This may sound crazy, but. . .

United States
March 24, 2007 9:01pm CST
Do you think a monkey (or gorilla) could learn to play a musical instrument? I think one could definitely be trained to, and I don't mean just giving it treats for banging on a drum or shaking a tambourine, I mean like playing piano, an entire drumkit, or maybe even a guitar/bass. It probably couldn't be a brass or woodwind instrument, but a string or percussion instrument might just work. Sure, maybe it sounds far-fetched (and it is), but if gorillas can be taught to spell small 3 letter words, or even sign language (whoah!!!), then I bet you could teach one to play some music. What though, of a primate's ability to compose? Do you think that they would be able to write something that wasn't just noise (even if it sounded like noise to our ears, if there was some kind of consistency to what they did, some kind of organization or deliberate purpose it would count)? That last part I do think might be too much, but I'm not sure. What do you think?
1 person likes this
3 responses
byoungster
@byoungster (12)
• United States
28 Mar 07
wats goin on in this world now days...monkeys will be driving stick shift cars within the next 10 yrs...lol
Metallideth
@Metallideth (572)
• United States
28 Mar 07
Yeah, it's funny how primates' intelligence and similarity to humans has turned them into a "gimmick animal," always on TV dressed up in human clothing, or doing tricks for people. I'm not exactly helping matters with this post, lol, but I think it would also be interesting to not only see them play something, but actually create something.
scarlet_woman
@scarlet_woman (23465)
• United States
25 Mar 07
if anything,drums would probably be the most likely. i'm not sure they have the finger movement to play a stringed instrument. i would definetly try gorillas tho. i saw a geographic show with koko and michael-the signing apes-actually swearing at each other through sign language when no one was watching.there must be some comprehension at work there.
Metallideth
@Metallideth (572)
• United States
26 Mar 07
There's definitely comprehension taking place. I read in a National Geographic that there was an gorilla that asked for a kitten on its birthday and they got her one. She took care of it and was very good to it, but I think it ran off and got hit by a car or something really disappointing like that :(, but still, she actually asked for something that she wanted and understood that she was going to get a present on her birthday because her caretakers told her. That's hilarious that the gorillas were swearing at each other!! I think you're right about the string intstruments, it would be really hard. Drums and keyboard could definitely work, though.
milliemocha
@milliemocha (48)
•
25 Mar 07
Haven't chimps been taught to play the piano? I am sure I have seen that somewhere. I don't see why they can't be taught to play certain instruments... perhaps just to learn certain melodies rather than to actually read and play music. I am really not sure about them composing meaninginful msuci thought... I would have thought that was quite hard! I would like to see what a chimpanzee could come up with. I know that there are elephants that have painted quite good pictures using their trunk to hold a paintbrush - so anything is possible!
Metallideth
@Metallideth (572)
• United States
25 Mar 07
Thanks for commenting (I assumed most people would deem this as one of those "fake" discussions). I think whoever could train 4 or 5 monkeys to play a few instruments could be rich if they released a DVD and went on tour. Heck, they wouldn't have to write anything, they could be a cover band or something! The monkeys couldn't sing, but if you didn't want to do all instrumental music, a person could sing, or maybe a monkey could just make noise to a certain rhythm. I don't know, maybe I have waaaaay to much free time, lol.