Heya,
Sorry this is another random thread, but I was wondering if people who play more instruments are better than people who just play like 1 instrument or something. Because my friend who only plays the piano is amazing at music, and my other friend who plays like 6 different instruments isn't really like amazing but she's sort of like she knows how to play the instruments and that's about it (I sound really mean-sorry!!) ... sorry if I'm being confuzzling...
thanks!
CrazyDudette22

I don't suppose it's a matter of being 'better' - I think that's your musicality. It depends again I suppose on the amount of work in to each instrument. Your piano friend MAY be at a higher grade because that's all they concentrate on and don't have any other instruments to confuse things.

Of course, this might not be the case. Interesting argument.

I'd say that being a dilettante would make one less musically able than someone who pursued fewer instruments in greater depth.

You can also find interesting ideas about this matter in a former thread : To Be A Well Rounded Musician, started by Honky-Tonk.

Here's the link for it:

http://forums.abrsm.org/index.php?showtopic=9184

Car Expert

At school I used to play piano, clarinet, double bass and guitar but now I only play the piano. Piano is such a versatile instrument, I feel I have still only just scratched the surface of all the different styles and possibilities after nearly 30 years!
Carol

My friend that plays 10 instruments is amazing at the main instruments that she plays and I believe that playing so many instruments definately helps when she takes up more instruments. She has only just started playing the Soprano Saxophone (In music class) and has picked it up really quickly.

Playing lots of imstruments definitely helps when picking up and starting to learn a new instrument, but you might not be amazing at any of them. You can be amazing at quite a few instruments - I know people that are,but I guess there are more amazing people who just play one instrument because they can focus on that.

Eek that makes no sense sorry

I don't see what's wrong with being a dilettante. Schubert described himself as a dilettante.

I may never be as superb a musician as Schubert but I am enjoying widening my experience beyond singing, and I hope that the piano, recorder, theory and even violin will help add something to my general level of musicality. Which in turn should help my singing.

Cheers

Katyjay

I understood it! I suppose the phrase 'jack of all trades and master of none' springs to mind. (Not meaning to offend anyone with that statement.) I agree with you as I can't see how if you play loads of instruments you have the time to practise them all to a really high standard, like you can when you can just concentrate on the one. Of course, it's useful in some situations being able to play, for example, all or most of the woodwind instruments if you want to play in musicals and shows, as I seem to remember from playing flute the odd time in school shows, or for being a woodwind peripatetic teacher, where it's more likely that the teacher would be asked to teach any of those instruments. Or even for being a secondary school music teacher - a basic knowledge of most is useful for teaching/coaching the school orchestras. (I had to try my hand at violin, clarinet, percussion, electric guitar, and drumkit at teaching college! I enjoyed some and hated others, but it was an experience anyway!!) But yes if you want to be truly amazing at an instrument I agree you need to be focussed on that one. (Wish I was truly amazing at piano........ )

There's a quip about a person "who spoke eight languages - unfortunately all at once!"

Different instruments teach you different things, don't they? For example, singers and string players and some wind players need to have a good sense of pitch to get the right sound from their instrument - so, playing that instrument will develop this. Playing piano or guitar helps you understand harmony, but you can be tone deaf and still hit the right notes (frets on a guitar to guide you). I did one term of guitar and I learned more about how chords make "tunes" work than I had from 2 years of clarinet and piano. Piano helps more with theory, I think.

So, to answer the question, I think the more instruments you have a go at, the better your understanding of music will be - but you won't necessarily get good at any of them. Does that make any sense?

Sorry, I guess that's what happens when I try to write a short post .

What I meant is that if one is a dilettante such that one never takes any one instrument to the level where one would have to start considering musicality, interpretation and so on, one might never develop those skills as thoroughly as someone who'd studied at least one instrument to sufficient depth to need them.

In your case, your singing studies have given you opportunity to study something to the depth where interpretive, musical performance is required; I agree, though, that studying bits of other things alongside that is definitely a good thing and should, as you say, help your general level of musicality .

Yes I think it's worth having a "main instrument" that you really love and are good at, and take that to as high a level as you can, and it's a shame when people just faff on a few instruments and never get anywhere with any of them, but I think it's great and can also be very beneficial to take any musical experience - learning instruments or different styles or whatever - because that is going to contribute to your musicality in all areas

Ahh, that's what I was trying to get at, thankyou .

not quite so tired today, it shows...

Yes, I think I'm a far more well-rounded musician for having played lots of instruments. I only have enough time to regularly play recorders, clarinet and piano now, but the knowledge of string playing that I have had in the past, and of playing the flute, has certainly been useful to me too, in all sorts of ways - both for my own playing and in my teaching.

I think this depends on one's chosen main instrument (if there is one) and one's aspirations. For example, singers can not practise for that much time in a day (the human voice gets tired) so to become an excellent singer one doesn't have to (or can't) practise for all of one's free time in a day (I believe the same is true to a lesser extent for some brass instruments); however if one is at the Julliard studying piano one is advised to do no more than five hours a day practising (apparently any more risks injury). So if one wants to be a world-class singer then other instruments will probably help as it means one can get more experience and practice of music, if not singing, into the day than one could otherwise without the other instruments; however, if one was taking, say piano, and wanted to become a world-class performer playing another instrument (seriously at least) would take away from one's practise time (unless of course one would only practise the other instrument when one would never want to play the piano anyway).

Of course, not everyone is (most people aren't...) willing to spend all of their free time on their instrument, or has aspirations of being a professional soloist, so if they enjoy to have two or more instruments and that will mean they do the same practise as they could on one; or even to be not quite as good on their instruments so that they can play more instruments that's a reasonable choice . I do think though that once the number of instruments gets really large, one has to guard against becoming a 'jack of all trades and master of none'; having said that if one wants to become a composer that's probably quite a strong position to be in.

Personally I'd like to play fewer instruments and be able to dedicate more time to the ones that I want to play to get better at them; but that's a matter of personal choice and some people will feel that they would rather have a wide interest in a number of different instruments than focus themselves on one or two either purely for enjoyment, or for pragmatic reasons: it's all about personal choice .

I guess it also depends how much musical and technical "talent" you have to spend on your instruments.... whether there's a chance even if you concentrated on one that you would reach the heights on that one. For example I don't think even if I spent my every spare moment practising violin I would ever be likely to challenge Maxim Vengerov!! So there's probably more point to me "spending" a little of my time and talent being reasonable on it, because I enjoy it, and the time and talent I "save" by not trying to be a virtuoso I can spend on another - if that makes sense! Whereas if there was a possibility I could reach the heights of artistry and technical wizardry on one of my instruments, then maybe it would be worth me dropping others to spend all my effort on that one.

The fact is that I want to be as good as I can be on the flute, but even if I was a really incredibly amazing player I wouldn't *want* to be an international soloist and I doubt my health would survive it anyway! And although I work hard and will do the best I can, I think that my manual dexterity is still bad enough even after years of all these instruments, after all this training that started at 7 on the violin, that probably I have to conclude that my fingers may move as fast as they can, they'll never be as quick as they'd need to be for me to manage the extreme technical stuff.

So while I'm happy to put a lot of time and effort into it, to broaden my musical experience and playing on it, and to work as hard as my health will allow (I try to do two hours a day most days - not all at once!) it would probably be a bit silly of me to shun all the other things I enjoy playing and play games with my health by spending all the daylight hours playing it - not to mention that my neighbours would have me lynched! Playing other instruments, for me, is a better way and more useful to my musical side, and more fun for the ability to join in with lots of different things and always have something else that's different but still musical that I can be doing, than spending all day every day fluting!

I wonder whether this "jack of all trades, master of none" applies only to instruments from different families or equally so to instruments from the same family, i.e. playing every type of recorder, or clarinet, or saxophone, etc.

i imagine the ideal combination of instruments would be piano on the side of the main other two not necasarily to a standard of brilliance just to about grade 4 so you have a grounding in bass and treble clef and melody and harmony then a treble instrument as either your main or second instrument like violin flute clarinet oboe trumpet etc as this would give you the immense enjoyment and gloating rights of getting the lead parts in orchestras and chamber groups then finalya bass tenor or alto instrument with a large range (bassoon and cello are examples also viola) to build harmony and give you the immense enjoyment of getting all the scrunchy harmony and the gloating rights of not having to wait until the lead flautist dies until you can get into the orchestra (also works for other instruments whjich are extremely popular)