I got my first real five string

Me and some guys from the guild,

we had a band and we tried real hard.

Dengo quit;

Tistann got married.

I should have known

we’d never get far . . .

In WoW one cannot learn to play an instrument, but in Lotro one can.  My lore-master has taken up the lute, which is very cool.  (Although her only other option was clarinet, which is decidedly uncool, so she didn’t have too many options.)  My minstrel, not surprisingly, has a much broader variety of instruments available to her, including **harp** (yeah!) – but she’s still too destitute to afford one, so we’ll have to revisit that later.

Once you have your instrument, you can play it using the numbers on your keyboard, which apparently correspond to notes on the diatonic scale. 

1  2 3 4 5 6 7 8

C D E F G A B C

So, for example, the first verse of Camptown Races obviously would be played as 5 5 3 5 6 5 3 , 3 2 3 2.  (Note: be sure to enter /music first and have your lute equipped as, if I remember correctly, a ranged weapon, before you attempt this.)

One thing you may notice about playing an instrument on Lotro, or at least playing the lute (we’ll see whether it applies to other instruments as well), is that you instantly become a rock star as soon as you begin playing, even if you’re just tapping randomly on the keyboard.  Toons will immediately gather around you and dance, clap, and otherwise indicate how wonderful you are.  It’s pretty entertaining, and if anyone gets scary you can just log out for a while.