Well, I'm a pretty pretentious bastard music-wise. Started on the piano in 3rd grade, with the same piano teacher as @Nicole44 , if you believe that. Only took lessons through 6th. Started Cello in 4th. At some point my cello teacher said to my parents, "You need to upgrade your teacher, he's better than I can do." So I started driving down to WTSU (now WT A&M) for lessons. My first teacher from there, Matt Lad, is now with the Cincinnati Symphony. Second teacher is now Montreal Symphony's principal. The third, Chris Costanza, pursued a solo career; now a professor at Stanford. I made All-State Symphony my junior and senior year. At Texas, I studied for 2 years under the great Phyllis Young (RIP) before realizing I wasn't going to ever graduate if I pursued 3 degrees. It's the one instrument I'm best at, and the only one where, whatever thought or emotion crosses my mind, I can just play. Played trombone from 7th-12th grade. Actually joined the Longhorn band in the off-season my freshman year, but it, too, was a casualty of running out of time. I also sold the instrument at a garage sale after my son was born, which remains one of the dumbest things I ever did. My parents bought a synth in 1989, an Ensoniq VFXsd, that I still use today; nothing sounds quite like it. In college I also picked up the bass -- initially, my brother's Peavey T-40 and Combo 300 amp; later, sold off the Peavey for an Ibanez fretless. Played in a couple of bands and never went far; my bandmate, Marc Gunn, now makes a living as a filk musician on the autoharp. You might have seen him and Andrew McKee as the Brobdingnagian Bards performing on campus in the late 90's/early 00's. Around this time I also discovered the demoscene and tracked music. This got me exposed to digital audio production techniques, FM synthesis, and sampling basics in ways I never would have otherwise. Current studio setup is all of the above, minus the trombone, plus my late Mom's acoustic guitar and a cheap-but-good Yamaha Pacifica. I've been using Cakewalk for my main production tool since it was a MIDI sequencer for DOS, and haven't been forced to switch yet. They finally started paying people to develop for it again, by the way. Scarlett 4i4, 4th gen. Note that the 4th gen Scarletts use the same DAC/ADCs as their high-end studio gear. It's as good as I'll ever need it to be. I've also spent real cash money on Roland Cloud's Pro subscription. You get all of Zenology synthesis and Zenology FX (surprisingly good guitar amp sims), PLUS 2 licenses to your favorite of their "Legendary" line of classic modeled gear. Also they have the "Play4life" promotion where you can get a lifetime key to Legendary gear; they've had two since I subscribed, so now I have lifetime keys to their Jupiter-8 and D-50 VSTs, plus the 2 licenses I get through the Pro subscription, which are currently slotted in to a TB-303 and TR-808. Classic. And all still driven by that Ensoniq VFXsd. Though most of my money lately has been going towards refurbishing my cello, an unusual 300-year-old beauty that I adore, and repurchasing sheet music for songs that I learned once, but since lost the music for. It remains a hobby and not my career. But then, my career (being a big computer nerd) is also a hobby even when it's not my career. So, no regrets there.