For those of you who have been in musical ensembles, either instrumental or vocal, for a long time, have you not recognized that a performer's personality seems to be connected to the instrument or voice part? In general, choral groups are much more outgoing and the individuals each have a smaller personal body space, i.e. they tend to be comfortable with closer physical proximity than instrumentalists, who are more introverted and have larger personal spaces, even more so when the instrument needs room to be performed. I have been in instrumental and choral groups for several years, and I have made some observations and have discussed them with a few of the types in question. With instrumentalists, the personalities seem to sort out like this, as follows: The flutists tend to be women, and girlie-girl ingenues at that. Some may characterize them as bimboish and air-headed as as result. I am not sure about men flutists-- although the few I've met are usually graceful and somewhat feminine (although *not* necessarily effeminiate). Clarinetists are often women, too, and are gamins to the ingenue flutists. They are much more quiet. The leading chairs may be outgoing enough, but many are very mousy. As with many lower (alto, bass, contrabass) versions of instruments, bass and contrabass clarinets are more outwardly thoughtful. They seem to be men more often, too. Saxophone players are brash, although it is mostly true of alto saxophonists. Same rules concerning lower versions (baritone sax, bass sax, etc.) seem to apply. The brass always carry themselves with a measure of dignity.. or ego. Trumpet players are often ego-inflated and brash, but no cheekiness exceeds that of French horn players. It's a running joke that trumpet players think they are God, while horn players know they are God. Besides ego, french horn players seem to have a lack of patience. I had three directors that were horn players, and they all were rather neurotic. Trombonists are clowns.. I guarantee. It must be the slide. Even if a trombonist isn't clowny alone, put the trombonist back in to his/her section, and (s)he will be. Baritone horn and euphonium players.. may be clowny as trombonists or like unto the tuba players, which generally mean they drink like fish. Tuba players.. carry weight in many a sense. Big bodies, big presence. As I said, many drink like fishes. Percussionists are of a few stripes. Many are competitive, especially those of drum and bugle corps training. They may be very quirky or very brooding and moody. The quirkiness seems to come more with those who are genuine percussionists.. rock n roll drummers often don't fit the bill. You've got to be able to play it all.. especially 'the goodies.' Bassoonists are intelligent and often great conversationalists to me, too. They are down-to-earth and generally pretty straightforward and honest. Oboe players have a nut loose somewhere. Most all of them, save a few I have met, have a bona fide oddity about them. It must be in that the instrument has the greatest intonation problems of any, and the players have to make all their own reeds. They cannot 'lip up' like bassoonists can. String players: Violin-- still difficult to tell. Quiet, but may hide an interesting personality. Sometimes appear to be a little snooty. Viola-- never met a violist I didn't find interesting. Never boring. Must be all those insipidly boring lines they have to put up with. Cellists are deep. They may hide some ego, but many seem to be capable of dealing with suffering. I have met at least one who crosstrained in classical guitar studies. Bass violinists are great conversationalists. Some are exceedingly quiet. Mellow at any rate. They have odd and quirky senses of humor when electrified (i.e., bass guitarists). Guitarists are laid back.. way back. Few are purely classically trained, and many do not know how to read standard notation at first. Quite a few learn by ear, by experimentation, by chord shapes, and by tablature (which was created for the lute). As I said, bass guitarists (which usually means electric-- not many play guitarrons) often have unusual senses of humor. Lead electric guitarists (for rock and jazz ensembles) generally have the egos if any do. Any major instruments I've forgotten?17 responses total.
Not that I'm particularly interested in your generalizations, but I suppose I'd consider the piano a "major instrument"
I have noticed that string quartets and quintets always seem to appreciate jokes of which the violist is the butt. I saw a string quintet walking into a restaurant in Greektown on Easter Sunday and I said to them, "What I want to know is, just exactly who was it that thought adding another viola would be an improvement?"
resp:1 They are not really *my* generalizations-- quite a few of them are based on comments, quotes, and such made by other musician friends of mine. And you don't have to be interested; I'm just trying to round out the music cf again, since it has been mostly about folk and Napster et al items lately. I almost forgot the piano, yes. (It was late when I posted.. what did you want?) I'm not sure what pianist personalities are like, but I remember how competitive and elitist the performance arena is; which is typical of popular instruments such as the trumpet, flute, drums, etc. Technically, the piano is a percussionist instrument, so percussion students do cover it a bit more perhaps than others, if only in experimental applications. Often these are mallet students (vibraphone, marimba, xylophone, bells, etc.). More often than not, however, the piano is its own category. Yet I also see similar personalities in electronic and MIDI applications for keyboard instruments.. and the more complex and involved in the studio they are, the more pensive and deep they seem to be. I have not met enough students of the organ to make any generalized comment. resp:2 Ouch. Well, I would imagine the violist would probably be the one most likely to chuckle good-naturedly.
I'm surprised that your generalization of violinists was as gentle as it was.
This is far from the first time I've seen such a categorization. I wonder why musicians are so interested in this? In high school, I tried to figure out if there were personality or other traits of teachers by what subject they taught, but no teacher I mentioned this to found the matter at all interesting or relevant. Very different from musicians; too bad I didn't mention it to a music teacher.
In rock bands, the singers tend to be extroverts, the guitarists introverts, and the drummers are maniacs. Bassists tend to be introspective, mostly because they have to listen to everything, and be the glue between the rhythmic and harmony. I agree witht he comment about quirky senses of humor, too. The biggest egos tend to be singers and guitarists. Of course, I have also played in bands where these descriptions did not apply.
resp:4 I do not know many violinists, although some folks I've talked to suggested they were stuck up pricks. resp:6 That's about what I've heard and seen. It must be remembered that those who play multiple instruments will fit in multiple categories, and probably comprise some of the folks where descriptions don't apply. I knew a prof who was Vienna-trained in directing, and he played viola and trombone. It spoke quite reflectively of his personality. Of course, directors, too, are personalities unto themselves, especially when the training has been long and significant. I do remember a friend of mine who was a horn player and a grad student in directing. He was quite the opposite from the typical horn player stereotype.
The predominant perception that violas are larger than violins has been proven false. It turns out that violas merely appear larger because violinists' have big heads.
*laughs*
I think cycklone just described Dr. Teeth and the Electric mayhem.
Well, yeah, but then we identified with Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem because they *were* based a little on rock stereotypes.
As a horn player, here's how I view our instrument's affiliated personality: I'll agree that their tends to be a certain ego that goes along with the horn... however, I'll greatly disagree that it exceeds that of trumpet players. Nothing exceeds the ego of a trumpeter, except possibly the egos of some violinists, but there is much more diversity in violin personalities than in trumpet personalities. Horn players tend to be perfectionists. They tend to be competitive. They tend to be very opinionated and fairly blunt and up-front with their opinions. They tend to be moody and mercurial with their moods. I'll disagree with that lack of patience part, since there's no way to survive on this beast of an instrument without an extreme degree of patience. I'll agree with neurotic, but almost every musician I know has some sort of neurosis. Maybe the fact that I'm lacking in some of these traits contributes to the fact that I'm only a mediocre horn player.
Your mileage just varies, then. But your assessment-- self-assessment, even, echoes much of what I've heard, including that the horn is difficult to play. But then, the evil thought of "well, of course the horn player would claim to be humbler than the trumpets and violinists!" went through my head, too. I knew a horn player who did not fit the stereotype at all. It must have been that he was a grad student in conducting.
Your #0 was interesting to read. I can't buy into any of it, I'm afraid to say! ;-) The *real* clowns of any concert band are the percussionists, hands down. Here's the ole joke: Those that can sing, do. Those that can't are given an instrument. Those that can't play are given 2 sticks and a drum. Those that can't drum have 1 stick taken away and stand on the podium. ;-)
Oh, that makes sense. You have some percussionists that are clowny, given that they have so many "goodies" to play with. But you must admit some real brooding types are there, too.
Never seen anyone stand on the podium with a drum, pa-dum.
Ummm.. have you seen some conductors and the way they tap on their podiums? They might as well be making some music if they weren't instead calling attention to themselves.
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