CanadaJim
I started with a descant recorder aged 9 (in 1976). One of my teachers at school asked a group of us if we’d like to have lessons at lunchtimes. Within ten minutes of the first lesson I knew I was going to love making music. Within a few weeks I was teaching myself how to play pop songs and TV theme tunes. I was blown away. And then I wrote a hymn for the school concert - I was 9 and it was rubbish, but it was my first foray into songwriting and I loved it.
Piano and clarinet lessons followed for a little while, but I hated being told what I had to play, though I loved performing in the school orchestra. And I was playing a lot of football, so I gave up the music lessons. A few years later (when I was about 16 or 17), I bought a small electronic keyboard (Casiotone MT40) with my hard-earned newspaper round money, and amused myself playing Depeche Mode and Human League songs to the very limited built-in drum patterns. The keys were small on the keyboard so it was really hard to play accurately. I also had a double cassette deck on my hifi, and found a primitive way of multitracking. And I started writing ‘proper’ songs.
Wind on a few years and the Atari ST home computer with built in MIDI ports was launched - I was working by now and able to just about afford one, along with a proper MIDI keyboard (Kawai K1) and drum machine (Kawai R50). The sequencing software on the computer, linked to the MIDI gear, was my own personal recording studio. While my mates were out at the pub most nights, I was at home writing songs just for my own amusement.
Then life happened. I drifted away from music - full time work and a young family to look after left very little time for anything else. I didn’t play a note on anything for a very long time.
Then, after separating from my partner ten years ago, I suddenly had a lot more spare time on my hands. Three years after that, on a whim, I bought a uke. And it drew me back into the world of making music. And it blew me away all over again. I already had GarageBand on my iPad, so after learning the basics on ukulele, I thought I’d buy a new MIDI keyboard and use my previous musical experience to enhance my somewhat limited uke-playing ability - hence the multitracked songs I usually bring to the Seasons.
Wow - sorry - I never intended to go into so much detail here - if you’re still awake and reading, well done! And thanks for asking the question, @CanadaJim - it’s good to reminisce now and then. 🙂
