Encouraging your kids into music/guitar

viz · February 2018

Our three sing and play guitar, keyboards and drums.

Kebabkid · February 2018

That's a great story and well done to her. You must be very proud.

As Mrs.KK is a music teacher but specialises in singing in piano and I play a bit, everyone kept telling us our son would be musical. Well, one hopes so but I've seen that's not necessarily so.

We applied the gently-gently approach. We made sure there were instruments around the house i.e. guitars, piano, synth, kazoo, various percussion, including electronic pads, and we just let him have access to them and just watched if he liked something or gravitated to any particular instrument as well as always having various music playing in the house. As it turned out, he chose drums and vocals, but he can pick out a tune on piano.

After 4 years of playing drums, and this includes private lessons and playing in band situations at his Saturday rock school and school productions, at 13, he's a Grade 6.

I think my proudest 'Dad Moment' was when he turned to me one day and said "Dad, can we have a jam"?

He's a regular kid who likes the trappings of today's teenage generation, which includes electronic devices, but I'd say he spends three-quarters of his free time playing and studying music without any prompts from us and he looks forward to it (thank God for a Roland drum kit and headphones)!

It's a wonderful thing to see and one of the best things I saw was a couple of years ago when the advanced group at his rock school (average age 14), performed 'Dark Side of the Moon' in its entirety and here's clip

ESBlonde · February 2018

I never expected my children to be musicians, it's something you love or don't. I tried to give the opportunities to do all sorts go carts, skiing, football, etc. as well as offering them instruments. Oldest son had some competance on guitar but loved football and sold his gear to spend more time on football (to be fair he plays for a team that now pay him so his standard is quite good). He can still bash out a few chords and wants one of my more valuable guitars in my will. Youngest son also started on guitar but then decided drumming was better before abanding both first for football and then pool/snooker where his talent is recognised at national level.
I don't think you can do more than provide experiences and encouragement for what they see as important. If that happens to be the same things you love then great.

Dominic · February 2018

Kebabkid said:

That's a great story and well done to her. You must be very proud.

As Mrs.KK is a music teacher but specialises in singing in piano and I play a bit, everyone kept telling us our son would be musical. Well, one hopes so but I've seen that's not necessarily so.

We applied the gently-gently approach. We made sure there were instruments around the house i.e. guitars, piano, synth, kazoo, various percussion, including electronic pads, and we just let him have access to them and just watched if he liked something or gravitated to any particular instrument as well as always having various music playing in the house. As it turned out, he chose drums and vocals, but he can pick out a tune on piano.

After 4 years of playing drums, and this includes private lessons and playing in band situations at his Saturday rock school and school productions, at 13, he's a Grade 6.

I think my proudest 'Dad Moment' was when he turned to me one day and said "Dad, can we have a jam"?

He's a regular kid who likes the trappings of today's teenage generation, which includes electronic devices, but I'd say he spends three-quarters of his free time playing and studying music without any prompts from us and he looks forward to it (thank God for a Roland drum kit and headphones)!

It's a wonderful thing to see and one of the best things I saw was a couple of years ago when the advanced group at his rock school (average age 14), performed 'Dark Side of the Moon' in its entirety and here's clip

Fantastic

munckee · February 2018

My daughter had guitar lessons at school and thought it was okay, I bought her a cheap nylon string which she didn't practice loads at home. She asked to switch to piano and has got reasonable at it, she sings really nicely and announced a performance a couple of weeks ago and played Mr Piano Man and sang along and it was good.

I've never pressured her with it but I've noticed the better she gets at piano the more interested she is in playing guitar and I hear her practicing more now than ever.

Corvus · February 2018

Nice one Wolfetone!

I didn't do anything regards my boy, though he always had music around. He decided he wanted to play and we got him a Strat copy after he made do with a terrible classical for a time. He got into it well, but Rock School lessons nearly killed it for him. At 11 he stripped down the Strat completely, resprayed it & changed pickups & wiring, changed trem etc. Now 19 he still uses it along with a Jazzmaster I built and his band are a proper good mates. Most if not all of them look like going to Manchester to do music tech & production type courses.

For a while he wanted to jam and be shown things, but I guess the teenage go-it-alone thing kicked in and while I could've taught him stuff & saved him time, letting him explore his own way, supporting where possible, has worked best.

BigMonka · February 2018

@Wolfetone that's a brilliant song and recording, she (and you) should be really proud of it. She's got a lovely tone to her voice too. :-)

My daughter is 7, and although there are always guitars around the house and she sees me and other family members playing lots, I think that one of the reasons she's not interested at the moment is that she thinks of it as her dad's hobby so why would she want to do the same thing!

Teetonetal · February 2018

I guess one thing is to think about what inspired you to play? for me it was going to see a live concert aged 8 or 9 - it was a Church / folk thing in a very small theater with an American songwriter that my parents loved. Guy was a real good player and I played since then. Helped that my Dad was also into guitar in a small way, so we a couple of acoustics around the house.

that said, my no 1 love is mountain biking. growing up I didn't know a single person int biking and I stumbled on it purely by chance. (had to get somewhere really quick, so took a forest short cut and loved it...)

pmbomb · February 2018

Teetonetal said:

I guess one thing is to think about what inspired you to play? for me it was going to see a live concert aged 8 or 9 - it was a Church / folk thing in a very small theater with an American songwriter that my parents loved. Guy was a real good player and I played since then. Helped that my Dad was also into guitar in a small way, so we a couple of acoustics around the house.

that said, my no 1 love is mountain biking. growing up I didn't know a single person int biking and I stumbled on it purely by chance. (had to get somewhere really quick, so took a forest short cut and loved it...)

@Teetonetal ; I got into MTB because a client ran an MTB holiday company and offered me a discount off a bike. I have them as a client because I saw their brochure in a Youth Hostel when away kayaking. I got into kayaking because I lived and worked in a town that had a river and a club. I lived and worked in the town because the company I worked for moved there after I joined it. I had a couple of good job offers ... it was near random which I took.

Been riding ever since, turns out I live in an MTB paradise.

I love the random connectivity of it all.

Sorry I digress ....

Teetonetal · February 2018

pmbomb said:

Teetonetal said:

I guess one thing is to think about what inspired you to play? for me it was going to see a live concert aged 8 or 9 - it was a Church / folk thing in a very small theater with an American songwriter that my parents loved. Guy was a real good player and I played since then. Helped that my Dad was also into guitar in a small way, so we a couple of acoustics around the house.

that said, my no 1 love is mountain biking. growing up I didn't know a single person int biking and I stumbled on it purely by chance. (had to get somewhere really quick, so took a forest short cut and loved it...)

@Teetonetal ;; I got into MTB because a client ran an MTB holiday company and offered me a discount off a bike. I have them as a client because I saw their brochure in a Youth Hostel when away kayaking. I got into kayaking because I lived and worked in a town that had a river and a club. I lived and worked in the town because the company I worked for moved there after I joined it. I had a couple of good job offers ... it was near random which I took.

Been riding ever since, turns out I live in an MTB paradise.

I love the random connectivity of it all.

Sorry I digress ....

@pmbomb Just goes to show though - I think you can encourage kids at what they do and you can give them openings based on what you like / are good at, but ultimately everyone finds there own way and it might turn out to be something totally random.

I liked hearing about Billy Morgan (bronze in big air) his parents encouraged him to go to Gymnastics, he did that for a while, then went snowboarding on a dry slope... ends up the first man to land a quad cork. Sometimes we need to let life be random and not impose too much direction on others.

boogieman · February 2018

Iamnobody said:

pmbomb said:

Iamnobody said:

Great stuff. You must be very proud.

Re. Encouraging music there’s guitars and keyboards around the house. Both mine have Hello Kitty Strats but are far too young to play yet.

The eldest (6) does piano lessons but we don’t push her - she’s probably on the cusp of giving up as she doesn’t practice as much these days. That’s fine as we’d hate her to feel like she has to do it.

We listen to a lot of music at home and they both love singing.

It’s got to happen naturally like with your daughter. But as mentioned above we are planting seeds.

uh-oh. off to Google "Hello Kitty Strat".

Are they full sized?

We have this in pink - OK for the money but won't hold tuning. Doesn't really matter at this stage to be honest.

https://www.gear4music.com/Guitar-and-Bass/LA-Electric-Guitar-and-Amp-Pack-Black/7

Hello Kitty Strats are full size yes. They are decent guitars actually.

There are no longer in production though so used is your only option.

Both mine were mint and bought from young ladies who were given them as presents by their parents but subsequently didn’t take up playing! I can see the same thing happening with our two in a few years!

They are becoming collectable though and some people are trying for silly money.

My daughter's HK Strat wasn't that great to be honest. They were Indonesian made and obviously budget guitars, the neck on hers was horrible but it was the last one Peter Cook's had in stock so I didn't have any choice. They can always be made better I suppose. They definitely look cool in a kitsch so-bad-it's good sort of way. I sold hers for £90, if I'd known they were going to go up in value I would've held onto it till they started fetching silly money. The Bad Maru bass from the same range is also daft, but eminently collectible.

Wolfetone · March 2018

Thanks (on behalf of my daughter!) for the encouraging and interesting comments. We did a little video yesterday for her tune. feedback always welcome;

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Encouraging your kids into music/guitar

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