Guitar Player or Guitarist? Piano Player or Pianist?

“ist.”

Three little words. But I believe they have lots of meaning.

Well, they do for me.

You see, I use those three letters to distinguish musical ability. I assign those three letters to musicians that I believe have the skills to make a living at their instrument of choice.

For instance, I consider myself a “pianist,” but not necessarily a “guitarist.” I believe I’m more of a “guitar player” – not bad, but not Nashville-good.

Is such a distinction necessary? No, not really. But I do it anyway.

Is this an interesting topic? No, not really. But I wrote a post about it anyway.