Do you have any musical education? And if yes at what level? Do you play a musical organ? I always thought that only a person with some musical education could respect and value the prog/jazz music.

I used to play the piano 6 years ago (for 4 years) but i quit because i got bored with all those "heavy" classical songs that they use to teach at the children! Today i went back to the music school and asked to start the piano again! (i'm 19)

Concerning musical theory i finished the first 3 classes 6years ago . I'm starting again now from the point i stopped 6 years ago

Forgive me if some words do not make sense but the class advancement and musical terms are differenet from country to country and even more difficult to translate.

I've dabbled in guitar for a few years now but light years from being a musician. Time is precious. Music is practice. I do believe that educated persons have more of a understanding of Prog as well as Jazz and classical. It's not neccessarily music for musicians. It's music for thinkers, artists and creative persons.

'course I could be wrong.............

I've played the saxophone for eight years now, and I'm doing well...

Next year I'm going to study Musicology!

...so I guess that wil make me a well-educated listener!

Aerandir said:  "I always thought that only a person with some musical education could respect and value the prog/jazz music."

I have to disagree. I think that an open-minded person with basic understanding of music and has time to listen to it can appreciate progressive rock and jazz. However, a musician might have better opportunities to understand "intelligent" music. I'm playing the organ and piano, and I'm singing in a choir. I feel that it helps me to analyse and understand my favourite music.

Marius

I had piano lessons for a couple of years when I was a kid, but I had to leave it due to my complete inhability for coordinating my hands. I tried later to play the guitar self-taught, but, although I'm able to reproduce songs rather easyly, I'm the worst player in the world. I'm simply VERY clumsy.

This christmas, I had a keyboard as a present. I'm again trying, but I won't try to learn how to play. I'll just use the computer for composing songs for my own enjoyment

Regards

The only "formal" musical education I had was three years in high school. I played in the concert band and jazz band. The jazz band was fun because our teacher was really into big band jazz. We played a lot of Glenn Miller arrangements and some other compositions by Herbie Hancock, Maynard Ferguson, Duke Ellington etc. After high school I continued on playing locally in various local jazz bands for a while and actually got to play with some really "scary" players. I even played a few gigs with a Black Sabbath cover band, what a trip that was! As for people with musical education, most musicians I used to play with, unfortunately were more interested in playing stuff which was more traditional or some sort of offshoot of jazz.  For the most part these guys (and girls) were into  stuff like Chick Corea, Miles Davis, Weather Report , Spyra Gyra etc. which was fine with me because I like that stuff just as much as I do anything by King Crimson, Tull , Gentle Giant etc. I think "Prog" is more of a listeners genre of music and I think that most "prog"  fans are non-musicians. In general, though, I think that theytend to be somewhat more sophisticated than someone who just listens to the top forty and in a way they can be compared to connaisseurs of Classical music. Fortunately for me I was a listener before I was a player so I can appreciate everything from Soundgarden to Bartok from both perspectives.