Can you play any musical instruments?

[Darn Dane]

I picked up playing the acoustic guitar from my dad (that man had music flowing through his very being!), and took lessons after school for a couple of years.

I quit playing some years later. Recently I tried playing my old guitar again, and golly ghee, have whatever skills I had back then rusted far away...!

 

I don't so much wish to pick up the guitar or another instrument as I'd love to be able to compose tunes. I tried that on my Commodore 64 back in its heydays, but soon figured out I can't stick two notes together for the life of me! 🤪

[helana12_03]

I played guitar and piano growing up and trash cans in college (it was an actual class). I'm not sure I can still play any of the above. It's been a while...

[u.amaya]

At middle school I used to play the flute (the transverse one), and I was even part of the school orchestra. Unfortunately I had to quit as soon as I entered high school, but I still have my old flute at home and I still remember how to play it. Hopefully I'll be able to take it up again one day... after I find someone who can fix it 🙃

[purple_rain]

Guitar, bass guitar, drums, cajón. But, like @peterh_137 said, none of them with any degree of skill. ^^

 

I would love to learn to play the cello. Maybe a few more percussion instruments. And the upright bass! If only it weren't so large and heavy for little me. 

[Dunsen_Churner]

Could play tuba & trombone, but havent played them for a good long time. I now only play the piano somewhat regularly.

[ymenic]

I played violin all throughout school but haven't played in a decade. I regularly play guitar since high school and in the past few years picked up bass guitar.

[Skeleluna04]

Been playing flute since I was 8! Its been a few months since I last played due to scheduling conflicts with my community band, but I'll get back to it as soon as possible. Debating picking up lessons, again, though, to keep up on solo repertoire. We'll see! My little sister is also learning, now, so hopefully in the future I can convince her to do duets with me XD
I also need to get back into being a major nerd in regards to this-- Occasionally I will transcribe music I like so that I can play it on flute, and will often spend a day recording and editing and putting together a video where I play all the parts as a flute choir. It's sooo much fun but also so much work loll

[Squirrel Combat]

On 4/27/2025 at 8:46 PM, Squirrel Combat said:

I play trumpet and have limited proficiency on the piano. I am currently in a community band and this summer will be leading another music composition workshop at a festival in the Netherlands. I also recently borrowed a piccolo trumpet from a friend.

Update: I couldn't get that piccolo trumpet to play properly. The valves were messed up and didn't match what they should be playing.

[Cloaked Dragon]

No. 

We were forced to learn guitar and flute in 4th grade (age 10). Any fascination with instruments died right there. 
My hands were too small to hold the guitar properly so I tried holding it in a way that made it possible for me to play (the chords and all that. The stuff you have to do with your fingers on the "throat" of the guitar, pressing the strings down. I don't know the terminology. That was impossible for me with my tiny hands and an adult sized guitar). The teacher yelled at me like... I've never been yelled at like that before or since. It was like I had committed an unforgivable sin and personally affronted him. You would have though I murdered this man's family from the way he yelled at me. 
Tried reasoning with him, showed him my hands were too small, my fingers too short. That I could not reach. That seemed to make him angrier. 
All I did was place it down and played it like a guqin, apparently for that I deserved eternal condemnation.  

Every time I look at a musical instrument, whether it's a guitar or something else, I'm reminded of that incident and the interest is snuffed out like a candleflame.

 

The flutes were no better. We played on the same flutes my grandmother used when she was in school. And I'm not sure when those were last cleaned properly but from how greasy they were I gather it was some time pre ww2.

 

I have musical trauma. 

[everywhere and nowhere]

On 10/25/2025 at 8:45 PM, Considered A Hazard said:

My hands were too small to hold the guitar properly so I tried holding it in a way that made it possible for me to play (the chords and all that. The stuff you have to do with your fingers on the "throat" of the guitar, pressing the strings down. I don't know the terminology. That was impossible for me with my tiny hands and an adult sized guitar).

I just thought... I don't have small hands, but I have kinda restricted joint mobility at least in my legs and back. To some extent a lingering effect of injuries, but some of it must have been next to inborn - for example even at the age of four I was unable to bend down and touch the ground with straight knees, which probably means an unusually stiff body for a child of this age. My fingers aren't this obviously stiff. They seem to move relatively normal, but on the other hand I have poor fine motor skills - extremely bad handwriting without accompanying spelling problems, relatively often "missing" an object with my hand (which also might have something to do with my strabismus and lack of stereoscopic vision)... I remember that I could never play the kind of chords where one finger is stretched across the whole neck of the guitar, pressing all strings down. I couldn't do it no matter what, when I put any other fingers on the strings, my index finger would always bend and stop pressing strings.

Of course "tricks" such as touching your forearm with a finger remain far outside the range of movements possible for me, a gap of several centimeters remains...

I also remember - although this is not related to playing instruments - that at the age of about ten, when I had my knees bent for a prolonged time (for example at school), I needed at least a minute to straighten them... I couldn't stand up quickly from a chair.

[fantastic mx. foxglove]

Drums! I've been playing them for almost ten years now. Unfortunately, with where I'm living now, I don't get to practice as much as I want to (not having a real kit sucks)

[iff]

@lilihierax

 

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iff,

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