Do You Let Your Kids Play With Your Music Gear?

[jive1]

Just curious, do you let your kids play with or use your music gear?

I do up to a point. I want my son to be comfortable around instruments, how to play them, and how to take care of them. There are some instruments or pieces of equipment that he's not allowed to play with unsupervised, and he's definitely not allowed to touch anything that isn't mine or is at the shop. But he's a toddler, so I gotta be careful anyway. But I do let him handle my bass, plug in pedals, turn knobs and sliders, etc.

[Cmymud]

I bought them there own gear

[jaywa]

Funny you should ask that.

I have two granddaughters living with me, ages 8 and 5. Every now and then one of them sits on my lap while I'm practicing and I'll show them how to pluck and fret, but a 78 P-Bass is way more than their little fingers can handle so they lose interest pretty fast. We solved that by getting each of them child-sized replica guitars ($25 at Menards) that don't have a lot of musical value but look like the real thing and let them "play along with papa".

Witness below each of them... my "folkie" (doing her best Lisa Loeb), and her little sister, the rocker...

[tekdiver500ft]

Yes, but they are both in their late teens, and both are very responsible.

[pflash4001]

My kids have learned how to handle gear from an early age. My oldest got his first Fender at 6 months. He got a Gibson Les Paul Studio and a ticket to a Santana concert for his 6th birthday. I have no problems with them handling gear within reason...

[jaywa]

Originally Posted by pflash4001

My kids have learned how to handle gear from an early age. My oldest got his first Fender at 6 months. He got a Gibson Les Paul Studio and a ticket to a Santana concert for his 6th birthday. I have no problems with them handling gear within reason...

Smart dad... you've got him working on his singing skills early on!

[pflash4001]

And they do have their own gear too...here are more pix...

[pflash4001]

And more...

[pflash4001]

And the newest member of the family...Andecy...She's going to be the most ass kickingest girl sound guy ever...

[miles'tone]

Yes I've got a fretless jazz copy in my living room that my 3 year old son can play with. I let him pluck and bang the strings (he knows the names of the open strings now).
A few weeks ago I showed him a walking bass line and asked him if he wanted to try. He laid it on the floor and with a look of deep concentration on his face, he stepped onto the strings by the bridge and slowly, like a tight-rope walker, he walked all the way to the headstock! Cracked me up. He looked so proud when I told him that was the coolest walking bass I'd ever seen. Bless

I haven't shown him my custom P-bass yet

[pflash4001]

Originally Posted by jaywa

Smart dad... you've got him working on his singing skills early on!

That pic with the Ric and the mic...he set that up on his own...I walked into the room and he was singing The Itsy Bitsy Spider...accompanying himself with a 4001...kid's got expensive taste. He's 10 now and asking for a Ric 660 and a Selmer sax...

[pflash4001]

Originally Posted by miles'tone

Yes I've got a fretless jazz copy in my living room that my 3 year old son can play with. I let him pluck and bang the strings (he knows the names of the open strings now).
A few weeks ago I showed him a walking bass line and asked him if he wanted to try. He laid it on the floor and with a look of deep concentration on his face, he stepped onto the strings by the bridge and slowly, like a tight-rope walker, he walked all the way to the headstock! Cracked me up. He looked so proud when I told him that was the coolest walking bass I'd ever seen. Bless

I haven't shown him my custom P-bass yet

That's a great story and a great example of kids' linear logic at that age!

[BumbleB]

My daughter is 8. We are a musical family and she is expressing interest in music more these days so we don't want to squelch it. She has her own recorder (two now actually) which she takes pretty good care of and I've let her play a few riffs on my bass before. She's not supposed to touch my gear unless I'm there. I take her to the music store with as often as possible so she can see and play with the various types of gear. We are thinking about getting her another instrument and some lessons in the not so distant future, probably looking at this for her birthday in the summer.

[ma4rk]

My daughter does my tech work.

[lbbc]

yes..but my youngest at 19 & 20 w/jobs. So, if they break it, they replace it!

[EricF]

Mine are 8 and 14, and have proven themselves to handle my music gear with care and respect. It was a learning process, though.

[Joe Louvar]

We (grandparents and our adult kids) only let the grandchildren play with our gear while supervised - but our grandchildren also have pretty nice gear of their own.

Originally Posted by jive1

Just curious, do you let your kids play with or use your music gear?

I do up to a point. I want my son to be comfortable around instruments, how to play them, and how to take care of them. There are some instruments or pieces of equipment that he's not allowed to play with unsupervised, and he's definitely not allowed to touch anything that isn't mine or is at the shop. But he's a toddler, so I gotta be careful anyway. But I do let him handle my bass, plug in pedals, turn knobs and sliders, etc.

[fenderhutz]

Gear my kids (5 and 7) can touch:

An old 60's FMIC Terrega classical guitar, an Alvarez acoustic, a drumset, a keyboard, and there are little things like bongos and such.

Gear they can touch under my close supervision:

My amp, my bass, my guitarjo (6 string banjo), my mics, my pedalboard. Mainly because I need them functional for gigging.

Gear I won't allow them to touch:

Nothing. I want to build a music fun environment for my kids.

[Rockin Mike]

I wish I could get them to play with my music gear.

It breaks my heart that they're more into Facebook and Minecraft.

[silvertone]

I told my kid, "don't touch my frikkin' guitars."

Now he's in several SF Based bands and plays both lead guitar (Strat) and electric bass (3/4 scale Kay Pbass). He's 14.