Music Room Feng Shui

[Brent Hutto]

Do you have a certain spot in your house where you just play better for no particular reason?

I'm lucky to have a decent size "music room". It's not 100% dedicated to my playing and practicing but I can pretty much use the whole room as I see fit. Generally I've been sitting in my SoundSeat (tm) chair, near the computer and with a view of a mirror in the adjacent foyer. It works out well relative to having everything pretty close at hand, from table space to the wall hanger for my mandolin to shelves with books and gadgets.

In recent weeks I've found a spot across the room where everything just seems to flow better. I have a wooden straight chair (made by my great-grandfather 75+ years ago so a certain amount of mojo there) and a music stand with a light attached but otherwise it's kind of out in the middle of the room not within arms reach of anything. I'm thinking maybe the "breathing room" and uncluttered space is why I seem so much more comfortable playing there. Or maybe it just has the right musical Feng Shui in relation to windows and doors and so forth. It probably also has the best lighting of anywhere in the room due to a large lamp in that corner.

So do you have special spots that are more musical than others?

P.S. And if your special spot is on a tropical island somewhere I don't particularly want to hear about it at just this moment...

[Jesse Harmon]

Love it that you have that chair. I also have my great grandfathers platform rocker that unfortunately gives me back problems if I am not careful how I sit in it. This is for sure going to add to your playing. I also have my grandfathers violin that I had spruced up at White brothers String shop in Okemos Mi. That's just incredible that I get to enjoy this. Enjjoy.

[Brent Hutto]

Jesse,

My great-grandfather was a fiddler and I do own his fiddle. Unfortunately it was badly damaged some time before I was born (as in something large fell on it, splintering the fiddle case and cracking the fiddle in two places) so that even after being restored it is barely playable. I can scratch out a few tunes on it, tuned down a whole step to avoid stress on the body. Sounds kind of screechy even tuned down.

Although he made this chair for my great-grandmother and not himself, maybe there's a reason I like to sit in it and play fiddle tunes on the mandolin. Good vibrations, you know.

[Jesse Harmon]

Hope the restorer was a good one. White Bros String Shop did a good job on this one although it is basically a mid range instrument. I had a friend play it while I guitar accompanied him on Ashokan and did a video for my Mother and Aunt before they died. Can't make it sound too good myself right now but hope to get to that a little bit some day.

[billkilpatrick]

usually, right here in front of the computer. sort of defines me as a inveterate "noodler," doesn't it.

[Randi Gormley]

My music room is what would have been the living room in other times. We moved the piano into it when we first came 19 years ago, and the kids called it "the piano room" ever since. It's generally the home of all our instruments, temporary and permanent. We had a friend come over and play with us once and he commented that the sound seemed very warm and loud in the room. I'm thinking it might be the wall of books. I have two walls of floor-to-ceiling book shelves (filled) one the length of the room and the other along the shorter wall abutting the fireplace. We have a couch and a wing chair in the room and we sit on the couch to play, with the music stand before us. In daytime, the light from the windows behind us lights up the music; at night we have some off-shoulder lighting, which is a great incentive to learn stuff by heart, especially these days when I begin to see why larger type music would be a great invention ... when we put the instruments down, the area becomes our reading room.

[jaycat]

Yes, indoors (I live in a studio apartment). At least in this weather.

[Eddie Sheehy]

How many strings on a Feng-Shui and what's the tuning?

[fatt-dad]

the front porch. Can't wait for Spring!

f-d

[mandroid]

Feng Shui, I'm still running on Chaos Theory..

Entropy , if it starts looking more organized , time is running backwards.

and the beer starts going back in the keg

[F-2 Dave]

I was out playing my mandolin on the deck last summer, looking at the cows and having myself a big old time when I noticed some Feng Shui growing out in the yard. A little Round-up did the trick.

[Barry Platnick]

I have a music room in the basement with my instruments etc. But I play 90% of the time ( when its cold) in the sun room (enclosed heated porch sort of thing) off the kitchen...guess I just want to be outside.

[Mike Snyder]

Best music room ever was the deck on my house in Arkansas. Built on the side of a mountain, the back-side deck was on the down slope. It was like a tree house. 40 feet down, hummingbirds, deer running around, a little black bear once in a while. I had a pair of oak church pews out there. Great place to pick. Also a great place to get West Nile Virus. Only takes one skeeter.

[i-vibe]

seems the best spot is always taken

[Brent Hutto]

I could probably take down that doggie but I sure wouldn't want to mess with the cat. Some times it's better to just go sit in the corner and leave 'em be.

[JeffD]

My music room is my living room, its also where I read, and watch movies and everything else. I tried the music room approach and hated it.

But then again, I live alone.

[Brent Hutto]

Fortunately I don't play in the room with the television or I'd love an hour or two of prime music time most nights. Can't imagine how much TV I used to watch before I had guitars and mandolins around. Now I try to sit through a 60-minute episode of NCIS and by the third act I've got to go grab my mandolin and finger scales and arpeggios without picking while we find out "who dunnit".

[i-vibe]

I could probably take down that doggie but I sure wouldn't want to mess with the cat. Some times it's better to just go sit in the corner and leave 'em be.

Oscar (dog) is my biggest fan...since at 14 yrs old, most days he's deaf as a post. Percy (cat) on the other hand is for the most part indifferent to my mando playing. However, i pluck (or bow) two notes on my '42 KAY C-1 bass and he comes running from wherever he is.....sidles up to me and the bass and starts rubbing himself against my leg and the bass. yes....we're his.

[Brent Hutto]

Our cat likes the mandolin OK but I'll bet if I had a bass she'd love it. Generally the lower-pitched an instrument is the more she digs it. But even on the mandolin (like on guitar) she actually knows at least a couple of tunes by heart. There are a couple of songs I play all the time that, if I watch out the corner of my eye, she'll wake up and get ready to start grooming just before I get to the end. And if I pause for a couple seconds before playing the final notes she'll perk up her ears and bug her eyes out like "Go ahead and play it!". Usually she dozes while I'm playing and then stretches and groom when I take a break.

[i-vibe]

funny.

yesterday, i was stringing up one of acoustic gtrs in the "library" where my bass resides. bass was still in it's gig bag in the living room after saturday's gig w it. so, i'm tuning up the low E string on the gtr and Percy comes running up the stairs all excited thinking it's the bass...runs into the room...see's me w the gtr....looks to the (empty) stand where the bass usually resides.....and turns around and leaves. cracked me up.

[Heady]

Ok - I know I'm dredging up ancient history again, but... no sense in starting a new thread when this one was here, right?

I use this corner of my bedroom for music. I don't want to use a closet because if my music stuff isn't out, the tiny mental barrier to setting up makes it a chore and then I go weeks without playing. That bookshelf is just cookbooks and self-help books I rarely use, so my husband suggested putting it in the office in the basement to make space. Everything else is music related. My husband also has a guitar in a different corner, the 9 year old has a ukulele on his desk, and the 13 year old has a piano about a foot from the end of his bed, and a guitar, amp and a cello flanking his headboard -what we should probably do is work at work and turn the office into a music room - but I know us, and we're never going to keep work at work (and we're never going to move the piano to the basement), so.... I want to make better use of this corner.

The mandolin is in the middle, the viola on the right, the chair and stand probably don't require identification. There's a flute, an alto recorder, and a tin whistle on the bookshelf.

The crate is full of sheet music - the silvery box is strings, picks, rosin, spit rags, wire clippers, a very soft pencil for lubricating friction pegs etc. - the canvas bags on the chair are for rehearsals (one for viola, one for mandolin - I am pretty mediocre on the winds, so I only play them at home) and more sheet music.

I don't know what to do - any suggestions? Any tricks? I was looking at desk organizers for sheet music, and also this combo file cabinet junk drawer thing I saw at Staples, but they're all ugly. I want to avoid 1) an avalanche 2) putting things out of sight and 3) ugly things.


Am I asking too much? probably, but I thought I'd bounce it off you guys anyway

[David L]

It somewhat depends. If I play piano, I play in the living room (where the piano is). The banjolin usually gets played in front of the TV. Others are usually in the music room. The music room is long and somewhat narrow, so whether you orient yourself widthwise or lengthwise can make a difference.

[Beanzy]

How about something dual function mayb a bit like these Ikea units?



you could do similar, perhaps folding down from the side into the space. You could build in the instrument storage space, possibly use it as the folding desk support.

[Mainer73]

Music space Feng Shui is definitely important! My place is completely open concept, so unfortunately I don't have a dedicated music room, though I wish I did. Fortunately, the Feng Shui is suitable for music throughout, as are the acoustics!

[Charlie Bernstein]

Nope. I sound terrible anywhere in the house.

When I gig, I like to wear cowboy boots. They always make me sound better. Feng shoe?