What Made You Pick Up The Guitar?

[myspace.com/jessenoah]

i wanted to be like axe and score chicks

[rocketman]

I as playing piano 5 years before I picked up the guitar. Listen to YYZ and Alex Lifeson's incredible solo made me want to play guitar.

[335guy]

My first instrument was the piano, at age six. That lasted a few yrs. before I wanted to play baseball. Then I saw the Beatles and that was it. Like millions of adolescent boys, I wanted to be like them. It seems silly in this day and age, but I cannot tell you just how much influence the Beatles had on kids all over the world. It was truly "Bealtemania" with Beatle boots, Beatle wigs, Beatle clothing, etc. So as a young lad who also wanted chicks to be screaming for me, I got my first guitar and amp. An Airline from Montgomery Ward. The worst POS ever built. Beginners today have no idea actually how good the inexpensive, under $100.00 guitars are today compared to what was available then. The worst were the low cost Airlines, and the Teisco Del Rey's sold at White Front Department Stores. Next up were the guitars like Harmony and the odd brands from Europe ( Framus, Welson, Vox, and so on ) My first real guitar was a Gretsch Nashville and it cost $160.00 new in 1964. I've had a slew a different guitars over the years, many I wished I'd kept but didn't. Of course, my personal Beatlemania wore off after a year or two when I got into the blues. But it was the Beatles who got me playing the guitar in the beginning.

[Tim Plains]

I inspired myself to learn by playing air guitar in front of a mirror.

That's not surprising' date=' you seem pretty full of yourself...

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to go play in front of [i']my[/i] mirror.

[retrosurfer1959]

If Im being honest it was a little hippie girl named Bonnie!

[Ian Martin]

That's not surprising' date=' you seem pretty full of yourself...

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to go play in front of [i']my[/i] mirror.

 

Whatever.

I'm ten times better at playing in front of the mirror than you.

And I look a hundred times better.

[flyingarmadillo]

My roots are acoustic folkie so probably early Bob Dylan or old Pete Seegar. But I voted for impress a girl, cuz that was the immediate cause.

[Boston004681]

 

I do! :-)

 

Holy Crap! Tim played with the scorpions?!!!!

[Boston004681]

Anyway i was 10. I had an uncle who played. He taught my cousin(his oldest son), and then my cousin taught my other cousin. The first cousin was the one that really inspired me, but the second taught me the basics.

[Flight959]

I was in my local music shop (Rockbottom) years ago and I watched a guy either testing a guitar or an Amp and he was realy good... I thought, I want to do that!

 

Flight959

[Flight959]

....Oh and Slash from GnR..

 

Flight959

[Boston004681]

 

Homz' date=' You are a very strange human being........

[pippy]

My Dad, when he was 14yrs, was told by his dad; "Don't you touch that piano! That's for Grown-ups!!".

 

Fast-forward 30-years-or-so;

 

My Dad; "See this, son? This is the key to the piano-key lid. (Moves, with us [me and my bruv] in tow, to the kitchen...throws key in the bin {trash-can}). Any time you want to make as much noise as you want on that piano, don't let anyone stop you!".

 

My father was passionate about music. It didn't matter if it was a Gregorian Chant or Fats Waller; if it was good music he would love it.

 

Fast-forward a few more years; in addition to the piano we now have : Clarinet, sax, banjo, accordion, violin, guitar, C-Descant (of course) recorder, mandolin etc...etc...

 

My first love was the clarinet; Being in Scotland at that time meant that everyone had to learn to play something and I just liked the clarinet. At the family Hogmanay (New Year) celebrations with the relatives, I, aged 9 (and onwards), used to get up to do 'my' party piece, which was part of the heritage in coming from the 'no TV' age.

 

Soon afterwards I really got into playing the mandolin. It was a late 1800's Neapolitan 'Bowl-back' model (not a Gibson, I'm afraid) and the neck and fret spacing were perfect for someone my build to attempt to play a fretted instrument.

 

By the age of eleven I'd heard of an American guitarist called Jimi Hendrix - by way of a distant cousin. Come Secondary school almost all of my classmates were listening to David Cassidy and/or The Osmonds. I couldn't understand it...Luckily for me some of my mates, like myself, had older siblings and we became a seperate, and distinct, group from the rest - we were listening to Led Zeppelin (L-Z II had just been released), the recently departed Jimi Hendrix, the sublime Free, and all of a sudden it became obvious that what I really wanted to do was to become Paul Kossoff. He was (and perhaps still is) my only real 'Idol'.

 

That's it, really. I wanted to be Paul Kossoff, on stage at the Isle of Wight, performing 'The Hunter'.

 

In fact, I still do.

 

Life isn't fair.

[pippy]

 

The girl second from the right needs her pointing fixed.

 

I'm just offering my services in case..........

[Guest RogerGLewis]

My dad had a great record collection in the early seventies, Rory Gallagher, Clapton, Hendrix. He had a Mate called Barry Bird who was a great guy, who has now sadly passed on. Barry was a great blueser and used to play the clubs in Hanover where our family was stationed at that time. Barry gave me my first few lessons on an old Hofner aoustic which I still have and my dad had a lovely Framus acoustic which I had for years but don't have any more. A combination of hearing them talking and playing new records theyd bought and Barry being such a great bloke I think made me interested in the guitar. Barrys peak was backing the moody Blues when thay were in Germany around 1974 I guess, but sketchy on the date. He had an old Telecaster must have been a late 50's or even earlier and a fender twin reverb, I remember gasing for that when I got a little Older 17 and not 8 as in my Hanover days, we were by then living in Dusseldorf at that time where I started taking an interest again going around a friends house who had an Ibanez electric and Marshall AMP he used to love the Framus so he would mess about with that and I got to have a go on the Ibanez. Great memories.

[Basshole]

My brother needed a bass player, and since no one in this town cant play bass worth a damn, and since there is no one avaible. I picked up my bass and kept the rythm while he played solos all day.