So my 16 year old has expressed interest in recording and making beats. Today I set up all the stuff I don’t use anymore on his desk. Kind of cool to be able to share and hopefully see something come from it. Anyone else have a similar situation?
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It is so awesome you can set him up with such a capable area. My father let me use his real to real and 4 track to record my many bands. It’s something I will never forget and looking back a great bonding experience.
I tried a year or so ago with my now 18 year old twins. That was a negative pretty quick. Sports and girls were/are their focus.
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My daughter (11) has expressed interest but I don’t buy her stuff right now. She can use mine. Bought her some cheap turntables for that interest that were used once.
Currently she is learning piano using my Fantom 8 and an iPad app (talk about an excessive midi controller). I told her if she practices everyday for a month I’ll buy her a Williams digital piano for her room.
She also sometimes plays with the Circuit I never use and some iPad apps.
If she keeps at it I will give her the circuit.
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I don’t enjoy the music he’s interested in but if I can show him how to use these tools, more power to him. It’s just stuff I don’t use anymore (2012 MBP, iConnectAUDIO4+, M-Audio condenser mic) but perfectly acceptable for someone learning and I wouldn’t get much if I tried to sell all that. Might as well put it to some sort of use.
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My father wasn’t into my metal noise either, did love to be involved though. As long as I didn’t let anyone else touch his real to real. Hahaha!
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Totally. If you aren’t using it put it to use! I like pretty much all music. I can either appreciate the word play, or the base lines, or the drums, or melodies of just about anything my kids want to listen to. It doesn’t hurt they are too young to realize what’s new or “old”.
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My kid is 14 and got interested in music production via video game soundtracks. I got him a AFX Station last winter and then a Scarlet audio interface and some little KRK Rokits. He’s teaching himself to use Ableton. I just let him do his thing and don’t try to influence or push him unless he asks for help.
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…me too…
gave my son a model:samples for x mas 2019 to get started…
did’nt catch him…
last xmas i tried with an ipad including lots of apps and cubasis as a mainframe, headphones, interface, little speakers, mic, little akai controler…
still not really on fire…a little bit, but nah, not really…
hmmmpf…
my mom, his grandma, is already telling me, don’t push him to hard to follow ur footsteps, son…
but aaaargh…i would have died for such a setup at his age…he’s 15 now…let’s see and wait…
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Yeah, I haven’t pushed it. There are guitars, bass, samplers, synths, etc. everywhere and none of my kids have ever expressed interest until now. I take that back, my 8 year old covets my op-1 but I won’t let him near it.
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Go figure your 8 year old wants the most toy looking of your things
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Get him an OP-Z!
Edit: When he’s a little older and only if he earns it, honestly, lol
It is full circle. My dad is super into cars and really hands on stuff, I couldn’t give a crap about that. I’m into music and have various instruments, big into iOS, my kids don’t care lol.
It’s just how it is. If they dig it consider yourself lucky! I don’t know any kids who get down to what their parents do lol. I’m lucky I at least have them listening to some of the same music I do, will count it as a win 
That said it looks like a nice little setup. I love the desk!
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I think that’s an awesome little setup to get going. Definitely gotta encourage these kids.
I agree with everyone that unwelcome pushes are futile, but if the pushes are welcome…bring them on!
I’ve incorporated the Animoog App into my three year old’s bedtime routine. He loves farting around on that. With any luck, sowing the seeds will yield good things down the road!
My 17 year old daughter just asked for “something” to start making music on. I was thinking digitone keys or OP-1. But those are maybe a bit costly.
Would you say that these devices were suitable for a beginner at this age? Or to complex? Something else you would recommend?
Would Ableton and a midi keyboard maybe be a better starting place? I myself have hardly ever used Ableton, I’m a hardware guy.
This may depend strongly on your daughter’s affinity for complexity and even more on what sort of music she wishes to make.
[Edit: my kids had years of piano and violin by age 17 so I cannot use them as examples. But I can contrast their approaches to computers. One used standard programs without issue, learning what was necessary, using help desks and documentation. The other never read a word but blasted into every corner of every menu fearlessly and had apps doing backflips almost immediately.]
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When I think back to being 17, I was already playing guitar/bass in a metal band and then I got into Digital Hardcore so my wants back then were a Yamaha SU10, an Atari and a 909 but ReBirth on a shit PC more than sufficed, especially with some distortion pedals thrown in. Anyway, my point is that I knew far more about what I wanted to do than my boring non-musician parents would ever know or even want to know. And surely kids these days grow up with the Internet/computers on tap, so maybe talk to her about what she wants to create and use that info to get either a ‘real’ instrument, some software or a groovebox.
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I totally agree with Craig. When I was about that age, I did tons of research and ended up getting a M-Audio 4x4 break out box for my pc with Cakewalk Homestudio. I’m sure these days your kids can give you pointers on what would work for them.
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When my son was about 10 he showed an interest in music. At first, I bought him an old boss drum gadget, can’t remember what it was called. He played around with it for a bit, but then told me he’d rather have a guitar. I bought him a cheapo fender guitar set up with a little amp. On his own, he ended up asking if he could take guitar lessons and ended up studying classical guitar for six years and stuck with it, well also learning how to play some of the more difficult iron maiden stuff (totally not my cup of tea, but impressive nonetheless). He is now 34 and is in three bands, has put out several albums a few of which he is proud of, and can’t wait to start playing live gigs again in his most polished band moving across the country just prior to the pandemic. His style vacillates from crust punk to some thing he calls God, but sounds more like punk than what I remember goth sounding like. In any case, I am proud of his musical adventures and creativity, even if it is hard for me to relate to the kind of music he enjoys playing.
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Whoops meant Goth not God. He’d get a kick out of that auto correct snafu!
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