So to give a bit of the backstory, I come from a family that was involved in Bluegrass music. My uncle was best friends with a legendary (within the bluegrass community) instrument maker and could play anything with strings on it. My uncle taught a lot of us kids how to play various instruments and every Sunday after church we would gather on his porch (or in his living room when it was cold) and play for several hours.

I learned the Guitar which I became very good at. The Banjo, which I would say I was proficient. The mandolin and the fiddle, which I could play a handful songs without butchering them too badly :) Of course moving and having no one to practice with I stopped playing some 30 years ago. That is until my youngest came to me and told me she wanted to learn to play the Violin.

I think I related the arguments she and I had about her believing that I couldn't teach her the violin because I only played the fiddle (in her mind they were two different instruments), which took me learning and playing the first couple bars of "Let it Go" for her to finally win :)

So after buying her one of the good but inexpensive student violins, she began learning but refusing to play any bluegrass. It was touch and go as she would at times get very frustrated. During this time she almost quit trying, but as she was also interested in the guitar I bought her a good parlor sized guitar at an auction to play on so she was spending the time practicing some kind of instrument.

The one thing I coldn't teach her was how to read music, while I understand what the notes are on sheet music I have never been able to associate the written notes to the sounds on the instrument. Entering her first year of intermediate school she joined a mariachi band, and has taken to reading music like she was born to it.

Through all this she had been adamant about not playing Bluegrass, which by the way does not bother me in the slightest, as it was what I knew on the fiddle and could use to teach her. The couple of bar bands I played guitar in back in my youth played folk and soft rock, so I'm not set on any specific style that I think has to be played and like all kids of music with the exception of Opera and rap.

Of course now that the little one (okay she's not so little anymore at 5'3" is taller than most other kids in her class) has been practicing and playing in her band for about a year, she has become quite good. Couple weekend ago she came to me remembering that I had told her that the Mandolin was tuned and played exactly like the violin and asked if she could try it. I offered to turn it but she insisted she could (and did) then after a little confusing over the frets, that I explained in terms of a violin, she was playing amazingly well for someone that had never touched a mandolin before. Standing in front of her mother when she got home and playing the theme to Star Wars (They are both big star wars fans)

Then last weekend she brings her Violin out while I'm cooking on the grill and plays Cripple Creek on it for me, grinning from ear to ear at me while she did it. Later that day she got me to download and print off the sheet music to 'Irish Washerwoman' so she could learn it for a talent show they are having at school.

Did I forget to mention that she has started learning the banjo and wants to play the flute in the school's regular band next year?

Maybe I can get her to teach me the flute :)