We have all heard the saying, “jack of all trades, master of none.” While this might ring true, I want to offer a middle ground experience as it relates to learning musical instruments. From my experience, the skills acquired by practicing one instrument can be transferred unto another. As a musician with over eight years experience playing the guitar, percussion, and piano, I want to share my experience on the matter.
The first instrument I ever picked up was the acoustic guitar. What an exciting time that was! There was a DVD instructional video that came with the guitar and I must have played through it dozens of times. In fact, I still have that disk and the small booklet it came with.
I practiced the guitar for hours at a time, pushing through most of the pain I experienced in my wrist and fingers. In hindsight, this is one of the worst ways to practice. If you experience a lot of pain when you practice, stop and take a break!
A couple years went by and I decided to learn the drums. Drums are very different from the guitar and I thought that it would be a great instrument to learn. Around the same time, my high school’s band program was starting up and lacked a percussionist. So, I decided to fill the role.
For three years I was the main percussionist for my school’s orchestral and jazz band. I learned a lot during this time and even went to a few percussionist camps. After I graduated high school, I spent the next four years as a percussionist for the University of Alberta. It was here that I really expanded my skills.
In my first year, I was practicing both the guitar and percussion every day. It was the first time that I experienced my rhythm-playing abilities from being a percussionist flow into my guitar playing. To put it simply, I had impeccable timing as a guitarist!
In order to complete my degree, I needed to take a full year of aural and keyboard skills. And so, this was the year that I learned how to play the piano. What’s great is that by this time, I had a full working knowledge of the guitar fretboard and a developed skill-set reading percussion sheet music.
Even though I already knew how to play two instruments, the aural and keyboard skills classes took me by surprise. To pass the classes, I would have to do multiple written exams, vocal exams, and keyboard exams. If this wasn’t enough, if you messed up a section, you failed that section.
So, I did what any good musician would do in this situation: practice. Again, I practiced for hours a day making sure I did not flub a passage. It is here that I will conclude the story.
So, what are the values and skills of learning to play multiple musical instrument? To start, if a musician were to learn another musical instrument that is different from their main instrument, there is a possibility that they could enhance or supplement their existing skills. Of course, this could also work the other way. By already knowing how to play an instrument, it might be easier for that musician to learn another.
What is fascinating about music is that most music theory is universal. The notes I play on the guitar can also be played on the piano (same with scales, chords, pieces, etc.). Of course, the mechanics and timbre are different, but the music on paper is relatively the same. So, by taking a general approach to learning multiple musical instrument, one can get a better overall view of the music they are playing.
I want to remind you that this is not an argument for or against learning multiple instruments. I am simply sharing my thoughts and experiences with doing so.
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Do you have similar experiences with learning to play more that one instrument? What are your thoughts on the topic? Share your thoughts and experiences in the comments below as I would like to hear them!