We all remember the elementary school horror of having to play the recorder in music class. I can still feel the excitement building as friends in other classes carried the slim vinyl cases down the hall. The recorders were in. Soon we would get our very own to take home and play – just one more day until music class.
Then the moment arrived. I was handed my recorder. It was the first instrument I could truly call my own. Sure, I played viola in the school orchestra (awfully), but that was rented. This was mine. I was sure that I was going to create beautiful music with it.
The dream fell apart the instant we started playing them. Shit they sounded bad. Like…really terrible. And that’s saying something from a kid who performed in an elementary school orchestra.
And that pretty much summed up my opinion of the recorder…until recently. Similar to my many Wikipedia marathons, where one search for random information leads to another, I had taken a plunge down the rabbit hole on YouTube. And that was the day I discovered the recorder is a legitimate instrument.
I was wrong. Against all odds, and everthing I learned in elementary school, the recorder could be a beautiful sounding instrument. Granted, this was a professional musician who was playing something that appeared to be a little more refined than the $15 dollar tubes of plastic we were provided.
It turns out a decent recorder, according to my Google search, costs closer to $300-400 dollars – and that’s probably on the low end (still not bad compared to a lot of instruments). So there you go. The recorder is a real instrument that gets a bad rap thanks elementary school music classes across the country. Now I might have to go out and buy one and see if I sound any better this time around.
PENT-UP CURIOSITY 