Your Musical Genesis

[JHC]

What sparked your interest in music, how did it develop, did you come from a musical family, did you study an instrument.

My Grandfather played Violin and Cello semi pro, my Mother and Father both played piano (amateur) and also did the odd stint on the local church organ, we were all in the church choir, the house did not have music playing all day just the occasional practice from parents, they sent me for piano lessons early on but I was not really interested and stopped after about a year, later on in my early teens I had a go at Violin, then Cello this was much more interesting and led me onto the Double Bass which ticked all my boxes and I stuck at it. Much later on I had Clarinet lessons and finally found the Flute, so although I never made a living from music I was semi pro for a number of years, my interests went from classical to Jazz and then back to classical which is my preferred music but I do still enjoy jazz. How about you?

[Corno Dolce]

After hearing Virgil Fox at Riverside Church I knew I was destined to be a 'piper'........

[teddy]

Most of my family played something, and just about all of us played piano, to some degree. We often listened to music on the radio or windup gramaphone. We children all asng at school and in church and at various concerts. It was listening to Luxumberg that really set me off, and AFN and later Radio London and Radio Caroline that really sealed it. I get a great deal of pleasure from music of all genres and just wish I coul get a decent sound out of an instrument.

teddy

[Krummhorn]

I was born into a very musical family. My parents were long time musicians in the Scandinavian Symphony in Detroit (Michigan), and later in the Long Beach Philharmonic (California). Dad played the double B flat tuba, Mom the violin. As we kids grew up, my sister took on the viola & violin, and I took up the piano.

Our morning routine at home was listening to "Coffee Cup Concert" on a local classical station while we ate our breakfast and got ready for work or school. I demonstrated an aptitude for the piano and began lessons at age 6. When I was 12 years old, I began organ lessons, and in 1960 took my first church organ position, and haven't been home on Xmas Eve since.

My Dad took me to many organ concerts in my youthful years ... Corla Pandit, Virgil Fox and many other fine musicians. In my early adult years I had the good fortune to hear E. Power Biggs in Los Angeles.

[Contratrombone64]

Colin, interesting question. My musical talent was not hereditary: my mother was tone deaf and my father had no musical gifts whatsoever. That said, my father did have a huge appreciation for "classical music". My first epiphany about music (can't think of a better mo****r) was in primary school. I sat in a little school band playing a drum and lusted after the glockenspiel as it got the tune. At the time, my yearnings were subtle and grew quickly (though I had no idea why).

[Soubasse]

Thanks for putting this question Colin. It's often an interesting one to review, particularly after many years when certain memories may present themselves after varied types of prompting.

I wouldn't say that mine was a musical family by any stretch of the imagination. My father however, was a most competent pianist, and - as I would find out a few years later - a competent organist as well. He was also an Anglican priest which meant a childhood ensconsed in Sunday services and the various trappings that come with it, including some (still) rather nice music. Regardless of my having abandoned the Christian beliefs many long years ago, I still admire the music that has come from the liturgies of many denominations. I have of course, been able to draw on this when it came to continuing my profession as a cathedral organist following my "change of life", so that I could play to my own personal satisfaction in a church in as non-hypocritical a manner as possible - at least I believe I do (hope that makes some sort of sense!).

I didn't get to see, hear or play a proper pipe organ until I was about 12 years old and this was when my dad was asked to move to a new parish. For the first time, he was at a church that had a pipe organ and not a harmonium. It was watching him try out that organ on the day we visited this church that really struck a spark in me, and made me want to be able to play an instrument like that too. I'd been learning the piano for some years at that stage, but this was new, exciting and different.

I enjoyed hearing Beethoven when my mother put an LP on the old "record player", there was something in this composer's music that really stirred me too. But it was when I heard a piece of music that brought me to tears, that I realised there was something very powerful, and something very emotionally and personally fulfilling about music. I was quite young and I was powerless to stop the tears. Furthermore, I was completely unable to figure out why I was moved in this way, it just happened.

There was also music that scared me, and others that made me wonder. For a "young, impressionable lad" (!), this continued to be something of paramount importance and would always stay foremost in my mind. By the time I was 12, I had resolutely decided that whatever I did when I left school, I must be something to do with music. As I grew older and heard more, I discovered more importantly that there was music that could both speak of and appease anger, music that could articulate the singularly inexpressible, and music that could create absolute euphoria ... was there anything that this brilliant craft could not do??

I absolutely loved University - I was learning everything I wanted to know (and more) about music. And I want to keep learning as I have been. I feel that if I ever stopped wanting to learn about the inherent mysteries in this so noble of the arts (perhaps a little less noble than it used to be, sadly), that I might as well give up on everything. I want to soak it all up like a sponge - and hope that I will do it justice.

[Dorsetmike]

The family were a bit musical, Mother and her sister both fairly good on the piano, and good accompanists. Father had a great voice, one of the best counter tenors I ever heard, he was still singing treble solos in church well into his 20s, I inherited the counter tenor voice though never as pure a tone as fathers. It seemed as though our singing voices never broke in the way most do. Family and some neighbours would get together from time to time for an evenings singing round the piano, mostly victorian songs like the Lost Chord, Come into the Garden Maude and some of the then current 30's/40s popular songs. The family gramophone mainly carried classical music and quite a bit of opera which I never liked, interspersed with a few comedy numbers like Spike Jones and Arthur Askey.

I started to learn the piano but gave up after a couple of years when I started getting homework from school. I later played the harmonica for a few years. The RAF sent me out to the middle east in the mid 1950s, no night life except boozing in the NAAFI canteen or a social club in the camp church. The latter soon found me singing in the choir, the only "treble" joining the soprano of a couple of WRAF girls.

Inevitably the church choirs eventually brought me into contact with other choral groups and I discovered motets and madrigals, I was mostly singing the alto line having lost the top end of my range, I was happiest in small groups, 1 voice per part when possible . This continued until I left the RAF aged about 40, I couldn't find a suitable group to join especially as my then wife worked as a nursing auxilliary about 4 nights a week. My voice deteriorated probaly due to lack of singing use (plus the dreaded cigarettes)

So now nearly all of my music is listening, I still don't like opera, except for some very early like Purcell and Monteverdi. Instrumental music, in classical my preference is baroque, any jazz except for the more extreme atonal stuff, whatever music I listen to must have a tuneful melody for the most part.
I also got exposed to a lot more jazz than I had previously

[JHC]

It seems that the day of making music in the home has passed ‘Mum on Piano Dad on Violin kind of thing’ mainly due to Radio and TV etc but when you listen to music as opposed to just hearing it do you listen alone?? Perhaps 75% of my listening is solo, but I do belong to a music group that meet each month in each others home a program is provided by the host along with food and drink and each piece is dissected and commented upon, the evenings usually last for 3-4 hours, then there is the odd concert for me it is about 6 per year, being out of the main centres has its drawbacks.

[teddy]

My big regret is my youngest daughter. She took up violin at primary school and was a natural. Twice she played with the school orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall in London. She could have been a first violinist, but would not practice, so never became good enough for that position. Wasted talent.

teddy

[JHC]

It is never too late, how long ago was this??

[Contratrombone64]

I noticed that the recalcitrant and idiotic robot spelling bee here didn't like my use of the word m.o.n.i.k.e.r ... I wonder why?

[JHC]

I noticed that the recalcitrant and idiotic robot spelling bee here didn't like my use of the word m.o.n.i.k.e.r ... I wonder why?

It's probably American, were the asterisks inserted by you or the robot?

[Contratrombone64]

No - hence my comment. Obviously monik er in the USofFCKNGA doesn't mean a "tag" or "handle" or "nom d'plume".

[JHC]

It's probably a lady Americans name, which makes very good sense ITO (mo****r !!! the google spell check likes it)
I spoke too soon what a hoot

[JHC]

It does it automatically so just for fun mo****r mo****r mo****r mo****r MO****R