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Age is a commonly expressed concern in studying music, and there are many questions on this site addressing "late starts" from a variety of perspectives. This post is intended as Link Central for users with related or similar questions.

If you've found this question, chances are you're interested in learning to play an instrument or in some other aspect of music, like theory. But you are -- or feel you are -- getting a late start, and you have doubts: Is it even worth starting? How far can I go? You are far from alone, both in asking and in asking here. This post will help lead you to similar and related questions that have already been fielded by the community.

Tom
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Aaron
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    Does this answer your question? Can one be too old to learn an instrument? – Brian Towers Oct 05 '20 at 08:04
  • As long as you haven‘t to start a concert or solo career in mind ... it will never be to late! – Albrecht Hügli Oct 05 '20 at 09:11
  • @BrianTowers - that's the first question quoted in the answer. – Tim Oct 05 '20 at 12:45
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    Wasn't the whole point of this question to cover any/all of the potential duplicates? And put them all under one banner? – Tim Oct 05 '20 at 15:06
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    @Tim Indeed. There is a certain irony. :-) – Aaron Oct 05 '20 at 23:35
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    @BrianTowers The answer you linked to is related, but is a different question. The intent here is to compile links to all the various age-related questions to make them easier to find, rather than to answer the question itself. – Aaron Oct 06 '20 at 00:06
  • @Aaron was it your intention for this to be closed? Or are people misunderstanding the intent? – Нет войне Oct 06 '20 at 00:24
  • @topoReinstateMonica Appreciate your checking. I was not intending for it to be closed. Short of knowing why individual close votes were cast, I certainly allow for misunderstanding. – Aaron Oct 06 '20 at 00:27
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    @Aaron maybe a post on meta clarifying your intent might be useful, if there isn't one already? I can see why a mod might want to lock such a post, but at the moment the single "This question already has answers here" link undermines the answer. – Нет войне Oct 06 '20 at 00:30
  • @topoReinstateMonica Agreed about Meta. My current thinking is to see what happens over the next day or so. One advantage to being closed vs. locked is that the answer can be edited to add new links as they appear. – Aaron Oct 06 '20 at 00:33
  • I support the intention of Aaron. My first thought was: oh, he might be applying for moderator. I would also support this intentions. ;) – Albrecht Hügli Oct 06 '20 at 11:45
  • I vote to reopen this question. It is unfair to close it and nitpicking to say it is a duplicate. It is quite clear that this isn‘t a problem of Aaron and the intention is very serious. – Albrecht Hügli Oct 06 '20 at 12:04
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    I'd be for moving this to the meta, but it's not really a fit for the main site as is. It's mostly just pointing to other answers around the site which is not the point of a canonical question. You should be able to point to a canonical question to get the answer, not have the canonical question point elsewhere. IMO, almost all questions in your answer should be closed as a duplicate of the question this is closed a duplicate of. I'm happy to talk about this more in chat if needed. – Dom Oct 06 '20 at 14:31
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    Perhaps one approach could be to make a meta post (or posts) listing 'good answers to common questions', so that when we do get common questions we don't have to search for them anew every time. A slightly trimmed-down version of Aaron's answer here (listing the best 'am i too old' questions) could be a part of that? – Нет войне Oct 06 '20 at 16:57
  • @Dom I see your points. Let me start by seeing if I can turn this into a better canonical question. Give me a few days. – Aaron Oct 06 '20 at 17:33
  • @topoReinstateMonica I could definitely get behind this. Please consider adding it as an answer to the current meta discussion on canonical questions: Should we create a FAQ about Music Theory? – Aaron Oct 06 '20 at 17:35
  • Can this be made into a community wiki? I don't have a problem with rerunning a question if it would be beneficial to collect answers in one place, but I don't see why this OP should get the reputation for it. – Max Nov 19 '20 at 03:46
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    @Max The option of a community wiki has been discussed. I (the OP) am not opposed, but have asked to wait to see if I can better adapt the question to fit as a canonical question. If we do go the community wiki route, it would probably also get moved to Meta, which I would also support. (For the time being, as the OP has done all of the work, the OP would like to receive the credit. However, should the question get re-opened, which is my goal, you could certainly add your own answer[s] and receive any reputation gain for it/them. For now, I'm just keeping the list of links up to date.) – Aaron Nov 19 '20 at 05:44

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The consensus here on SE MP&T is...

Go for it!

Among the various questions and answers linked here, you'll find a wide variety of viewpoints: encouragement, pitfalls, concerns, and so forth, but in general, you will find that the broad feeling across the site is "Yes, you can. Go for it."

NOTE: It's not always obvious from the title, but age is expressed as a concern in all of the listed questions.

What follows is a list of questions regarding beginning to learn when you feel your age is a concern. They are organized by subject matter; just know that an answer related to an area different from yours might still be the one you're looking for.

Late start as a general concern

Guitar

Piano/Keyboard

Saxophone

Violin

Viola

Voice/Singing

Theory

Composing

Music school

Developing muscle memory

Exams / Auditions

Going pro

Aaron
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