What’s the „magic number“ of instruments that makes you a multi-instrumentalist? Three, four, five, oder more? How good should you be on any of them to call yourself a multi-instrumentalist?
Is playing several instruments a good thing or would the old saying of „jack of all trades but master of none“ apply?
Historically, people who played several instruments (for a living) was rather common for quite a while. Specialisation set in from the 1800s and, especially in classical music (with a few exceptions) we still have a tendency for professionals to have one main instrument and become as good as possible on this instrument.
I don’t want to take sides. However, I consider myself more of a multi-instrumentalist than a specialist in just one or two instruments, and some of the instruments I play have a little bit in common, so adding them to my skill set came almost naturally.
When I was in kindergarten, I played the recorder. I can’t say that I really knew how to play and I remember colourful pictures and „graphic notation“ showing which finger holes were to be closed. I always wanted to play the piano like my grandfather whom I loved dearly, and in the early 1980s the piano moved in with us. I had to take part in a music group first for a year or two before I could take lessons, but it was worth waiting and I still remember my first piano teacher fondly. She laid a good foundation that saved me during four years of mediocre teaching I had afterwards).
I kept my recorder and occasionally still played it. One day I found my mother’s old neglected guitar and started trying to figure out how to play. I taught myself playing chords and accompanying songs but never had proper lessons. I also had „lessons“ on the bugle (German Jagdhorn) from my father’s co-worker.
The (piano) accordion came next. A whole new world opened up and I loved the instrument from day one. I was quite good at it and even auditioned at music college but didn’t make it. But that’s another story.
Then there was the organ. Again, there were keys like on the piano and the treble side of the accordion, but one shouldn’t be fooled by these similarities to think that the organ is easy for a pianist. It has challenges of its own. Those of you who know me from previous blog posts will know that I continued playing the organ and that it’s now my main instrument (with the piano a close second).
During my time at music conservatory, when I studied for my diploma, I dived deep into singing and conducting and a little less deep into percussion. I can still play a xylophone with more than one mallet, but that’s a skill I don’t need that often anymore since I’m currently not teaching elementary music. Another thing I still do is writing songs and sometimes composing instrumental pieces.
My recorder collection grew and I also starting dabbling with tin whistles. For a while, I played horn in a marching band. I was given two diatonic button accordions that I still don’t play in front of an audience because I feel I need to practise more. I started playing ukulele last year and I sometimes play melodica.
When you’re playing so many instruments, you get asked a lot of questions. For example, how on earth do you do that, and don’t you get confused? Sometimes people seem disappointed that you’re not a virtuoso on one instrument.
And sometimes you have conversations like this:
„How many instruments do you play?“
(6 or more)
„Do you also play the violin?“
Nope.
„That’s such a pity.“
I know that the person probably meant well and maybe the violin was their dream instrument, but this comment still baffled me.
By the way, I wanted to play the violin for about half a day when I had just started secondary school – my music teacher had said that the school has an orchestra and that you could borrow instruments. So I came home and said to my mother: „I’m going to learn the violin.“
My mother looked at me, shaked her head and replied: „No, you’re not. This would annoy the dog“.
And so my career as a string player ended before it had even begun.
The closest I’m getting to a violin is my Otamatone and while there are people who can play it quite well, I’m not one of those people and I don’t feel the urge to work on my skills as much as I do for other instruments. But that’s just an aside.
I might not be a virtuoso, but I take pride in my ability to play different instruments and to make music in all kinds of settings. For me, this path is just right, but it has also been difficult from time to time.
I’m going to write more about virtuosity in another blog post.