Whats everyone's specific reason for ever having picked up the guitar or whatever. What was it compelled you?

For me I was very lucky growing up in Glasgow musically. There was always music going on in the house. From this I must have known every word to Exile On Main St by the Stones by the time I was 10. Bobby Womack, Taj Mahal, Lou Reed, Paul Simon, Pink Floyd, Cream, T- Rex, Zeppelin and The Who, oh and Stevie Wonder, my Mums favourite were played all the time.

Every now and then my parents would have friends round for dinner or a drink or whatever and the kids would go and play upstairs. My Mum recalls that I used to never play with the kids, I used to sit outside the door and just listen to whatever music the 'grown-ups' were listening to. I remember that's where I first heard Mike Oldfield's Crisis and Tubular Bells II. Most of all though I remember hearing Queen and I quickly made a cassette of them for my Walkman (ah, those were the days, lol).

For about a year I listened constantly to Brian May and I loved the sound of the electric guitar. Then, and its a big then, Guns N' Roses broke big and I coaxed my Dad to take me because everyone else was going........everyone was going nuts for Slash who I thought was great but I was so intrigued by the skinny shadowy figure at the other side of the stage who sang a few numbers and was playing a Telecaster and these huge Gibson hollowbodies.........Mr Izzy Stradlin.

After that, it was headphones in and I always listened to the left channel when listening to Guns, his earthy, solid, perfect timed chops seemed to me to be as cool as he looked, it matched his persona so well and I fell in love with his tone and style and to this day I love all his solo work with guys from Faces, Stones, Georgia Satellites etc.

2 years later and I finally got my Uncle to give me his old guitar and my journey began. I stuck at it and I have been very lucky to have been in bands who have worked with some of my heroes, albeit not Izzy but hey.

It was life changing!

Thanks for taking the time to read this and I look forward to hearing you guys stories.

CC

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Fender Stratocaster (parts build)
Fender Telecaster 72 Custom RI
Fender Telecoustic Deluxe
Gretsch Electromatic Pro-Jet
Gibson Les Paul Standard Plus
Gibson ES-135
Zenith Type-17
Marshall 70's JMP Superbass 100w
Blackstar HT-5

I love it, It makes me feel good. It's my excape and when the crowd is into it. You know what I mean Iceing on the cake.

CC - I got the bug in 1964 when I was 6 years old and first heard the Beatles. It grew as a slow burn for about 40 years as I grew up. I can still remember how my uncle's Strat felt in my hands in 1967. Growing up as a po' boy, there wasn't the money for gear and lessons, so the bug just smoldered, sitting under the surface.

Then work, college, and a military career got in the way, and life happened for a long time. About 5 years ago, I decided one thing I was going to do when I retired from the Air Force was to scratch the itch that I've had for all these years.

I had a couple of buddies that played guitar and had collected some neat gear, so even though it wasn't time to start playing, I did start to gather my gear and started on the basics of chords and strumming.

I retired Feb 1 of this year and hit the ground running. Since I don't have a wife or kids, there wasn't anybody to tell me "No" when it comes to collecting my gear and picking up a guitar and practicing. I keep a Strat, a Tele and my Mustang on stands next to an amp and a music stand in the middle of my living room, and that makes it easy for me to pick one of them up and play for awhile.

I have an awesome instructor and take lessons once a week to make sure I don't develop bad habits and that I have my basics down solid. After 23 years of flying airplanes, I'm a firm believer in knowing the basics and having a solid foundation in whatever I do.

I'm able to spend 3-4 hours a day either practicing or studying theory, and I'm very fortunate I'm able to satisfy just about any GAS attack I have when I find something I want. I enjoy digging around in pawn shops and used gear stores looking to add to my collection. I have several plans in my head for some builds I want to do, and am collecting bits and pieces of projects to start on in the next few months.

I told my girlfriend that while I'll probably never be good enough to hit the road, I can already write her a song and play it for her, and that's an accomplishment in itself.

I thoroughly enjoy everything on this board but the bickering. (That crap gets old in a hurry - no reason to have it on a board like this.) I like reading the stories about texasguitarslinger and Ali having their gigs, I enjoy the expertise of guys like Ceri, Martian and the others when it comes to repairs and builds, I enjoy the sly wit and wisdom of zzdoc, I drool when alainlafrance and the others share pictures of their collections. I enjoy hearing everyone’s stories and questions, and I enjoy the friendships I'm building with folks from around the world as we all share different aspects of this hobby/obsession.

As you can tell, I'm having a lot of fun. I just wish I was able to start back in the 60's when I first wanted to learn to play and had my first GAS attack. But - no worries - I'm making up for lost time!

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Old age and treachery will win every time over youth and enthusiasm.

"You can never have too many Tele's." A quote from my Sweetwater Sales Engineer

Embarrassing background story:

When I was 5 years old I saw The Bay City Rollers on a children's TV program and I announced to all that I wanted to play guitar in a rock and roll band. That christmas, my Godmother bought me an El Cheapo 3/4 size nylon string acoustic with which I proceeded to make noise. A few years later (I think when I was about 9) I started getting proper lessons and actually learnt a few chords and stuff. When I was about 13 I gave it up, soon after my parents spent (for them at least) a LOT of money on a steel string acoustic.

Fast forward to the age of 22 and I decided I'd have another crack at it. Bought myself an MIM Strat and Princeton Chorus amp and taught myself enough to keep me entertained.

Now I'm 39 and I play mainly for relaxation. I find it really helps me unwind at the end of the day. I might not even play any songs. I'm happy to just sit for an hour and just strum various chord progressions and repeat the same old blues licks over and over. I love it.

Cheers.

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MIM Std Tele, MIM HSS Strat, Homemade Mongrel Tele, Blues Jr, Champ600, coupla pedals...sweeeet!

I started as the lead singer for a band and our rhythm guitarist left for family reasons. We couldn't find a replacement and stopped for a while. During the break I started taking lessons. A year later we started up again with me on lead vocals and guitar. So it was sort of born out of necessity. I am very glad it did. Playing guitar is so much fun and very rewarding!

I come from a naturally gifted musical family. All but two of my moms 12 brothers are self taught guitarist. I remember watching them when i was around 7 years old and became interested in learning. Well my dad got me an autographed Roy Clark acoustic to learn on and just as i was getting into the habit of practice the guitar was destoyed. Well 20 years passed and i finally got myself a guitar and have been teaching myself since. I continue to play for my family and friends just for the pleasure from it. When i play it is my happy place that gets me away from everything. I have never wanted to be part of anything bigger than the church band because when you make it your job you lose the magic and the love for why you started to begin with.

I was drawn to 'that sound' which I later learned was Scotty Moore playing guitar on Elvis' songs. And of course, as I got older, I realized it got me the babes!

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You dig?

I was more interested to sports actually. But, one day my dad told me to take piano lesson, just like my elder sister and brother. At the first time I got the lesson and play C major scale on piano, my teacher said that I actually have a talent on music and I had to dig it.

After 2 years, I took drum lesson after saw Phil Collins. Drums is the thing that makes my rhythm sense being much better through the years. And now I still play drums.

Finally, my brother inspired me to play guitar. I remember when he played a jazz song through his acoustic guitar. That's the point where I started to play guitar. And, between drums and guitar, I found myself mastered to play guitar faster than play drums. That's why I choose guitar, but I still play drums and piano.

The thing that I never get the answer is three of us (my sister, brother, and me) have musical talents. But none of our parents, uncles, aunts, cousins, have any musical talents. I found this is the greatest gift from God.

I came from a family of musicians so I naturally absorbed that interest. My dad and his brother both played multiple instruments, trumpet, guitar but mostly accordion. They both have their own polka groups, started playing out when they were teens, and continue playing now. Remember we're in WI so polka music goes well with beer and cheese!

I was taking some accordion lessons from the old man for a couple years in 5th-6th grades. That's rignt, my natural lack of athletic ability was not enough to guarantee that I would get pummelled on the playground, kids heard the accordion sounds coming from the house during the day while I practiced so that upped the ante on abuse.

Christmas 1978, I got an album from an aunt as a present, a group I'd never heard before, called KISS. She bought in on the recommendation of a teenage neighbor. I was clueless, I put it on the turntable and from the first song, Strutter '78, I was hooked on rock n roll.

I quit the accordion, bought some drums which I proceeded to pound on til I learned what's what. Never looked back from there. Got rid of the drums about 20 years ago and got a bass, started on guitar about 5 years ago.

It's relaxing, and there is no better feeling than playing on a stage and having people on the dance floor enjoying the tunes your cranking out.

Don't know where I'd be without music in my life, and I owe it all to polka music that I don't like. Of course, there aren't mahy accordion players around anymore so if I had kept up with the lessons I could make alot of $$ right now with that thing. High demand, low supply thing.

Brilliant stories guys, very interesting!!


Keep 'em coming!

CC

_________________
Fender Stratocaster (parts build)
Fender Telecaster 72 Custom RI
Fender Telecoustic Deluxe
Gretsch Electromatic Pro-Jet
Gibson Les Paul Standard Plus
Gibson ES-135
Zenith Type-17
Marshall 70's JMP Superbass 100w
Blackstar HT-5

For me .Last year my 5 year old ( that really has a beat )wanted to learn to play guitar started taking lessons with a old kids guitar .Problem being she was having trouble with playing chords with small hands. But taking her to lessons I started to practice what she was learning.So when she stopped I took her place .6 month of the basics . My daugther has since started taking piano lessons which we do not have to ask her to practice , we have even played some of her song together ( great bonding that can never be replaced ) I am so glad she wanted to play the guitar to start with because my taking over has given me hours of enjoyment.

I picked one up and started learning. No formal training, people showed me some things. I just like playing music and the guitar felt right. I gravitated to the punk rock scene pretty young so it was all power chords and raw emotion. It's like kurt Cobain said "Punk is musical freedom. It's saying, doing and playing what you want. In Webster's terms, 'nirvana' means freedom from pain, suffering and the external world, and that's pretty close to my definition of Punk Rock. "

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Hi

I started going to see bands locally in the late 70,s and by 1981 after i had seen wishbone ash i thought im gonna get one of those geetars. Many bands later and a few crap unplayable guitars i got a new 1982 sunburst strat.

Faffed about with other guys for a while then got rid of that guitar about 1990.

Fast forward to about 2005 and i bought a cheapish acoustic which later
became a much nicer Martin 0016 and then a Korean stratocaster and in
2008 a deluxe US strat from a guitar fair near Penrith.
I play purely for pleasure and since getting back into guitars find it more
interesting watching musicians trying to work out some of the tricks of the trade so to speak.
Im had quite a few lessons (all acoustic based) and now my partner who
got into guitars/bands etc after we met is probably better than me lol.


I just find it a fascinating hobby and the learning (faffing) continues on!


Hope i havnt bored you guys too much. Joined the forum really to learn and absorb other peeps greater expierence and knowledge.

Take care .......Alan

Not boring at all! Thats why I started this thread, I love everyones back-stories.

Hope you are enjoying the Forum!

CC

_________________
Fender Stratocaster (parts build)
Fender Telecaster 72 Custom RI
Fender Telecoustic Deluxe
Gretsch Electromatic Pro-Jet
Gibson Les Paul Standard Plus
Gibson ES-135
Zenith Type-17
Marshall 70's JMP Superbass 100w
Blackstar HT-5

Most of my family played one instrument or another while I was growing up. So, it was only natural that I would take up something too. I started on clarinet when I was 9. Switched to trumpet at 11. Learned bass at 17, when we lost the bass player in the school jazz ensemble, and went back to woodwinds when I was 33. I started on guitar at 40 (2-years ago) and hope to take my first piano lesson soon too.