Guitars And Other Musical Instruments As A Source Of Money

Many people love music and this extends to their musical instruments. These instruments can play a large part in many people’s lives. Sure, the human voice is the best musical device out there, but musical instruments accentuate the sound of a human voice.

There is hardly a music anymore in fact, that is not played without any musical instrument. The good thing about musical instruments is that there is a certain skill entry point before you can actually play one very well.

This skill entry point is what separates the musicians from the ordinary people who cannot play musical instruments. Although there is no practical value in knowing how to play a musical instrument, people will actually pay musicians to play musical instruments.

That is why learning to play a musical instrument could actually be a profitable skill. You not only earn by being a musician yourself, but you could also earn by creating musical instruments or their accessories.

To those lucky enough to have access to musical instruments, the only problem is playing them and enjoying the process. While playing musical instruments might look glamorous and seem very attractive, take note that it is a very physical process.

Guitars:

Let us take a look for example the guitar. Many people want to learn how to play them because they seem so exciting to play. What most people don’t know is that in order to play a guitar well or even learn it, you need to develop calluses in your fingertips.

I remember when I was trying to learn how to play the guitar. I was a teenager then and my fingertips were soft and tender. I noticed that even only after a short time trying to learn the guitar, my fingertips were a bit sore already.

Now imagine being a professional musician and having to play a guitar for a few hours each day. You would naturally develop thick calluses in your fingertips as a result of playing the guitar.

This developing a callus thing is already a big obstacle to aspiring guitar players especially to women and other people who want to maintain a soft and tender finger. Only the determined would be guitar players are not bothered by growing calluses.

Drums:

Besides being hard to transport and carry around, drums can be very tiring to play. If you do sufficient research online, you would find articles that report that playing drums for extended periods of time can be damaging to health especially if you are getting old.

This is the reason why the drummers in the band are the first ones to quit or become replaced. Playing drums is arguably the most exhausting part of any band especially those from metal rock bands who have very active drum sounds.

This is the most obvious way of earning from your skills of knowing how to play musical instruments. I don’t need to tell you that if you become a famous musician performing to sellout crowds you will become rich and famous.

But there are also musicians who just get by. These are the type of musicians you see playing musical instruments at bars and other crowded places. There are also other musicians who earn money by playing their musical instruments on the street where people give the change money.

While this might not sound glamorous, many successful musicians usually started out this way by being unknown musicians. So there is no shame starting out as an unknown musician. Many musicians in fact make a decent living performing music this way.

The very less musical way of earning money from musical instruments is by becoming a musical instrument maker. While making musical instruments is a craft that is honed thru the ages, there are other instruments that you can still make much easier money on.

Guitar Picks:

One of the easiest products you can sell would be guitar picks. There are even guitar pick collectors. I recently saw a collection of 325 pieces of old rock and roll musician themed guitar picks being sold on eBay for 9,000 British pounds.

This would mean that each guitar pick is approximately worth 28 British pounds or 39 US dollars. This is not bad considering that many newer guitar picks can be bought for a few cents only.

Either as a manufacturer or a collector of guitar picks, you stand to make money. I mean how hard can it be to make your own guitar picks? There are even many YouTube videos that teaches you how to make your own customized guitar picks.

I even saw one YouTube video instructing viewers on how to make guitar picks out of used plastic bottle caps and old DVDs and CDs. These kinds of objects are virtually free and can be had anywhere now for free.

In this day and age, guitar picks have become the equivalent of baseball cards to baseball. Collectors not only buy them but trade them as well. This is another source of income that you could derive from guitar picks. You can become a trader or a middleman for guitar picks.

Bamboo Instruments:

Though not usually used for modern music, musical instruments made from bamboo continue to be made. Various kinds of flutes, xylophone, chimes and other musical instruments continue to be made usually by people in the musical crafts business.

I recently looked at Lazada which is a big and popular e-commerce online site in Asia. In there I found various kinds of flutes, panpipes and kalimbas being sold. There are in fact many sellers of such products.

I’m no expert in making bamboo flutes and panpipes, but it seems that as long as you have a bamboo you could gradually master the art of making flutes and pipes out of bamboo. If you live in an area or have access to a lot of bamboo, this could be a good source of income for you.

Besides flutes and panpipes, you could also make other non-common musical instruments using bamboo like shakers, slit drums, tongatongs, buzzers and so on. You can even make xylophones even though they are a bit harder to do and tune.

They may not be as popular as guitars, drums and pianos, but they are simple musical instruments that can be sold either as what they are: as musical instruments, or they can be sold as novelty items.

This brings us to our next source of income for musical instruments, as toys for children and even adults. We have already discussed bamboos, but there are also toy musical instruments made of other things, like popsicle sticks and other materials made of wood.

There are also toy musical instruments made of recycled materials and plastics. Remember the rattlers and shakers you had as a kid? Maybe you still have the toy drum or piano made out of plastic that was given to you when you were a kid.

When I was a kid, the toys which made me happy most were the toys which lights up, shakes and produced a sound. Even the children I observed these days are also interested in the same kind of toys.

You may not have the proper skills or access to materials to make the more popular musical instruments like a guitar, drum and piano, but you can create musical instruments that could delight children.

One of the best toy musical instruments that you can create does not have to be a physical musical instrument, but a digital one. If you are knowledgeable in making mobile phone apps, you can make apps that simulate musical instruments.

One of the most popular apps I know that simulate musical instruments are piano simulation apps. There are even some piano app making tutorial in YouTube. I simply typed the YouTube search keyword ”piano app programming” and I was shown some videos about the said topic.

Definitely one thing that you could do to earn money from your skills in playing a musical instrument is to be a tutor/teacher. Teaching guitar lessons is especially suited for this way of making money.

Unlike drums or pianos which are not portable, you can easily bring your guitar anywhere to teach a person in their homes, schools and some other place. But don’t despair if you only know how to play drums, piano or some other non-portable musical instrument.

You can teach classes online. There are many online sites where you can teach and sell your courses, but you can begin your online teaching career with none other than the big one of them all, which is YouTube.

If you search the keyword term “guitar lessons” in YouTube for example, you would be taken to many tutorials on how to play a guitar, from beginner levels to more advanced levels. The person teaching these YouTube guitar lessons could be you one day.

I have also noticed that several of these tutorial videos have millions of views with some channels having millions of subscribers. This is proof that many people are searching online for information regarding how to play guitars.

These online video lessons presents a lot of opportunities for the uploader. Not only can the uploader branch out into offering tutorials and courses as well as one on one lessons, but they can also offer merchandise and other forms of making online income.

There could be the very real possibility of someone being musically discovered when they upload not only their tutorials and courses, but also samples of their work. Who knows, a musical producer or a talent scout might show interest after watching the video.

You can make a video for example of you singing while playing your musical instrument/s and some of your viewers might like it enough that they share your video to their friends and networks.

Next thing you know, your video goes viral and reach millions of viewers. After this, you may be on your way to real internet fame where the possibilities of fame and fortune is very real. So if you are not doing anything, grab your musical instrument and make a video.

You may just become the next pop or rock sensation. If nothing else, it would have given you more exposure that you are able to monetize more your online presence like selling courses and merchandise.

There are many ways of earning from musical instruments. You can learn how to play them and make money as a musician or become the person who makes musical instruments. You don’t have to sell difficult to make musical instruments, even their simple accessories would do.

You may not become famous as a musician, but you can still be famous by becoming an internet musical personality. You can be a tutor and sell courses and other online content or you may still be a musical entertainer in your videos.

Busking To Earn Money