Older people taking up new instruments

• Video: Teacher Matt Whipkey and his student Karen Dickinson talk about taking lessons as an adult.

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When Jon Dye was in his 20s, he sang in bands and played a little guitar.

Then he grew up, got married, had kids and now runs his own restaurant, Tommy Colina's Kitchen.

But he never gave up on playing those guitars, so he started taking lessons again two years ago. At age 52.

"It's a skill I've yet to master," he said. "I may never. But I keep trying."

When you think of the typical guitar or drum student, it's a teenager struggling with chords and scales. But local music teachers say a good number of their students are older.

Some are relearning instruments they used to play and others are picking it up for the first time. Some still keep up with their instruments and reunite bands that haven't played for decades.

At Dietze Music, about a quarter of Matt Whipkey's guitar students are older than 30. Most of them have some playing experience, but a few are starting from scratch.

"I really enjoy my older students," Whipkey said. "Usually as an adult, if you're committing yourself to doing this, you have a certain sense of focus, dedication and willingness to learn and practice. It's really interesting though. You pick up on things a little faster as an adult compared to a third-grader."

Dye, one of Whipkey's students, wanted to get back into music. He said he spends a lot of time on his restaurant, and he doesn't really get into sports. So music is now his hobby.

"You work hard, you go home and it's there. You pick up the axe and strum for a little bit," he said. "It's a lot of fun. It's very relaxing, too. Sometimes the barking chef like me needs a few tunes to calm him down."

Dye has thought of playing with a band, but it would have to be occasional and he'd need to find "the right group of cats."

Greg Schatz, a Douglas County District Court judge, doesn't play very regularly, but he does get his old band together occasionally. Schatz and his friends started the Phabulous Phaetons in 1964 when he was in high school.

Though the band officially disbanded decades ago, they still get together to perform once in a while.

"We began our reunions in about 1987 and have gotten together every few years since," he said.

The band's planning yet another reunion for this summer. Usually friends and family show up for gigs.

Whipkey writes down a song for a student. (REBECCA S. GRATZ/THE WORLD-HERALD)

Many wonder if an old dog can learn a new trick such as mastering an instrument. It can be tough, but certainly not impossible. While children are growing new brain cells all the time, adults have to work with the ones they already have to form new connections.

Norman Weinberger, a neuroscientist at the University of California Irvine, is a leading researcher on the brain and the auditory system.

"Is it as easy to learn something when you're 65 as it is at 5? No. But can it be done? Yes," Weinberger told NPR.

When you're learning an instrument, a lot of your brain and body must work together at the same time, which is why it feels so difficult. You have to read the notes, translate them in your mind, keep the rhythm and move your hands and feet simultaneously in order to play some notes.

"When brain scans have been done of musicians, you find the enormity of the areas of the brain that are actually being activated," Weinberger said.

When Whipkey teaches older students — he's had some as old as 70 — how proficient they become has a lot to do with dedication and focus. While some people have inherent abilities and can tap into them at seemingly any time in their lives, others push through with sheer dedication.

"If you're 50 and you've never played and you want to start, you have an idea in your head of something you want to accomplish," he said. "They're usually pretty specific. They're very goal-oriented. They want to play a certain track of an AC/DC record or Led Zeppelin record. They'll say, 'I know this song and I love it.'"

Motivation or not, Steve Sharp said everything's tougher to do at age 55.

"But every morning, I get up at 5:30 and practice for 45 minutes," he said. "It's like doing pushups. Today I can't do so many but tomorrow I'll do more."

Sharp has found that he won't practice if he waits to do it after 12-hour days as the finance director at Stan Olsen Auto Center. Sharp told his teacher that he wants to sound like Eddie Van Halen, but that hasn't happened yet. So far, he's learned riffs by Roy Orbison, Collective Soul and others.

"Right now, we're trying to bang out some Carlos Santana," said Sharp, who dabbled with guitar more than three decades ago. "He's the master, so I feel honored to even be playing his music."

Dye, the chef, said he hasn't let it faze him that people often think of music as a young person's pursuit.

"It's mostly greeted with a raised eyebrow or a bit of a smirk. But I always say, 'You still sit and stare at men in tight pants playing football all day?'" he said with a laugh. "I don't sit and tell people, 'I'm a rocker.' I have no dreams of fitting back into my leather pants."

Contact the writer:

402-444-1557, kevin.coffey@owh.com

twitter.com/owhmusicguy

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