How you became a guitar player?

[DaveyO]

I was wondering how you all came about to become guitar players.
Me? i was a bass player who always played around with the guitar but
never serious,when i stopped playing bass due to tinnitus, i had to do
something musical so guitar was a natural choice,Acoustic guitar .
Progress is slow but i'm not in any hurry.
Dave

[Blue in VT]

I too was a bass player in college....not a very good on though.... ....and then one day while listening to a Blues anthology album I heard Mississippi john Hurt's Candyman....it sounded so simple....so I bought an acoustic....and found out how wrong I was!!!  I was frustrated and gave up for about 10 years...and now have been back at it for 2 years and while I still haven't quite worked up to Candyman I'm well on my way!!



Blue

[Denis]

I was 13 and I wanted to be a rock and roll star!!!! 

I got a classical guitar as a Christmas gift instead and never really owned an electric guitar...well, once for a few months but I was 15 or 16.  Never go another one since then.  I started getting into fingerstyle early as my dad wanted me to be a classical guitarist...still love John Williams and Segovia.  I started learning Simon and Garfunkel tunes...and Neil Young...and of course, the Beatles.  I took a few lessons here and there over the years but mostly, I'm self taught.  I took a music theory course at Ottawa U years ago so I do have some "paper" music knowledge, I can read music but not very quickly.  Not like a pianist will sight read.  Guitar doesn't really work like that.

Still want to be a rock start but an acoustic rock star

[jeremy3220]

you guys have some weird stories of how you became guitar players.
Me, I was ordained in the 7th realm of the woodland elf city by the elf queen "Eramei" as "Sir Jeremy: guitarist to the mortals"... I swear it's true 

[Denis]

you guys have some weird stories of how you became guitar players.
Me, I was ordained in the 7th realm of the woodland elf city by the elf queen "Eramei" as "Sir Jeremy: guitarist to the mortals"... I swear it's true 

Jeremy,

Where might I obtain some of the herbs you've been smoking...must be some good shi.... er...stuff...

[Old Geezer]

Jeremy,

Where might I obtain some of the herbs you've been smoking...must be some good shi.... er...stuff...

Denis,

I prolly have some kickin around......how do I get 'em across the border???

OG

[Denis]

Denis,

I prolly have some kickin around......how do I get 'em across the border???

OG

Not to worry OG.  Canada #1 cash crop is the same as the US'...there's no shortage here!

[Caleb]

I always wanted to play as a child, but my parents (dad in particular) was not supportive at all, so when I turned 18 I bought my first guitar.  This was at the height of the "grunge" movement, so natrually, I started playing Nirvana songs and the like.  I grew up on Van Halen and stuff like that, but figured out how hard it was to play like those guys and never really pursued that kind of music (thankfully now, since it's more of a laughing stock than an artform).  About 6 years ago I developed a love for the acoustic guitar and now pretty much listen to and play acoustic music pretty much exclusively.  I don't plan on playing guitar much in 2007, since I'm trying to learn the mandolin and an focusing pretty hard on it.  I can see this becoming my main instrument.

Nice idea for a thread, btw.

[tuffythepug]

I didn't seriously pick up a guitar until I was 40 years old.  I'm 57 today so I certainly didn't learn to play the guitar to impress and pick up chicks like many others (who will probably deny it)  I think l started learning to play simply because I love music so much I just had to figure out a way to make some.    Also I kind of got off on the challenge of learning to play so late in life.   Starting so late, I know I'll never be a great guitarist but I have found that I can keep myself entertained for the rest of my life.  Sometimes I can even entertain others.

Lynn
(Tuffythepug)

[Gemnoc]

Guitar is the third instrument I learned after piano (during elementary school) and alto saxophone (high school). Fourth if you count those flute lessons when I was 5 or 6.

After finishing high school I was rather fed up with music lessons and it was 5 years before I played an instrument. In my last year of university, a friend left a guitar in the student's workshop for anyone to play. Also my sister had started guitar lessons a couple of years before. During that time I would occasionally pick her guitar or my friend's and try to make some music out of it. It got me hooked so when I got my degree, I took my whole summer off before finding myself a job; I bought a cheap acoustic, and learned by practicing about 5-6 hours a day for 3 months. The fingertips on my left hand would hurt like hell and I'd continue to play for hours. I had a great time. Then I had to become an adult and take a job and I've been progressing at a snail's pace ever since.

[unclrob]

The Beatle's,then Hendrix.

[Walkerman]

Years of lessons on the trumpet...then, when I was starting high school ......the Beatles came to America....I had to have a guitar...Fisrt I learned
Gloria, then House of the Rising Sun, followed byTobacco Road then I moved on to
Donovan followed later by Neil Young
I never picked up my trumpet again.  The funny thing is, I never really learned any Beatles songs until recently, over 40 years after the fact.

[Celticjam]

I am still not much of a guitar player...yet.  I wanted to play since I was about ten but my parents refused to give in and put me in piano lessons from 2nd grade until about 6th grade.  Hated them (the lessons, not my parents).  Played a little on friends' guitars in college.  Then work, friends, marriage, kids and all that good stuff happened.  Then my lovely wife gave me a guitar for my 36th birthday, about ten years ago, and I think she's regretted it ever since....but not me.   

Kevin

[inspector13]

Well, I am not that much of a player but I get so much pleasure and stress relief from it I don't care...It is only for me. I have wanted to play from the time I was little. I remember sitting on the floor of my parent's home while my older brother (20 years older) sat in one of Moms wingback rockers and played and sang " Mr. Bojangles " among other songs of the day. I loved hearing him play. He was killed in a small plane crash when I was 14.
Several years ago I was given his 1971 Guild D50. Yes the guitar!  I decided at that time if I was ever going to learn to play now was the time.

Ok there is my sappy story.

[bob_d]

I started playing guitar after a student at my high school brought his guitar in to play for the class. He wasn't even that good. He only knew a few chords to a couple of popular songs but the girls gathered around him and started grinning at him like he was a rock star (and this was before the era of rock stars). I remember thinking to myself, "I can do THAT!!!"

Within two weeks I had a guitar and I was learning fast but the girls still didn't gather around me and grin like they grinned at him. No problem, I started playing the guitar to find love and wound up falling in love with the guitar! 
   

[inspector13]

Bob, At least the guitar won't break your heart.   

[jcbuggs]

My mother began taking guitar lessons when I was about 13 or 14. I had no interest. Then one Sunday night I saw the Beatles on Ed Sullivan and I spent the next ten years of my life trying to be John Lennon  

I started playing the guitar that my mother was using. It was a nylon string guitar with a neck about 2 1/2 inches wide that she got with S&H Sreen Stamps. (Anyone remember those? Or willing to admit it.) Played through HS and college, but got away from  it while raising a family. Back a few years ago I got interested again and bought a L-03R

Still have that old nylon string guitar and it hangs proudly in the guitar room.

Joe

[brimc76]

Actually, it was my piano teacher's idea!

[bob_d]

Bob, At least the guitar won't break your heart.   

Very true, Inspector. Although G.A.S. can be as painful as a broken heart. 

[D4ve]

The Beatle's,then Hendrix.

Ditto