What gender is your instrument?

Subject: What gender is your instrument?
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 09:57 AM

After discussing in another Pleading Guitar thread. I am curious.

My dulcimer and every guitar I have every played I have always referred to as female. The recorders, harmonicas, pianos I played were never sexed.

Does anyone else genderise their instruments?

Discuss!

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: melodeonboy
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 10:32 AM

My guitar and my melodeon are reliable and consistent. They require little attention or money.

My cajun accordion, however, is high maintenance and requires constant attention and money. It also groans and squeaks quite a bit.

What do you reckon? (tee-hee!)

Having said that, my ex-wife always referred to my melodeon as my first wife, so perhaps it is female after all!

(I think VT's going to box my ears!)

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: GUEST,Mr Red
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 10:34 AM

I have a pair of bodhrans and they haven't pro-created yet - so I can't really tell.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: melodeonboy
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 10:37 AM

Perhaps they're using the rhythm method!

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Hamish
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 10:53 AM

I have a Myrtle guitar. So she's a she. And an Ellastone. Ella Stone's also a girl.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: theleveller
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 10:59 AM

I've been trying to sex my guitar and cittern but, having found no evidence of genitalia, they are both 'its'.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: peregrina
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 11:03 AM

My two guitars have names based on their characteristics and puns from well-known songs; in each case the apt name gave rise to the gender, rather than the reverse. So one is male, one female.

The mandolins, as yet, have no names or genders. (And neither will be named 'Amandalynne' as a poster at another site suggested!)

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 11:03 AM

My wife refers to my guitars in female terms ("Bruce's girlfriends", "Bruce's harem" etc.) but I don't think of them in that way. We're just friends. Honest.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: IanC
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 11:08 AM

Apart from church bells (which are officially female) I've never particularly thought of any of my instruments as having a gender.

:-)

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Zen
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 11:09 AM

My instrument is male.

My guitar and mandolin are both female.

Zen

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 11:14 AM

I assume all musical instruments to be "pansexual," in that they can affect, entertain or offend persons of all persuasions without regard to race, creed, religion or color. In short....oops, sorry about the pun...

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: GUEST,Jonny Sunshine
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 11:25 AM

Funny this discussion comes up today, as I named my new bouzouki last night. Not all of my instruments get given names- my banjo's name is the name of the maker (or restorer, I'm not sure which) that's stamped on the neck, while my electric guitar and a couple of knockabout guitars are just referred to by their brand names. If I had to decide whether they were male or female I'd probably say male, but those of my instruments that I've given names to (two guitars, a mandolin and the new bouzouki) have female names.

My instruments' names tend to be a secret revealed to very few, because part of me feels that giving a name is symbolic of the deepest spiritual bond between player and instrument, while the other part feels silly giving a name to an inanimate object.



hence my keeping them secret.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: bubblyrat
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 12:03 PM

My main guitar is called "Ava" (partly because I play her "My Way"---think about it !!) but perhaps because she's an Avalon. Then no.2 is called "Martina" ( she is good-looking ,but not what she seems !)and is,of course,a Martin.My bouzouki is called "Boozy" ( after me),whilst my harmonicas are all called "Lewinsky", as there is both Blowing and Sucking involved.My 12-string is called "Greg" , as he designed it,and it says so on the headstock.
                I did own an Aria once, and I called it "Your Tiny Hand is Frozen" , but nobody got it. Sadly.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 12:49 PM

Melodeonboy - I am not rising to your comments. I haven't the proper equipment.

Mr. Red - Perhaps your bodhrans are blushing. Maybe too shy to procreate.

theleveller - could be hermaphrodites.

Bee-dubya-ell - Why am I not convinced?

peregrina - Might be a clue in the name.
MAN (masculine noun)
DO(verb)
LYN(femine name)

IanC - so are church bells part of your battery of instruments?


I should have added link to thread that prompted this thread. References to gender of new guitar started by Richard Bridge.

Subject: RE: Another pleading guitar thread
From: Richard Bridge - PM
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 05:24 AM

It looked like a boy guitar to me...

Another pleading guitar thread

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: PoppaGator
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 01:03 PM

I've never thought of my guitar as either male or female. As someone has already suggested, music ideally transcends gender ~ right?

I don't indulge in instrument naming, either. Doesn't mean I don't treasure my guitar, just because I don't anthropomorphize it.

When my brother visited recently, he surprised me by saying, "Hey! Marty's here!" ~ referring to my Martin in its stand in the corner of the living room. (I used to keep it in its case, less visible and less accessible.) It took me a second or two to realize what he was talking about.

I suppose that the name "Marty" is usually male, although some women use it as a nickname/short-form of Martina, Martha, etc.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 01:09 PM

Well Growler always refers to my Mugen 6-string as my "Old Man", and I was only responding to Tamara's repeated use of female pronouns for the Sigma DM4.

I've mostly referred to my cars as female, apart from one twin-cam FIAT that on good days was "the Flying Brick" (it was before I had my Damascine moment discovering Volvos) and on bad days was "The Turin Shroud". My 95mph Morris Minor Traveller was always "Queen Bitch" after a long drawn out battle with a pair of elusive faults that turned out to be (1) a poor earth and capacitor in the distributor causing overheating of the points contacts and spring that melted the plastic cam plus (2) localised overheating of the coil due to a loss of oil in the coil.

The Morris before that was named "Arkle" because the registration number started "AKL" and I tended to get it about fence-high over humpbacked bridges, and of course the missing horse was big news back then. Come to think of it, was that horse a mare or a stallion? I have a feeling it was a stallion.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: open mike
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 01:18 PM

my martin is (also) named Martina
and my nyckelharpa is Matilda..
named after my swedish grandma.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 01:33 PM

RB - so do you classify your cars in same category as your instrument(s)?

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 01:35 PM

arrghhh! blast! That's what I get for doing this without my specs.

Now I forgot what I was going to say before I hit the submit button.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: GUEST,kendall
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 02:09 PM

My 12 string guitar is "Uncle Curt". I didn't name it, Nick Apollonio the luthier did.

The Taylor, I don't know, but it must be female. Considering its shape and all, and how close I hold it.

The banjo is on permanent loan, so it's anyones guess.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: ClaireBear
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 02:20 PM

My single-O Washburn guitar is Arabella (female).

My harp is Aengus (male).

It's never occurred to me to name any of my dulcimers or concertinas, somehow.

The tenor uke hasn't spoken its name to me yet, but I suspect it has one.

C

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: GUEST,nickp cookieless
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 03:15 PM

The only one of my instruments that has gained anything like gender is my favourite mandolin (custom made) which is referred to as 'my baby'. But that is as in the child sense rather than (female) partner.

Nick

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Acorn4
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 03:23 PM

Julia's mandola is male and is called Nelson. Gerrit?

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 03:57 PM

My guitar is neuter, I suppose, but my banjo is definitely female. And thereby hangs a tale, which I can't forbear telling again here:

About forty-five years ago, when my Beautiful Wife and I had only been married about four months, I had to call her and tell her, "Won't be home until all hours tonight. A rush job came up that I HAVE to finish before I can think about coming home!" My newlywed wife was not enthusiastic, but what can you do? I dragged my weary carcass into bed about two o'clock.

The very next night I had to call her AGAIN and say, "I've got ANOTHER rush job; you go to bed, and I'll be home when I can!" Further unenthusiastic rumblings. This time it was about four o'clock when I left the office.

The following morning I was able to assure her that the situation that caused those late nights was over, and I said, with a grin, "I hope you didn't think there was another woman!"

My new wife's reply: "Well, the thought had crossed my mind!"

(Have patience; I'll get to the punch line in a while!)

Over the years, with the crazy hours I had to work sometimes, we built up a legend of "the other woman" at the office downtown. She was a statuesque Nordic blonde, sort of a Swedish masseuse type, with long blonde braids down her back, and her name was Olga.

When I retired in 1996 I decided that I'd always wanted to learn 5-string banjo, so I did. When I could afford to replace the El Cheapo piece of junk I'd been learning on, I had Mike Ramsey build me a beautiful natural blonde curly-maple open-back, and had him inlay the name "OLGA" at the 10th fret.

I said nothing of that name on the fingerboard to my Beautiful Wife. When at last that long-looked-for UPS shipment arrived and I opened the case, there, for all to see, at the 10th fret was the name "OLGA", my new mistress! My B.W. nearly collapsed on the floor, laughing.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: kendall
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 04:07 PM

When I asked a friend if he wanted to see a photo of the other woman in my life I could see that look on his face. I made it worse by telling him that she is black, 60 plus years old and quite beautiful. Then, I showed him a photo of my 1940 Chevrolet. He was amused.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 04:55 PM

My guitar seems neuter to me, but my girlfriend in college told me she was insanely jealous of it for a while. Something about the way I held it and touched it. Then she thought about it and decided there was no reason to be jealous since I couldn't have sex with the guitar even if I wanted to.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 04:59 PM

I used to think of some of my guitars as female...while with others I did not. My present favorite guitar seems to transcend the concept of gender altogether. It just is what it is.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Tootler
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 07:46 PM

My contrabass recorder is "The Beastie" but I have never thought about its gender. I suspect it is neuter though it does have a deep voice ;-0

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: GUEST,Frug
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 07:55 PM

Personally most of my instruments appear female. I remember someone way back saying, I got 2 guitars a 6 string and a 12 string. The 6 string she's my wife, solid and reliable and gets the job done. The 12 string she's my lover.........she makes a much bigger noise, she's exotic, allows more variation............but hell she can be temperamental !!

Frank

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Jan 09 - 08:17 PM

My harmonica is six and a half inches long and it spends most of the evening in my mouth. Moving swiftly on...

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Tangledwood
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 12:25 AM

My instruments are all female. All demand commitment and all come with strings attached.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Peace
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 12:33 AM

"What gender is your instrument?"

No comment!

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Genie
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 02:30 AM

My oldest and best guitar is a Martin. You might think that's a boy's name, but it's her LAST name.    The reason I know she's a girl is that her first name is a girl's name. And I know that because the guy who gave her to me called her that.

Plus, she's been more faithful and treated me better than just about any guy I've been involved with.

Genie

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 02:42 AM

guess I should have related the namesof past and current instruments.

1st guitar cheap classical bought at PX in Fort Lee Virginia later given to my Mother - Claire

2nd guitar yamaha acoustic 6 string (only had few months before sold to brother for money to fix our car - (had not time to name her or if I did I have forgotten)

3rd guitar a used battered 6 string acoustic sunburst I can't remember it's make (quickly commandeered by my left handed daughter) named Sunny because of the bright bright sound. The beast would not stay in tune though.

Appalachain Dulcimer - Somerset (I know it is a place name, but I still think of as a her)

loaner Mandolin - no name (mustn't get attached)

foster guitar a Martin Sigma DM4M from Abdul the Bul Bul to be named something appropriately feminine upon finalisation of adoption.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: GUEST,Jonny Sunshine
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 05:19 AM

Naming harmonicas is a step too far. I have too many of the damn things to remember a different name for each.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Musket
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 07:01 AM

She...

For every stereotypical chauvinist reason when strings break, won't tune or I need a scape goat for my slowing down of digit dexterity.

Also female for when it comes right, it can, (to me at any rate) sound rather beautiful.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Bryn Pugh
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 08:19 AM

I never thought about the gender of instruments until I got my first "big boy's" guitar, a smaller-bodied Harmony Sovereign.

This guitar was a pig to play, or, as I thought about it then (40 years ago) a bitch.

All guitars since have been female : currently, my Tanglewood is Betsan (although, come to think about it, every guitar since the Sovereign has been Betsan).

My Gretsch is Gertie, much to Mummy's disgust. No prizes for guessing what Mummy's given name is.

'Tina' speaks for itself, I think (herself ? ) .

I haven't yet decided on the gender of my pipes and tabor. I shall, of course, keep you informed . . .

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Mooh
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 09:29 AM

The instrument I was born with is male, the others female, except the basses which kinda bray like donkeys.

Peace, Mooh.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Catherine Jayne
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 09:53 AM

My good fiddle is called fritz and is male. My dutch fiddle is female but doesn't really have a name. My octave fiddle is called velcro and is male. Got a couple of mandolins but they're not named or generised.

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: squeezebox-kc
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 04:56 PM

my melodeon must be female because when i am out playing music my wife when asked "where's Ken" says he's of with his mistress again.

explain how church bells are she?
treble going treble gone- no she there
tenor lies behind, make places, = no
dodge,single, BOB now here we could be Roberta but probably not.
Grandsire would be male.
Great George, Big Ben, and most of the big tenor bells are male names

Enjoy your ringing and if you have not tried give it a go it is certainly a folksy pursuit and involves drinking beer afterwards as a rule.
Ken

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Don Firth
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 05:24 PM

I don't believe I have ever thought of my guitars in gender terms.

My classic was made in Japan. It has a red cedar soundboard and Brazilian rosewood back and sides. The label says it is a "Guitarra Artisana," but pasted right by it is another label stating that it was imported, inspected, and approved for sale under his name by José Oribé, a luthier in San Diego who makes concert quality classic guitars. The Guitarra Artisana is not as expensive as the ones Oribé makes, but it was fairly expensive. Like a lot of guitars made at the time (mid-1970s), it looks exactly like the José Ramirez 1a that Segovia played after he retired his Hauser. I played it once before the Seattle Classic Guitar Society (where some of the folks have some really expensive guitars, including a Ramirez or two), and because of its full, rich sound and its appearance, they assumed that it was a Ramirez. It wasn't anywhere near as expensive as a concert Ramirez, but it's one helluva guitar! I usually refer to it as "the Oribé," although it wasn't actually made by José Oribé.

I have a genuine flamenco guitar that I ordered from Arcangel Fernandez in Madrid (unlike the one in the photo, mine has clear golpeador—tap-plates). I got it in 1961. Absolutely outrageous guitar! Spruce soundboard and cypress back and sides. I learned a couple of years later that Fernandez's flamencos were regarded as the best, and guys like Carlos Montoya, Mario Escudero, and Sabicas were playing them. I paid less than $200 for it, and I'm told that "Arcangels" from the early 1960s in good condition are worth as much as $20,000!! I refer to mine as "The Arcangel." Not for sale!

I also have two small travel guitars, one nylon-string and one steel-string, made by Sam Radding of San Diego. They are Go-guitars, and they look more like canoe paddles than guitars, but for small instruments, they sound amazingly like full-size guitars. I used the nylon-string "Go" in a concert recently, and some folks thought it was a period instrument of some kind.

Gender? No. "The Oribé," "the Arcangel," and the two "Go" guitars.

"Go?" Perhaps they have a bladder problem?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: GUEST,Nikkiwi
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 05:51 PM

My Octave Mandolin is female, and called (appropriately) Octavia

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: CupOfTea
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 06:54 PM

I've been known to name cars. I even named my new (big black breathy sounding) refrigerator "Darth Vader." Instruments in my life had seemed to forgo the specifics of names, though my Goose Acres built autoharp has always been a "GooseAharp," to twit Pete Smackula as much as any other reason.

yet.. yet.. when I got my concertina, my Stagi baby, I fell so deeply passionately in love with this instrument that I've been calling it "My Main Squeeze" to all and sundry. I'm flagrantly heterosexual, therefore by default, my main squeeze is a he.

Joanne in Cleveland

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Don Firth
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 07:21 PM

". . . flagrantly heterosexual. . . ."

Hmm. . . .

Don Firth

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 30 Jan 09 - 10:15 PM

I just realised. They've never done a Springer show about someone who humps his guitar.

Is there a statute about sex with guitar, and anyway what would you say if the wife walked in on you when you were in the middle of having a session with a hot little Martin number?

'She meant nothing....I mean, she even looks like you in a certain light, honestly. Darling, really - it was you I was thinking every second of the time - but you've been so unresponsive lately.......'

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Canberra Chris
Date: 31 Jan 09 - 09:40 AM

Bells - Great Tom is cast?

When I recently bought my little harp there was no maker or model label on it, and the only clue was the single word on a sticker on the spare strings packet - Pixie. So 'Pixie' it is, as it suits, being cute, small and Celtic in design (though made in Pakistan by the Celtistanis - this one very nicely as it happens). But Pixies are genderless? Or is that for another thread?

I'm still up because it is far too hot to go to bed - all doors and windows open hoping for a breeze, just thought UK Cats would like to know.

Chris

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Stringsinger
Date: 31 Jan 09 - 12:22 PM

We have a matching pair of 0021's named "Marty and Rose".

Frank

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Genie
Date: 31 Jan 09 - 12:40 PM

"Mama Guitar Beats A Woman Every Time"

Who sang that?   A guy (obviously), but I can't remember who.

Genie

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: goatfell
Date: 01 Feb 09 - 11:13 AM

these people that genderise their musical instuments must have sex with them I just play my instruments I don't consider them as male or female a male or female are HUMAN and not intruments

Subject: RE: What gender is your instrument?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 01 Feb 09 - 11:24 AM

all very well, but when you've had a drink or two and there is seductive lighting and you start fondling and she doesn't object....

as my headmaster used to say .... just how far would a nice boy go?