one up for less than I paid for it.

[The Funk]

[url="http://www.westfieldguitar.co.uk/westfield/products.asp?ID=424"]http://www.westfieldguitar.co.uk/westfield...ucts.asp?ID=424[/url]

That's the bass I have. I have it in black but sunburst looks cool.

[Tait]

[quote name='Mobius' post='82000' date='Oct 31 2007, 11:14 PM']I disagree there, i played for 3 years before i picked up bass. Certainly taught me a lot about music and theory, and the extra hand dexterity helped. It doesn't help with the basics of bass playing like fretting noted and your picking action but of course there's more to being a musician than that.[/quote]

+1, even though i managed to fail grade 1 piano, it still taught me a lot for when i came to play bass.

and id get him a squier bronco, that was my first bass. they're cheap and pretty decent basses.

[Pugz]

My original instrument was piano. I started when I was very young and towards about the age of 10 or 11 I lost some of my interest and I ended up stopping at the age of about 12. At 15 I remember seeing a talented friend of mine playing bass. He did a slap improvisation and I thought it was the coolest thing i'd ever seen in my life. Immediately I thought "Oh my f*ing god I HAVE to learn to do that!". I pestered my parents to let me get a bass. My parents were a little reluctant as they thought I might lose interest like I did on piano. However after much pestering I eventually got my bass. A bit over 3 years later, now, I am still playing on average about 3 or 4 hours a day and I have found a real direction in my life which I really love and want to pursue as a career.

I never had any lessons and I figured things out for myself. I had some of my knowledge of theory from piano playing still up there somewhere and that has stayed with me since then so my theory is pretty good. In the 3 years I've played, I've managed to play live on Red Dragon FM, play at the Big Weekend Festival in cardiff, have paid for sessions in the studio working with great musicians and producer Danny Chang and have made something of a name for myself around South Wales especially over the last few months. I'm currently in 3 bands (including SEX if anyones ever heard of them) and over the past month I've had to decline about 6 offers to join bands.

Not only has playing bass made me realize a passion for performing music but it has also revitalized my enjoyment of playing piano. I restarted up piano and bought myself an electric piano to practice on. I retaught myself to play the piano and I am doing pretty well. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZ0ehB6pYyw heres a video of my playing clair de lune. I taught myself this piece after 6 months of restarting the piano after about 6 years of not playing. It is one of my proudest accomplishments learning that piece.)

Playing bass really taught me to appreciate music of different styles and has really made me open up to learning the piano again and more recently I have started the electric guitar too.

I don't want to say, do this or do that but I hope by reading my experience you can come to a decision yourself with knowledge of others experiences.

I am a self taught player and where as many people seem to think that it is a handicap having no teacher, I am personally very glad that I did teach myself and I actually consider it a learning advantage. Learning by yourself allows you to learn in your own way, in your own time and will allow you to develop your own style as to what is comfortable for you. A great explanation I heard from Victor Wooten from one of his bass clinics when he was talking about learning techniques I use frequently:

When you learn a technique, if you are taught how to do it, the teacher will show you exactly how you 'should' be doing it. So you basically cut straight to the technique and learn it quick. However if you try and figure it out for yourself, the chances are at first, you are going to go wrong. But in that trial and error testing phase of learning, you learn a whole load of other things that you wouldn't have learned say for example if a teacher had just said "do it like this." The way victor wooten put it was like, when you are driving, and you are trying to find a specific place you've never been to before.. if you are searching on your own and you get really lost, when you eventually find the place, you will know a whole load of other roads you wouldn't have otherwise known if you had directions showing you exactly where to go.


That to me, for the most part sums up why I think self-teaching is an advantage. At the same time my heart really was in learning the bass and I have a genuine love of music and I think that is pretty crucial. I followed my heart and it has taken me a long way. Though I will stress again that this is just my experience and things could turn out differently for your son but I hope that my account of my experience of become a bass player can help you make a better decision.

[paul, the]

Great post pugz!

---
That's just about every angle covered.


edit: loved your piano piece. A few wibbleys but a million miles ahead of me. More practice for paul.

Edited November 5, 2007 by paul, the

[L-mac]

UPDATE

Well......he got his first bass at the weekend and spent Sunday learning a couple of U2 tracks - 4 note specials - and feeling very pleased with himself!! Piano practice tonight didnt raise a single complaint for the first time in months.

Thanks for all the input, advice and brilliant posts.

cheers
L

[paul, the]

[quote name='L-mac' post='84145' date='Nov 5 2007, 07:01 PM']UPDATE

Well......he got his first bass at the weekend and spent Sunday learning a couple of U2 tracks - 4 note specials - and feeling very pleased with himself!! Piano practice tonight didnt raise a single complaint for the first time in months.

Thanks for all the input, advice and brilliant posts.

cheers
L[/quote]

Aww lovely to hear.

Keep us updated.

[Pugz]

[quote name='paul, the' post='83800' date='Nov 5 2007, 06:28 AM']Great post pugz!

---
That's just about every angle covered.


edit: loved your piano piece. A few wibbleys but a million miles ahead of me. More practice for paul.[/quote]

Heh cheers. Yea there were a couple of slip ups. Beautiful piece of music. I should play piano more than I do really. It's my 3rd instrument bass being top then guitar as my second.

The venue I'm playing in there I do 2 jam nights a month in that I set up with one of my bands. I play solo bass pieces and lots of band stuff. Also play lots of stuff on guitar there. Last time i did voodoo child which was pretty fun though only me and the drummer knew the song which was a bit dodgey. I'm there again next Wednesday too playing little wing this time, perhaps voodoo child too if I can get someone who knows the bass. I'll post a video if it goes well and I manage to get it on film.