What age did you start learning to play? And what was your influence or reason?

[kenny mac]

Hi there people,I was just thinking about when I started playing guitar,I bought my 1st electric guitar from a catalouge and it was a black Kay les paul copy,I started to learn it at 17 years old but the reason I got into music was strange.
I saw a telescope in the shop window and asked my mum to get me it for my birthday as I was interested in the stars etc then.
The Telescope was too expensive but the guitar was next to it and she said,,,,what about that?
I was more mesmerised by the colour.
I spent about a year playing the riff to satisfaction by the stones on one string,then my older brother walked in and looked at me with disgust and said,when you going to learn that thing.
I felt so humiliated that I got a hold of a chord book and stuck in,then graduated to the les paul copy.
I guess I should thank my brother for the push that I needed however brutal it felt
We all need some direction eh?
What's your story

[Blooby]

I remember having a paper route at 12 or 13 to save up for a guitar. I ended up getting an Applause. It was awful, but I learned how to play on it. Not well, mind you, but well enough to get over the initial hump. I remember listening to loads of my brothers' music: Zeppelin, Who, Grand Funk, Santana, Steely Dan, Bad Company, Kiss (who might have been the reason for initially wanting to play), and Foreigner, but I was also borrowing The Best of Return to Forever, Dregs of the Earth (The Dixie Dregs), Playing the Fool (Gentle Giant), Cosmic Messenger (Jean-Luc Ponty) along with a steady diet of Tull, Yes, Elton John, Billy Joel, Cat Stevens, etcetera, etcetera...

I used to think it was the influence of a buddy named Tori (I talked him into posting once. Link here) who went on to the Berklee College of Music (and got me into John McLaughlin and Frank Zappa), but in hindsight, my brothers definitely shaped my tastes. When I see how all over the map my posts on this site can be, I chalk it up to the eclectic listening tastes of my brothers.

Cool thread, Kenny. I'm interested to see what others have to say.

Blooby

[kenny mac]

That's a pretty diverse collection there blooby,I'm a bit like that myself I will listen to all genres,my iPod is a mish mash of everything, except jazz.
For some reason I never clicked with that genre,I guess it's what you would class as Jazz that's the problem.
Light jazz maybe .
All in all I love all types of music.

[Hook]

I bought my 1st guitar, a forgotten named ,strat style electric from Sears with a horrible little amp when I was 13. I didn't really learn to play until I was 15-16. I was the lead singer and lyric writer for my high school band and after a while I got tired of needing others to write my music for my lyrics.
So I bought a poster of chords and started writing and never stopped. Never had a particular guitarist influence me it was always the call of the song. (How crappy does that sound!)
Rock on!

[64Guitars]

I got my first guitar (a Stella acoustic) when I was 9 or maybe even 8. My grandmother had a friend from California who had two teenage sons that played. They had recently bought new guitars, so my parents bought their two old guitars from them for me and my siblings, but I was the only one who took any interest in playing and I eventually ended up with both guitars. The Californian boys taught me a few chords but I don't think I could play any proper songs yet. Then, when I was about 10, I started taking lessons from the older brother of a classmate. That was when I first learned to play proper songs and became hooked on the guitar. My grandparents bought me my first electric guitar (a 4-pickup Silvertone) when I was about 11. I made my first recordings on my grandfather's portable mono cassette recorder when I was 11 or 12 (still have the tape somewhere). I got a recorder of my own a couple of years later - a portable, mono, reel-to-reel from Radio Shack.

Influences? The popular music of the sixties and fifties that I listened to on the radio as a kid. I was into music as a listener long before I started playing guitar. I have a photo of myself at age two putting a record on the record player. And every Christmas and birthday, when I was asked what I wanted, I'd always name some new record. Music was my biggest interest and I had no money of my own, so I started my collection of LPs and 45s by requesting them as Christmas and birthday gifts. I liked lots of different artists but my favourites were the British Invasion bands (Beatles, Stones, Animals, DC5, Herman's Hermits, Donovan, Kinks, The Who, etc.). Prior to the British Invasion, I don't remember having any favourite artists; just lots of favourite songs. In 1964, I got caught up in Beatlemania. I had several of their 45s and LPs, and I remember watching them live on The Ed Sullivan Show (I was about 8). I had a school chum who was also into The Beatles. Whenever we had any money (I'm talking pennies, nickels, and dimes), we used to buy Beatles stuff like magazines and trading cards (I had quite a collection).

Although The Beatles were a huge influence in terms of me wanting to play guitar, I don't think I ever learned to play any of their songs when I was a kid. Even to this day, I've probably only learned two or three Beatles songs! That seems weird, now that I think about it. I guess their songs were too hard for me to figure out when I was a kid. Then, around 1966 or 67, I went off The Beatles when I discovered Hendrix, Cream, James Gang, Grand Funk, and all the other heavier bands of the late sixties and early seventies. It wasn't till 1991 that I got back into The Beatles' music again when I started collecting their CDs.

[Oldrottenhead]

my dad was a publican, and often customers would get drink on tic (credit) and square him up on pay day. but when they didn't have money he would be given all sorts, bags of mussels, fresh rainbow trout and salmon, but more often than not LP's.

so as a 12 year old i got introduced to lots of various genres as my dad would give the lps to me. i mind getting dark side of the moon, a bill withers album and lou reeds metal machine music in one batch.

this probably gave me my eclectic taste in music. but what got me playing was a different beast. he came home from work one friday night and handed me an accordion. and not unlike Kenny Mac i could play one fingered melodies on it, satisfaction being one of them lol. anyway i could pretty much play along (1 fingered) to any tune from the off.

but listening to music was always the priority to me, even before the albums my dad gave me, i had an uncle who repaired and maintained jukeboxes in the late sixties early seventies, and i would get all the old singles from them.
it wasn't until punk rock hit in 76/77 that i started to write and play as prior to that you had to be a musician but punk brought in a diy anyone can do it ethic. i still don't see myself as a musician i'm a punk rocker baby!

[Mike_S]

Mine is a bit of an on / off,  back on / back off story.

The reason I started is quite vague to me initially,  just a love of music basically. I was into Big Country, AC/DC, ZZ Top, Mama's Boys and anything rocky that was on MTV at the time.
I first bought an acoustic guitar about the age of maybe 15 or so. I had a little book to learn basic chords and could strum things like Knocking on Heavens Door and other fairly simple things quite quickly, I even tried starting to sing along. Never took it too seriously though.

When I started college I took my guitar up with me and I remember smashing it to pieces 'a la Jimi Hendrix' while drunk one night, most likely to impress my friends (genius eh!). After this i never touched guitar for years (maybe 5 or 6), but at around the age of 24 i bought a cheap rubbish start copy and started to learn again. I think i mainly wanted to learn lead to emulate mainly heavy metal type bands of the time - Gary Moore, Def Leppard, Iron Maiden, and loads more...

For the next good few years i only really dabbled from time to time in learning / playing and its only really been in the last maybe 5 or so years that i have started trying to take on to a decent level. So way too late really... but now just have a bee in my bonnet to try to play to a reasonable standard for myself more than anything and I even try to sing a bit now at the same time. I just wish I had taken it seriously when i was young and given it a go in a band as it is only a hobby to me and i know my nerves would not let me play in front of people all of a sudden at my age (mid forties).

But my main influence these days would be Rory Gallagher. I love his natural playing / singing style... he was just a human music making machine.

[Groundy]

As a  went to Kid went to a Party every saturday night, all Aunts and uncles, everyone would play something, Guitar, piano, harmonica, it would go on till about 3 am, I had that every saturday night for years, Thats really what interested me in music, My very first guitar was a Rossetti acoustic cut away, The action was about 30 ml high you had muscles on your fingers just holding the strings down, I was probably about 9 years old, My Mother said, it'll be a waste of money you wont learn it, if you do I will buy you an electric one , which she did 
At about 15 I had inherited an EKO acoustic which I would play in a Pub  every Saturday night I got paid £5 for the night which was'nt bad considering in those days I only got about £3 a week for working about 45 hours,
I shold'nt have even been in a pub at that age, needless to say I could'nt have a beer.
And thats how it all started.......


Alex   

[Johnny Robbo]

September 1978: I remember the very day... it was the 1st day back at school after the long summer holidays & it was also my 1st day at the "big" school as an 11yr old. I came back home in my ever-so-smart new school uniform and the guitar I'd got my mum to order from her "Empire Stores" catalogue had arrived - a KAY steel string acoustic, complete with instruction book and one of those "flexi-disc" records, and a pitch pipe (has anyone EVER got a guitar in tune with one of those things?).

By the end of the week I had mastered my first song from the book - Brown Girl In The Ring by Boney M, using the chords of D and A7. It wasn't Apache or FBI (the sort of stuff I wanted to play), but the feeling of being able to pick up an instrument and play something that sounded like music was a thrill that still hasn't left me. It was the first thing I was ever any good at & probably still is the only thing I can do properly.

The next step was a "red electric guitar"... that's all I wanted. It had to be red like Hank's & I duly got my wish. There was a show on the local radio station called "Tradio" where listeners could phone in and buy & sell stuff - kind of like a 70s version of ebay. I had £25 saved from my Saturday job working in my parents' shop & I heard someone selling a "red electric guitar" (that was the only description they gave). It turned out to be a Woolworths Top Twenty. I didin't have an amp, but I did have a "music centre" as they were called in those days - plug the guitar into the mic socket and I could play along with my cassettes... heaven!

Pretty soon after I discovered the blues via a Stray Cats B-side (Drink That Bottle Down: B-side of Stray Cat Strut) and it blew me away - I wanted to play like that! From blues I got into Layla-era Clapton, then all the rock stuff seemed to follow from that... then the blues introduced me to jazz, then funk, then... well it was like pulling at a thread & not knowing where it was going to lead, which was immense fun... it still is!

[kenny mac]

Great stuff....I had one of those flexible discs and pipes as well lol memories.