I'm Peter Martin, and I'm Adam Manus.

You're listening to the You'll Hear at podcast.

Daily jazz advice coming at you.

Today we're going to look at whether you should start a new instrument.

Now, you're looking at me, but I already play a couple instruments, so I feel like this is unfair.

Well, I was looking at you, but not accusingly.

I was looking at you for guidance on this, actually, for leadership, in fact.

I do play a couple of different instruments.

I play the piano as, like, my main instrument, and, you know, I play a little guitar.

I play some accordion, and those are more, like, peripheral sort of in my...

And the melodica. The melodica, that doesn't really count, though. That's just blowing into a piano, let's be honest. No, I've tried blowing into a piano. Nothing good happens with that. But you know, a lot of jazz musicians play multiple instruments. You know, I know you've played a little bass. Everybody plays a little drums. You know what I mean? It's good to actually know how these instruments work. But I think you're asking, should you start a new instrument from scratch, like trying to learn it?

Yeah, I kind of was, but I think it would be fun for us to look through the different reasons why, because there are, like, you've actually taken on instruments, the ones that you mentioned, and played them professionally and played

them well. I think there's that level. So let's look at that. And then let's also just look

at the other thing that you mentioned, which is just learning a little bit, which can really

help in terms of composition, just functional. Like you could never do it on a gig, but you can

get around instrument. Like if you want to write for brass brass instruments to be able to play a B-flat scale on the trumpet, you know, just to learn the fingers and learn what it takes. It's hard. I know brass players can't do it. Exactly. Or can't do it well, for sure. So, I mean, there's, I think that there's that. And so the answer would be yes you should start a new instrument now should you start an instrument and have the

expectation So, I mean, there's, I think that there's that. And so the answer would be, yes, you should start a new instrument. Now, should you start an instrument and have the expectation of it becoming the level of your primary instrument? Maybe not. I mean, it depends, though. I think when you start, if, when you start learning a new instrument, you should ask yourself the question, you know, what's my goal with this? Do I want to be as proficient as this as my main instrument, or do I want to, what are you doing there, dude? I'm pouring coffee. Is that loud? Yeah, it's totally allowed. This is so, it's so relaxed. I just wanted everyone to hear the supple sounds of my Java. It's a little rude, but yeah, yeah, no, feel free, feel free. No, so what you want to,

you know, do is ask yourself, how good do I want to get? How much time do I want to devote to this?

Will this distract from my main instrument, you know, anything you learn is going to enhance your

musical, you know, that enhances your musical knowledge,

will enhance your playing of your main instrument.

So I wouldn't worry too much about that.

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