Playing another instrument, just spreading your time too thin?

[educatedfilm]

I'm thinking of getting a really cheap keyboard to learn on (and once I'm "ok" at it maybe and organ), plus maybe a bass, and maybe a mandolin (if anyone sells them lefty)... This is really just for fun, not to improve my guitar-ing (if there isn't such a word,well then... I've just invented it), or my theory... but am I being a little to wishful? Post Janaury, I've got absoloutly nothing to do, other than maybe a weekend job, and there are only so many paitings you can paint before you run out of insparation, and gutiar becomes routine...
What do you think? Am I wasting my money on so much cheap stuff, when i could get my self a decent guitar and some pedals? Or is being able to play other insturments an advantage, and should take it?...
I dont know...

[PonyOne]

Well, my brother in lefthandedness...

In addition to guitar, I play bass, saxophone (preferrably alto, but I've been known to dabble with beritone) and I'm teaching myself keyboard.
I got a Yamaha RM1X, used, for a scant 500USD. The list for something like a grand, and generally sell for 700 new, 650 used. It's a "groovebox;" I don't know how familiar you are w/synth terms, but basically, a groovebox contains a bank of sounds and, often, either a sequencer, sampler, or some sort of tweakability engine, or any combination of those, and then combines them with a mini keyboard.
The RM1X is higher-end, and has a 26-keypad board, and has something like 750 sounds preprogrammed in, an effects block that lets you build your own effects or tweak existing ones, pitch bend, etc, all realtime. It's one sweet item; I'd never played with anything of the sort when I plunked my hard-earned bills down for it, but I don't regret it at all.
The first two weeks were pretty much like the first 6 months of guitar for me: one minute I was waving my johnson proudly because I was so cool and the next I was running down the block to jump off the bridge because I felt so pathetic (one of the dangers of living in an urban center).
Emotional duress aside, I was hammering out some simplistic beats that gto my friends' heads nodding in that time, and after a month or so, was making some pretty good, complex stuff.
It's now an indespensible part of my rig, I use it both for live stuff (I have a friend switch parts and such for me while i play guitar) as well as songwriting. I don't play drums and I haven't had one good experience with drummers, so this gives me the ability to hammer out my own drum tracks realtime, as well as add some eurotrash tekno to the mix.

With grooveboxes one of the bonuses is the ability to hook a MIDI controlling keyboard ($50-$200USD, depending on how many keys) which allow you to get the additional range the integrated minikeyboard can't offer (to rememdy this, there's an octave up/down switch that basically moves the board down appropriately so you get a full 88 keys, which is cool, but not well suited to live usage).
The Yamaha, like I said, is one of the more "up-there" boxes, and you could probably find one in the UK for about 300-400 sterling. From what I understand, they're supposed to be really huge with British techno artists now. Moving down is the Korg Electribe series, which are nice because they offer some really good sounds for a cheap price. The problem: you have the Electribe R (Rythm), A (Analog Synthesizer), S (Sampler) and now the M (combination of all above, minus the sampler). Basically, the RM1X and other boxes in that range take the R, A, and elements of the S and M models and put them in one box. Again, though, if you're on a budget and something in the 500+ range isn't in your abilites, an Electribe M or A are good bets.

I don't want to be long winded, but I'll keep going, you can filter out the unnecessary info/ad lib at your discretion.

If you want to learn the keyboard you need to make sure that you get box that has a good piano and supports a midi keyboard (90% do). Going the groovebox/midi controller route makes more financial sense than buying a full-fledged keyboard; you can get the same capabilities as a keyboard and then some for at least 100 less.
You also get the added bonus of a sequencer. Make sure it's a HARDWARE sequencer; the virtual ones on units by Zoom or the low-end Boss and Roland models are piddly little toys that are painfully confounding. A harware sequencer basically turns the mini keypad into a separate identity. It splices one measure down into either 8 or 16 pieces. You use a knob to select the sound that you want (there is a octave/pitch key that lets you change the note), and then push the key that corresponds with the part in the song that you want it to go into.

For instance, say that your measure is broken down like this:
{----------------}
You want a bass drum at a good simple 4 beat per measure interval. The turn the knob to you favorite bass drum sound and use the keypad so your measure is now:
{B---B---B---B---}
you add hihats at as they sound in Metallica's "One" (the song I'm listening to at present):
{HHHH----HHHH----}
and cymbals at the temp of 8 times per measure
{C-C-C-C-C-C-C-C-}
and then at the end, you decide to make the bassline more interesting so you add a n extra beat
{B---B-B-B---B---}
so you end up with these parts playing at once
{B---B-B-B---B---}
{HHHH----HHHH----}
{C-C-C-C-C-C-C-C-}
Right now it looks like a bunch of letters and dashes, but if you have a sequencer in front of you, you'll understand. Then you can add breaks, rolls, etc, and key them in as you wish by pushing another button on your magic box and switching sections.

Still follow me?

You probably already know what sampling is. As you can guess, a sampler samples. You connect it to a CD player, TV, VCR, amp, mic, sample CD, computer, whatever, and then record a clip of a song. You can go the Fatboy slim route and take someone saying "damn that's a lot of ass" and use it ass the backbone of your song (I don't like this personally), or you can do something like Alien Ant Farm: take a sample of Michael Jackson making some schizo rage sound and one of his famous "whoo" and put them in rapid succession to form an almost ambient instrument in its own right.
My RM1X doesn't have a sampler, but I have a sampler on my G4 that I use. I usually don't sample other people's stuff; I'll record my girlfriend doing one vocal, or my bird chirping, or a riff I did, and I'll cue it in at appropriate points.
Samplers can make good impromtu recording mixers, provided they have the sample time. Most expensive samplers have less than 3 minutes of time on them; it doesn't sound like much but if you have a whole ton of things that are less than two seconds long then you've got hundreds of new voices to add to your armada.
The cheapest decnt sampler on the market is the Boss Dr. Sample, which you can get for as low as $200. The downside to these cheap samplers is their lack of support for sequencing. More than anythnig else they're designed to supplement a machine like the RM1X. This is why I like the Electribe S, it has a full-fledged sequencer, a bunch of pre-pregrammed sounds, and something that you rarely see on samplers but that all need: a SmartMedia slot that can save your sampled bits and songs.

I rarely let my Yamaha take center stage in my songs and do the techno DJ thing; I get my rocks off performing with my band. But there are some thigs you just can't do with a guitar or bass or drums or sax, at least in this realm. Also if you're a high school dropout who works out of the back of an '86 Saab 900 or one of three small locations (read: me), it's easier than hauling a whole ton of gear.

Bass was actually harder to pick up than I thought, but, after a couple years teaching myself to shred and such, I can grab a cheap bass, plug into an amp at a guitar store and do a bunch of Les Claypool stuff like it's nothing. To me though, the guitar is just something more, and I end up rarely playing bass.

Playing other instruments is a definite advantage, and always worth it. Even if you plunk down $15 for a Melodica, it's worth it; hey, maybe your new sound, the blending of melodica and blues guitar, will make the backbone of a new sound that inspires millions around the world.
It's fun to see/hear the reaction of a crowd of goths and metal heads when you are closing the set and say, just barely out of breath, "alright, we're gonna book, but, first, we want to leave you with this...it's something you may remember from your days in junior high or high school, and probably scoff at now, but maybe this will warm your heart" and break into a techno/hardcore/industrial cover of "It's a Beautiful Life" by Ace of Base, complete with piano and fruity sounding techno breaks.

I don't think that synths will or ever should take the place of real instruments; nobody has made a good guitar synth yet, they all sound terrible. But they are instruments in their own right and are useful if it'll suit your style of music.

So if you're intrigued and I didn't confuse/scare you off, here are some names to look at:
Yamaha RM1X
Korg Electribe EA-1, ER-1, ES-1, EM-1
Boss Dr. Rythm
Boss Dr. Sample
Roland MC-303, MC-307

And, if your computer has a good processor and you are willing to get a PCI card w/midi & RCA in-outs, plus a Midi COntroller, check out Propellerhead's "Reason" software. You can find reviews of it online, I gotta jet. Hope this helped some.

[jarviss]

i suggest it...
i taught myself guitar....
and only played guitar....
picked up my friends bass once in awhile
and it was fun...
played piano...
played ukulele (fun stuff)
and what else....

i dont know....harmonica too i guess

i think that the more instruments you
try to play or tinker around on...
it will only broaden your horizons in music...

even if you dont plan on being the next
liberace on piano...(and who is, really?)
;)
it's still advantageous to get on there and plink
around..

i mean you already know how to form chords and
know your scales....if not theoretically,,,audibley
(did i make that word up?)
so you can sit down at the keys and pound out a melody...

by sitting there with all these octaves in front of you
in a line...you might be influenced to approach
songwriting in a new manner...
you never know what'll come out
:)

whew ... long post....

whenever i go to my father in law's house...
(he has a grand piano)...i plunk around and
although i can NOT play any song all the way
thru on the piano...i always come up with
melodies that i would not come up wit on the guitar
(actually, i write better ones on the piano)
:(

to sum up.
go for it dude...
you ALREADY have a guitar....

:)
rock on
-G

[Raskolnikov]

There isn't anything you can learn one another instrument that you can't apply to guitar, bass, or anything else for that matter. I think it would be very good for you to pick up some other instruments.

[jarviss]

....yeah...what he said
:)

[AuralXiter]

Bro' Don't hesitate to do anything that would make you happy. You'll only be a better musician and probably a better guitar player for crossing over, at least from a songwriter composer perspective. A lot of guitarists have no sense of texture or tonal variance. Learning more instruments can make you a more well rounded musician. You will be spending less time on the guitar though (possibly).


peace

[Azrael]

HI!

It can be very helpfull to widen your musical horizon.
Especially when u compose and arrange your own songs containing other instruments. You learn what tonal range several instruments have, what is playable and what is impossible to play with a certain instrument and you get heaps of new inspirations!

If you want to be different and go other ways in music that all the others, then this can be very usefull - my teacher for example writes the guitarparts for his songs on his keyboard and vice versa - so you get to play things on your guitar that you wouldnt have figured out just by using the guit. Simply because a keyboarder plays things in different way as a guitarist would (or a violin player, or whoever).

So knowing about other instruments possabilities and qualities can help you big time to write more interrestinn and uniqe stuff :)

cheers

-=[Azrael]=-

[Joseph]

http://www.freakygamers.com/smilies/s/contrib/edoom/buzz_saw.gif

Basically when it comes to music there are so many endless possibilities, you shouldn't worry about whether you have found the perfect instrument to experiment with, (just ask yourself if you're enjoying yourself.) Recently I started playing the violin more religiously, mainly because I don't want to look back ten years from now only to realize that I don't have enough patience to the damn thing still for more than five seconds.

Always be willing to experiment with many different instruments, because you never know when your time will become limited. You never know when you'll receive more responsibility, or when you wife is nagging you instead of nibbling on your ear.

-Joseph