How many people are still astonished at the very existence of this wonderful instrument?

I'm 5.5 years into steady practice now. I've been playing off and on for over 30 years. but the last few have given me something akin to critical mass. There are plenty of challenges left, but ideas are flowing nicely now, and my fingers are getting more and more cooperative, like two horses in harness.

I just can't get over this instrument!

I think one of the most beautiful things in the world, is the imagination of Emmett Chapman.

R

I’ve played trumpet almost 38 years. A lot of it getting paid for it (not much ) I’d give it up in a heartbeat to keep Playing Stick. I’m as Stick obsessed as I was when I ordered it. Always thinking what to work on next and about Stick gatherings. And huge thanks to Emmett for invention such a beautiful instrument

What you guys said.
It became the center of my creative life in the day it arrived. No sign of slowing down either.
Don’t know if Emmett will ever get the appropriate praise his genius deserves, as I’m sure nobody will truly explain the impact his life’s work had on so many of us. It just changed everything.


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I feel the same, although I had a Stick for quite a few years before I snapped and went " OK , this is what I'm going to do, I'm going to try & make this my thing" I'm about 4years into that plan and like you say it sort of becomes more enchanting to me each day, I can clearly imagine the music I want to make on it now and slowly that's happening.
I now have 3 of them. All quite different but all STICKS nonetheless.

The other night for want of a better description I was thinking what went wrong with marketing? I thought after40 odd years its penetration into the wider music world is still very limited and the number of players who could go out and play a whole night might number, I don't know , one hundred , two hundred, but its not many. I've heard varying theories from its just too hard to play , through to its easy to make " nice sounds" but going further is the tricky bit.
In any case, I love it and for what its worth I get out with mine as much as I can its been the best thing ever for me, and a whole heap of people now know " that thing " I'm playing is a Chapman Stick.
Counting down now for the 16,400 km journey to Stickcamp France , meeting up with old & new friends all with that common thread created by Emmett

I have a $3500 Paul Reed Smith (Custom 24) guitar that hasn't seen the light of day since I received my 40 year old Stick and now the Railboard is getting shared time with the vintage Stick. I'm still not sure which version I like best, but my vintage Stick has better tone with my JC-120 amps. The Railboard seems to have a faster action. I'm still working on my fEARful cabinets, so who knows what tones will come out of them.

Wonderful replies guys! Thank you all for dignifying my ramblings with replies.

Each day of family life can be cluttered, but life is long.

I have a full-time job (thank God!), a family (praise every other god in the book!), a pool, a yard, a dog. But, I have my Stick! And my little string band, which is expanding into a quartet or quintet.

Other things that I thought were obstacles but aren't: piano, tabla, conga, orchestral percussion, composition, orchestration.

And the Stick itself is an obstacle, at first. But it becomes a gateway with a few years of practice.

One day the pedagogy will be completely figured out (maybe it already is?), and five years of guided practice should be able to produce a fine Stickist.

R

My .002 (not that it’s worth anything)

The Stick is an amazing instrument that presents a lot of unique opportunities, and of course (like any instrument) equally unique challenges. Also like any instrument, those who play and appreciate the music created by said instrument all have pretty specific tastes in regards to the standards of technical ability, taste, etc etc. Pretty subjective...

I’ve never been so taken with something I’m so challenged by. I play every day. I still suck, but I suck less than I did last year. There is something so immediate, so joyful that this instrument releases. Such a simple device with such a broad expressive capacity. I’m diggin the ride. Thank you Sir Emmett.

Harry

Besides the obvious thing that you can play with both hands, what I love is the immediacy of it. After 40 years of playing pedal steel where you're operating machinery with your feet and knees, while having to manipulate various implements (bar and fingerpicks) between your hands and the strings, suddenly I'm intimately in touch with the strings with my bare hands in the here and now. Even piano, to which Stick is sometimes compared in musical capability, has mechanical linkages between your fingers and the strings. Just a neck, strings, tuners and pickup. The technique is unambiguous. No superfluous appendages - it's not a guitar and it's not trying to look like a guitar. No musical baggage in the tuning which is culturally and stylistically neutral. Truly a tabula rasa on which to explore terra incognita. Sophisticated simplicity. That's the zen genius of it.

I've been obsessed with the Sticks since I first saw this:


And now I have had the Rosewood 10-string for 1045 days, the Railboard 10-string for 929 days, and the NS/Stick 8-string for 509 days.

For me, I just hate to "waste" one hand doing nothing but picking (or strumming, plucking), and because of playing piano for a while (35 years), my right hand is my most agile and nimble limb of the two hands. Two-handed tapping just feels really cool, in a way that two-handed piano doesn't for me. I still love, love, love piano, but I also love the Sticks. My left hand is much more interesting and melodic on a Stick than on a piano, and I like the riffs that I come up with.

I admit that I get very frustrated when I want to really shred and cut loose, and I love to play improv on the piano for hours. My limiting factor on piano is more my imagination and bad habits than my piano ability, but the reverse still holds for Stick. My ability level would have come along a lot faster if I'd put the keys away entirely, but my goal has never been to replace one with the other.

I vastly appreciate the genius behind this instrument and kudos for Emmett Chapman and his many advances and improvements to the instrument. I can't wait to see where it's going to take me next, and I'm in no hurry to get there. The journey is the thing.

I also really like a lot of Stickists! You all are very cool people, even the ones of you who aren't. The community is the unsung side benefit of this (for now) mostly niche instrument.