Music, sweet music - Reminiscing of how I started as a musician

Right now, I feel the urge to head back to Buffalo, walk down to my parent's basement, pick up my beautiful sunburst Strat and start bouncing sound waves through the air.  To me, there are few things that compare to this.  Well, maybe at the peak of a jam session - when everyone is right on the same groove and feeding off it, guitarist singing licks, bassist rumbling away and the drummer just dropping a great beat.

Anyways, I've been a musician since forever, and here are my weapons of choice:

• Guitar
  
• Violin
• Drums
• Bass
• Piano

My musical career was all sparked by the tinge of jealousy that I felt watching my older brother play violin.  Being the seven year old little brother, I HAD to do what the older bro was doing!  So, I begged my mom and she signed me up for lessons.   Every Monday afternoon I'd head down to the Monaco's basement (Paul) from 1st til 8th grade, progressing from scales through the Suzuki books, learning the importance of keeping the count, the wiggle of vibrato and the sweet hush Pianissimo and veracity of triple forte.

This lead me to spend my mornings playing second violin in the Williamsville East/South Orchestra with Mr. Moose.  He was a great teacher, inspiring, passionate and always left you with a feeling that as soon as you thought you knew something, there was some even finer detail and nuance that you could strive for.  I loved all those early mornings and some late afternoons in Pit Orchestra for The Wiz.

Sometime during all of this, I realized that the opposite sex doesn't find violin as sexy as other instruments - so I picked up guitar.  That, and my dad always tried to get my to learn how to play.  The first song that I ever learned was Seven Nation Army on bass, leading me to The White Stripes, to Nirvana, to Pearl Jam, to Metallica to Clapton, to Led Zeppelin, to Zak Wylde, landing somewhere between Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn, and John Mayer (Yeah, that guy can play the hell out of a guitar!).  

Currently, I stick to playing guitar in my small studio apartment, waiting for the chance to get my hands on a drum kit or bass along with a group that can play any and all of them.