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What is the most difficult musical instrument to master? This question is one of the most common debates amongst musicians. Although there have been many results from the various debates about this topic, there are little to no answers to this question. Instead of trying to get an answer that will most likely not have an answer, let us simply group them into the 10 most difficult musical instruments to play.
1. Piano
The piano might seem easy to learn and play, but to master it, that is a whole new level. Learning and playing songs such as Twinkle Twinkle Little Star can prove to be really easy, even a 6-year-old kid can learn it after an hour or two. To master the piano, however, is totally different.
As you learn more and more piano pieces, you will need to start learning to coordinate your hands that are playing the keys and your feet that are stepping on the pedals. Sometimes, you might even need to include your eyes into the coordination when you are playing off the score sheet. What's more? While most instruments only require you to read a single bar on the score sheet, the piano requires you to read two bars!
2. Drums
Most believe that drums are easy to play because of how easy it looks. All we have to do is to simply hit them with the wooden stick, right? Well, of course, it isn't, why else will it appear on this list. Drums are not just difficult to master, but also difficult to play. Without proper knowledge of the different drums on a drum set, you probably cannot even play a single song.
Also, the synchronisation of both your hands and legs while keeping up with the correct style of tempo and beats is definitely not easy. This requires adequate and proper training, and by training, I mean LONG hours of training!
3. Classical Acoustic Guitar
Take a trip down to a church youth group and you will probably find that most of the youngsters in the group know how to play the guitar. They even make it look easy because if everyone knows how to play the guitar, it should be easy, right? What you probably did not know is that all these youngsters probably had a
rough start in their early days of learning the guitar. It is most definitely not easy to learn and play at all.
Firstly, you will need to practice a lot, and you might even suffer from itching and aching fingers from the long hours of practices. Secondly, to produce the perfect sound, you will have learn the proper hand technique to strum the guitar. This alone takes a lot of time to practice and perfect. Last but not least, playing the guitar gets exceptionally difficult as you start playing two or three-part pieces.
4. Violin
Unlike the past 3 instruments, the violin is well-known for being a difficult instrument to play, not to mention master. The first thing you need to learn when learning the violin is to get your posture of holding the violin right. This step alone will probably take you at least a few lessons in order to perfect and get used to the positioning.
After learning the correct posture, the next thing you will need to learn and practice is your precision of moving the bow to produce a proper tone. The lack of frets on the violin also makes it difficult for you to properly guide your fingers while playing. All in all, let's just say that the violin is difficult because of the requirements and time needed to learn and master the instrument.
5. Organ
The organ is an instrument that is similar to the piano, but very different at the same time. The difficult thing about learning to play the organ is the lack of sustained pedal. With the absence of the sustaining pedal, you will have to keep your fingers on hold when playing the keys, or the organ will stop playing immediately.
6. French Horn
The French horn is known as one of the most difficult brass instruments to play because you are required to play up to the highest partials as compared to most other brass instruments. This makes it easy to miss notes if your lips posture is incorrect and coupled with the fact that the tube is extremely long, a lot of strength needs to be exerted to blow the French horn and ensure that the sound is properly channeled out.
7. Oboe
Playing the oboe requires one to be skillful on the embouchure in order to produce the correct tone and make the music piece sound good. Another factor that makes playing the oboe hard is the constant switch of fingers to avoid playing monotonously throughout a play or performance.
8. Bagpipes
Just like the french horn, the difficulty of playing the bagpipes lies in the strength you will need to produce the proper sound. In order to play the bagpipes properly, long hours of practice and a lot of stamina is needed to master the right breathing technique to produce the sound. Sometimes, it might take you quite a while just get produce your first sound on the bagpipes if you are not someone with exceptionally big lungs.
9. Accordion
The accordion is undoubtedly one of the most difficult to play instruments due to the hard work needed to be put in to learn and master the instrument. You will need to practice very hard to have your hands work independently on their own while working on the bellows to supply air to the instruments at the same time.
10. Harp
Most of us have the impression that playing the harp is easy due to the constant appearance of baby angels playing the harp on cartoons and shows. However, it might not be as easy as it looks! The first thing that makes the harp difficult to master is the positioning of your hands and fingers because of how big the instrument is.
You are also required to perfect your pedalling skills which are necessary for sharpening or flattening notes whenever needed. Just like the piano or drum, the leg and hand coordination is extremely complicated. A lot of practice is needed to learn and master the harp because it is all about muscle memory.
Now that I have listed the 10 most difficult musical instruments to master as well as why they are so difficult, do you still feel that only one particular instrument is difficult? Well, every single instrument comes with their unique difficulty, and who are we to determine which instrument is the hardest? If you ask me, I'll say that it depends on the individual as everyone has their own talents and preferred learning styles.
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Wen Feng is a passionate music aficionado. He is constantly on the search for new music to listen to, with a particular interest in classical music. Piano pieces have always been a great companion and kept him calm throughout his school and work life.