Not quite a month ago I posted a story about picking up the guitar again after thirty-some years of not playing a single note. In the time since then I've seen some progress, and had a painful setback.
As detailed in my first post, one crucial event that led to going back to the guitar was taking my father's guitar to my friend John to be checked out and appraised last summer. John was a lot more impressed with Dad's forties vintage LG-2 Gibson than my seventies vintage Epiphone. When he asked if I was going to play the Gibson, I told him that if--and this was unlikely--I did start playing again it would be on the Epiphone. The rest of last summer and into the fall, every couple weeks he would ask me, "Are you playing that Gibson? Or at least that Epiphone?"
When I started playing again about six weeks ago it was John I called for advice on the best new strings for an old guy with arthritis and left hand that was less than prime after breaking my wrist a few years ago. It was John I called a couple weeks after that, to give him a progress report, and to pick his brain about a couple other things. A few days later I heard from his daughter that John had ended up in the hospital. Then last week I sent his wife an email with a funny assessment of how badly I was playing to pass on to him, for a laugh at my expense.
That night her reply came: John had died the night before.
He had helped get me into this, and I so wanted to make him laugh at what he had partially wrought: the rebirth of another sub-optimal guitar player. Just what the world needs, John. I believe our strategic reserve of people abusing their instruments, and music in general, is running dangerously short.
So, are you going to play that Gibson? Or at least that Epiphone?
I'm still playing that Epiphone, John. I play for at least an hour every night, and most nights I put in closer to two hours. I've redeveloped some callus, and my left hand has gotten a little bit stronger. My transitions from chord to chord have improved in several cases, but in others remain ham-handed and pitiful. Chords that demand a stretched little finger, like E7 and Am7 remain problematical. Barred chords are still a challenge. Now I can hit B flat right over two thirds of the time, but F7 and a couple others continue to be failure-prone. For some reason Bm continues to bedevil me. I seem to have issues with the B's; fortunately I have no burning desire to play the blues. My strumming suggests that I might be rhythmically challenged. Less than 1% of what I once knew about finger-picking has returned. My scales are, well, scaly.
I have several songs I plunk away at each night. My 'Midnight Special' is not bad, but nor is it particularly special; my 'Can't Get It Out of My Head' remains forgettable; my 'After the Gold Rush' has a heart of tin; my 'White Bird' might just be a damn seagull; my Moonshadow remains partly clouded over; my 'Crane Wife' seems to need counseling; my 'Space Oddity' retains space/time peculiarities--you get the idea.
Back in the day I used to also play 12-string. I've found myself wondering how badly that would go. Well, this morning I had to go to our nearest city, Watertown, to renew my driver's license. While there I went to Dr. Guitar to ask a couple questions about replacing the tuning mechanisms on that Gibson to make it playable, and secure a decent reference book so I could find some of the more obscure chords my odd song choices seem to demand. While there I asked if there was a 12-string I might take for a test drive. He sat me down with a very nice, middle-range Yamaha.
If I weren't facing shelling out money I don't have for income taxes I might just have taken that Yamaha home with me. I wasn't playing it any worse than my guitar at home, and I've always loved that 12-string sound. And in truth my playing might not be quite as bad as I make it sound--after all, our dog has stopped going into hiding every time I get the guitar out.
So, John may be gone but his wry voice is still in my head, asking The Question. The answer remains no to the Gibson, but yes to the Epiphone. Now that I've got him looking over my shoulder from forever, I'll probably have to keep at it. And maybe, just maybe, some day in the future I'll also be playing that Yamaha.
John was John Elwood Cook, highly regarded artist, former art teacher, life-long guitarist and songwriter who, among other things, contributed a fair amount to a solo album, ‘Tales From The Island’ by his old friend and summer neighbor, Joe Bouchard, formerly of Blue Oyster Cult. I don't believe in an afterlife, but if there is such a thing I hope it has guitars, and lets John once again have that sip of beer between songs his liver cancer made him give up.