The NFC B-Day Chat Thread

Nah, I wish it was a Gibson. It's more like a Gotta-Get-Her-a-Present-But-I'm-Broke-EBay-mandolin! That's probably why I never learned to play it very well. Cheaply made, the fret bars are high so the strings sit so high it was like running my fingers over a chain saw blade. I could have taken it to Hedge Music and had the bars filed down and then had it restrung, but that would have cost darn near as much as the mandolin did. I just liked messing with it - in short increments of time.
My banjo went the way of my other 12 string....stolen, pawned, lost but it was never replaced. Hope my grandkids want to play something out of these.

My daughter Terrin was about the best guitar picker/singer/songwriter I ever heard, until she got into her Janice Joplin phase and changed everything about her style. When my friends would be over and we'd all be sitting around playing guitar together, later I would find her sound asleep on the floor at the top of the stairs with imprints of the tile on her sweet little face. She picked up my guitar at 5, started playing, and as far as I know now she's never stopped, even at 47 years old. What a waste of talent and sparkle. <sigh> She wasn't content to learn what I could teach her, she had to go well past that, and that's it should be. I can still remember her grinning at me while she played and sang, "Leader of the Band." But she'd change it to "The leader of the band is tired and her eyes are growing old...but her blood runs through my instrument and her song is in my soul. My life has been a poor attempt to imitate my mom, I'm just the living legacy to the leader of the band." then "and Momma I don't think I said I love you near enough." Aaand now I made myself bawl. <sigh> I just love and miss her so much.
 
AW that's love Blooie. :love My son used to sit at the piano (an old brand less kind )
and play. He didn't play songs we knew but, he'd come up melodies that really sounded good and you'd almost think he could read music.

He also used to sing parts of "Lady in Red," like " Lady in Red is dancing with me, cheek to cheek." Lady in Red, I love you mama." That was before the "I hate you." period that lasted much too long.
 
PS some of Janis Joplin's stuff was good, I loved " Me and Bobby McGee," Used to sing it to one of my dogs but, I used his name instead of Bobby. Every time I mentioned his name his tail thumped on the bed.

Also "Merecedes Benz" that song suited my voice perfectly, could just screech out the words.
 
:hugs Music and memories..... Sadly Terrin is still in the "I hate you" phase and I don't see that changing in the time I have left. But her mental illness has made any relationship just too toxic and I can't do it anymore. So I focus on what I have, pray for her safety and health, and remember how it was. All we can do, right?
 
I've never been able to play any instrument, except a drum and a flute...native style. Heck, I can't even play the radio! :gig
My grandfather played a banjo, pretty darn good at, too!
My talents are geared more towards the artistic side of painting, taxidermy, making things out of raw materials. There's something about taking a blank of wood and making a gunstock out of it, or taking an animal that's dead and making it look "alive"....anyone can mount an animal but it takes real talent, artistic ability to make that animal look alive. Same with anything I do, you have to feel the soul of what your working on and bring it to life.
Just never had that relationship with an instrument. :idunno
 
I've never been able to play any instrument, except a drum and a flute...native style. Heck, I can't even play the radio! :gig
My grandfather played a banjo, pretty darn good at, too!
My talents are geared more towards the artistic side of painting, taxidermy, making things out of raw materials. There's something about taking a blank of wood and making a gunstock out of it, or taking an animal that's dead and making it look "alive"....anyone can mount an animal but it takes real talent, artistic ability to make that animal look alive. Same with anything I do, you have to feel the soul of what your working on and bring it to life.
Just never had that relationship with an instrument. :idunno

And you know, Sean, what you said in your post about "feel the soul of what your working on and bring it to life" applies to anything else we do, from cooking for our families to extreme sports. I think that's what I lacked. I can do a lot of different things. I really loved and enjoyed those things, but I just never got that "soul of it" part. The closest I probably came to that was with quilting. I envy you that feeling of having true passion to add to the talent for creating. But hey, I'm only 67 - I still have time to find it!
 
I have been loving this discussion, had no idea everyone was so musically talented. Also had no idea there was even a 12 string guitar. Guess I have a lot more to learn.

And I too have very eclectic tastes. I listen to about everything haha

And I just remembered jazz fusion, this conversation reminded me of it, I think I heard it once at a band concert, we had a separate jazz band thing for fun, i think they played some stuff like that, and i might have seen it at other concerts too, not school related. That stuff is pretty fun.

Blooie, I am sorry about your daughter.

And RJ, thank you for the vote of confidence! I think I probably will learn an instrument eventually, just for fun, but I doubt I will ever play my own songs. Idk. A lot of them I wrote when I was going through a lot of hard stuff so it's more like a journal than a song especially because some of them are really long lol but then a few that I made much later on were better, I wrote those as notes on my phone rather than physically writing them. I still occasionally jot down an idea or two on the phone notes, usually just a line or verse or whatever. I guess I should have physically written them down though because I had a couple good ideas that I lost. One I lost the phone and the other is on an old Tumblr account I used to have but I don't use it anymore and it would take forever to find. I actually sent it to a friend in messages there and I'm not sure I'd even be able to find it, the messages might only be one way/show one side unlock here. And I thought that one was a really cool idea and I liked the style of it. Oh well I guess. That was several years ago. Anyway, I might keep practicing. I mean, there's plenty of people that make it and they're not even good. That sounds really mean and what's good is subjective of course and obviously I don't want to put out junk, there's enough of that, but I guess what I mean is maybe I just need to find the right genre/style for my voice. I still don't think I would ever actually perform in front of anyone though. Bad anxiety and also just a shy/private person in general. I don't even like playing music or videos or watching TV in front of family meanwhile my brothers have no problem doing so. Plus I get embarrassed/awkward, idk. I won't sing or practice if anyone can hear me so usually that means I only do so when home alone which isn't that often. Idk, maybe once I move out it will be better.
 
And you know, Sean, what you said in your post about "feel the soul of what your working on and bring it to life" applies to anything else we do, from cooking for our families to extreme sports. I think that's what I lacked. I can do a lot of different things. I really loved and enjoyed those things, but I just never got that "soul of it" part. The closest I probably came to that was with quilting. I envy you that feeling of having true passion to add to the talent for creating. But hey, I'm only 67 - I still have time to find it!
Yep Blooie, It's never to late! :)
 

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