Comments on: Why You Should Not Major in Music Performance

By: GoofyDawg

GoofyDawg — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 18:11:53 +0000

Great advice from your teacher. I got similar advice from the dean of my college. The words he spoke have stuck with me since, and will continue to be a guide: “There’s always room in this world for people who are good.”

By: Josh

Josh — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 14:13:42 +0000

@Ovidiu – I think a good guitar teacher is invaluable, but learning to play on your own is valuable, as well. Sage advice from B.B.

Thanks guys for stopping by!

By: Josh

Josh — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 14:12:08 +0000

@Jon – Yes, it’s easy to see how hard it is to create a concert career in classical guitar when you see many people around you that are as good or better than you are. I still think I received a lot of value out of my classical guitar education, even if I don’t play classical guitar professionally.

By: Ovidiu - GuitarFlame.com

Ovidiu - GuitarFlame.com — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 11:27:23 +0000

Well, I don’t have a diploma in music, but I think your teacher gave you a good advice. I am a guitar player because I have studied it in private, as a hobby, without a teacher, so you and Jon probably have an advantage here

Anyway, I think that your specialization is way better the way it is. Training to be a musician or an athlete without a backup career may be tricky. I remember reading somewhere a few days ago an article about a kid playing the guitar quite good and dreaming of becoming a professional guitar player. BB King advised him to also follow a school in engineering, just in case the guitar thing won’t work out on the long term…

By: Jon

Jon — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 22:06:46 +0000

Some good advice, I did my Bachelor of Music degree at Birmingham Conservatoire where I managed to tailor the course to suit me, you had to do certain modules which covered Improvisation, Composition, Harmony and Aural and also various music history classes (classical, jazz) and music technology.

However, I majored in classical guitar for the first 2 years before realising that it is was a wrong decision. Only a few, maybe 2 or 3 classical guitarists will be touring England at any one time with Orchestras and even then they often teach to boost their pay. There were about 20 classical guitarists in my year, all of them better than me. I could however kick all of their asses in a shredding comp!! I later moved on to music technology and guitar fell by the wayside.

I am now a professional web developer and guitar is my passion and hobby. Maybe if I had taken a different route the tables would be turned? Classical guitar tuition put me off playing for a long time, I should have stuck with playing electric exclusively.