What Kind of Musician Would You Like to Be?

[ritter]

But that's all that I can give you...

[Florestan]

But that's all that I can give you...

It will do just fine actually. 

[(poco) Sforzando]

A composer/conductor, but more like Furtwangler than Mahler.

Moi: a composer/conductor, but more like Mahler than Furtwangler.

[San Antone]

Better.   

[Rosalba]

If I could have a choice over again, I should definitely like to be a better musician. I am fond of early music and I think I should like to play the viol or some other early stringed instrument, in a HIP ensemble. I would have enjoyed teaching as well as performing. I don't think it would have been a very rewarding life financially, but it would have been magical, because, as my signature says, music is magic.

[joachim]

Lord, what a question! I don't play anything, I can't read sheet music.

:(But in another life I would have liked to be a composer, oh no avant-garde music, but a romantic or a classic...

[steve ridgway]

I think I might enjoy being a percussionist. Does that count as a musician?

[Mapman]

I think I might enjoy being a percussionist. Does that count as a musician?

Of course! As one of many examples, the opening of Gershwin's Piano Concerto shows the musical qualities of percussion.

[Lisztianwagner]

A very interesting question.....I can play the piano, but not at a high professional level; if I could be a musician, I would definitely like to be a pianist/conductor like Vladimir Ashkenazy (or Herbert von Karajan if he hadn't dropped the piano studies). As a pianist, I would space from Bach to 20th century composers; while as a conductor, maybe I would concentrate more on Romantic/Late-Romantic music, but in particular I would like to conduct Wagner's operas with proper stagings and promote the works of Schönberg, Zemlinsky, Holst, Elgar and Vaughan Williams, because in Italy they're too rarely performed.

[vers la flamme]

Pianist-composer, who reluctantly turns conductor-composer when it turns out that no one else knows how to conduct my music, only to discover immense fame, fortune and success as a conductor-interpreter of a diverse repertoire of music, without ever sacrificing time for composing. Humble dreams

[LKB]

I'd like to be a better version of the musician I've been since 1973...

[pjme]

I think I might enjoy being a percussionist. Does that count as a musician?

But of course...

https://www.youtube.com/v/mPwTLg_Oz_4

or

Pedro Estévan...

https://www.youtube.com/v/9VD5uRAmF8A

or

https://www.youtube.com/v/cPIZ-fRdkv8

[Pizzicato-Polka]

Lord, what a question! I don't play anything, I can't read sheet music.

Same here, unfortunately...

But if I found a lamp with a genie inside, then I'd wish to be a violin virtuoso, one who's both performing and composing.

[LKB]

I think I might enjoy being a percussionist. Does that count as a musician?

Most assuredly. From around 1966 until 1978 l was a percussionist, it was my first serious musical interest. And while l spent a much longer stretch playing the oboe and singing, l can still appreciate subtle timpani playing, which was my specialty.

[Spotted Horses]

Most assuredly. From around 1966 until 1978 l was a percussionist, it was my first serious musical interest. And while l spent a much longer stretch playing the oboe and singing, l can still appreciate subtle timpani playing, which was my specialty.

I can understand. My brother was a percussionist and made a blanket rejection of all Karajan Decca opera recordings based on the type of timpani mallets that were used.

[DaveF]

2 pages in and time to lower the tone: a rock star with millions of women lusting after me, obviously.

[vandermolen]

I'd like to play the trombone.

[staxomega]

If you could start your life anew, would you like to become a musician? If yes, what kind? Composer? Performer?

How about you? Do you have such daydreams?

JS Bach's cantatas (particularly the sacred) are among my most listened to works. I've never heard any other than Webern's that match them. Some very fine Russian cantatas from the romantic era but still don't reach the same highs as JS Bach and Webern for me. So with that in mind if I were a composer I'd want to write cantatas in a serial style (not strictly 12 tone), sung in Italian, metaphysical texts, maybe religious (I wouldn't write them).

I'd never actually do it, I'm pretty happy with what I do, I imagine it's in the top 10% or possibly 5% of all jobs in terms of job satisfaction, and pays alright. Composing great music also requires a level of creativity I know I don't possess.

[Mandryka]

I've finally thought of the answer to this. I'd like to be the sort of musician who does the hammerschlag in Mahler 6.  I could do this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DEdq2WdFnU&ab_channel=sftimpani