Finding the muse wherever you can!
Posted October 18, 2007
The first time I held an acoustic guitar I was probably 13 years old. My father had borrowed a guitar from his friend so he could see if he really wanted to try to learn how to play. I remember the guitar sitting in the corner of the living room for two weeks. I don't even really remember my father picking the guitar up but I'm sure he did because he was trying to learn the Marty Robin's song Streets of Laredo. I think he got frustrated and just quit trying.
What I distinctly remember though is feeling drawn to that guitar. Nancy Wilson of Heart was and still is my guitar hero. The first time I heard the Dog & Butterfly album - particularly the song Dog & Butterfly, I knew I wanted to play the guitar.
One day, in direct defiance of my father's instructions to leave the guitar alone, "It's not a toy" he'd say, I picked up that guitar and started trying to figure out the song which had frustrated my father into submission. My father wasn't used to failure. He dropped out of high school in the 9th grade, lied about his age and joined the Air Force long before I was born. When he got out, he worked at a steel manufacturing company, and worked his way up and eventually started his own business which to this day is very successful. How my father let this piece of wood and steel get the best of him is still a mystery to me. For me, it was no big deal really. Picking out the melody note for note seemed easy to me. I don't even remember my fingers hurting. I'm sure they must have. But I nailed it. When my father returned home from work that evening, I decided I would be forgiven for touching the guitar if I showed him what I learned to do. In a relationship that has been marked with mutual disappointment over the years as I've gotten older, I can tell you that I don't ever remember seeing my father look more proud of me than he was at that moment I did what he couldn't. For my birthday, he bought me a cheap guitar from the now defunct Woolco. That guitar was awful - but it was mine and it was a start.
Two years later, on February 29, 1980, my father arrived home and very sternly ordered me to go get his pool cue from the back house, where my father had his office before his business grew to the point of needing an actual office. The house had been turned into a recreation room of sorts, complete with a pool table and a spot I always knew would be perfect for a piano - but that's another story for another blog. The youngest of 4 kids, I was not at all happy that I was the one he sent on this errand. I was busy doing something - reading or watching TV, and I was sure I was being picked on. You did not argue with my father for long before he would just put his foot down and lay down the law. Yes, I left whatever I was doing to go get his stupid pool cue.
When I returned, I spotted the guitar in the corner of the room. It was an Applause (made by Ovation - lower end model, but better than Woolco and pretty reasonably priced, and oh, it didn't hurt that Nancy played Ovation guitars and this was as close as I could get to an Ovation.) I pretended not to notice the guitar. I should note that I have never had a decent poker face. My father knew I saw it and called me out on it. It wasn't my birthday. It wasn't Christmas. I only mentioned the guitar to him once. This wasn't something my father did. He was a good provider but sentimental gestures like this only came around on special occasions. This wasn't one. It was leap year and February 29th would not come around again for another 4 years but big deal. It wasn't my birthday or Christmas. This was a strange feeling.
By the time I received this surprise from my father, I had learned how to play Dog & Butterfly on that cheap Woolco guitar. As amazing as Nancy is, I'm sure even Nancy would have appeared to reach major suckage levels on that guitar. Everything I played on that guitar was an effort. When I played my Applause for the first time, I was amazed. I really am a modest person and don't pat myself on the back too often, but the difference between how bad I sounded on that Woolco guitar and how good I sounded on the Applause was such a confidence builder.
As an adult, I would eventually buy a "real" Ovation guitar with my own hard earned cash. Once again, moving up to a higher quality guitar really made a difference in my progress as a player. And even though I had tried a few times to translate what I do on acoustic to an electric guitar, I found that my style (so heavily influenced by Nancy Wilson) does not translate so easily to the electric guitar. I'm really aggressive which is overkill on the electric. Still, there has always been this yearning to learn to play more rock type stuff and more leads, although I've managed to squeeze in some lead-ish playing on my Ovation. Consequently, any time I bought an electric guitar (never the coveted Fender Strat or Tele, or Gibson Les Paul) my frustration mirrored my father's so many years before. I failed miserably at it and got rid of the two guitars I had purchased.
Recently, I found a reasonably priced Ephiphone Les Paul Special in a pawn shop. The urge to give it the old college try surfaced yet again. This time, however, I purchased a digitech guitar effects module as well. Low and behold, something has sparked this time! I've been playing non-stop during my free time ever since.
The point, and I know I took a really long time to get to it, is sometimes the smallest thing can set you on a new course of creativity and musical expression. It can be a higher quality guitar, a new amp, new strings even. But when it hits, and you are in the zone, there's no rush like it - except standing at the edge of the stage mere feet away from Nancy Wilson when she plays the intro to Crazy On You and finishes it up with her signature kick. Both are better than sex. (Ok, maybe better than bad sex, but really, how bad is bad sex in reality?)
Here's hoping you find whatever spark sets you on your latest musical discovery. If you don't find it, don't give up hope. Keep plugging away and know that eventually, it will appear.
Take Heart,
Andrea
