Can you get really good, maybe even great after 10 years of playing?

Will read the rest later but this triggered me because we have two young children. One is kinda handy with stuff, the oldest… well, not.

If it sounds good, it is good… Ron :wink:

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Take care!

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Yes =]

Mr. Mathews may be a great guitarist and teacher, but I doubt he knows much about genetics if he believes this.
Of course everyone gets better the more they put into something, esp. if they have effective learning methods, but it’s also patently clear that some people learn some things much faster than others.
Our individuality/difference is our beauty (and also the reason we shouldn’t compare our progress with others’)

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There is also scientific evidence that musical aptitude is heritable, i.e. passed along genetically. Here is a quote from a Scientific American article on the subject of talent:

In a study of over 10,000 twins, two of us found that music aptitude was substantially heritable, with genes accounting for around half of the differences across people on a test of music aptitude.

(from Is Innate Talent a Myth? | Scientific American)

@brianlarsen does the rule of three apply in this situation?

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Well… what about pompiers (pronounced the Flemish way, of course)? :slight_smile: But as Lieven said, we do love our neighbours, and as a show of my appreciation, I will just call you Rog(i)er :wink:

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I think you can be good if you concentrate on what you love.
For me,its blues and thanks to Justin ,I have a decent skill set .I have concentrated on blues and will happily play that and write my own music .

I suppose I have a limited skill set,but a keen sense of rhythm. Again,the skills were taught to me by Justin-I just added application and practice.

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There’s a book called ‘Mastery’ by Robert Greene that people might find interesting as it relates to the debate of nature vs nurture with respect to learning skills etc.

By studying the world’s most famous high performers, historical and modern, he finds that hard work, deliberate practice and learning from mentors trump natural ‘talent’ or inherent genius - and are crucial to mastery in any field.

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