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Who makes you glad you are a guitar player?


rct

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The "whos yer favorite player" thread on dope.

 

Mrs saw that excellent pitcher of Hughie and Billy I put up here. She reminded me that in 2005 when we went down to AC and saw The Outlaws that I literally cried like a baby. I really did. It was only really Hughie and Dix and Monte and Henry Paul that were actually Outlaws. Chris Anderson has been around for a long time and I've seen him with Mark May and Dickie, so he was not a stranger. But MAN, he did Prisoner like Billy himself was standing there. I cried. I wept. I got to open for them guys back then, and this picture down here is of them then, super powerful guitar players, absolutely masters of one thing and one thing only and that was being The Outlaws. When Billy did that bit between verses in Green Grass or that wonderful screaming stuff at the end of Prisoner, he was all guitar player, 100% master of that les paul. When they were here 9 years ago and I got to see Hughie for a little while I was glad he remembered those days well and not badly, and he knew how strong them guys were. And I told him in front of my wife that those guys made me glad I was a guitar player.

 

So that's it. They above all are not just my favorites, the ones I always look forward to ripping, the riffs and songs I never tire of playing, they make me glad I'm a guitar player and not a soccer coach or something else. When I play their songs or listen to especially the Blazin saddles record, I am 17 years old again, learning and playing out these great songs. And 28 years later seeing what was left, and especially seeing Hughie just a couple years before he passed was really lucky.

 

Who makes you consummately happy to play the guitar and endlessly glad you are a guitar player?

 

the-outlaws-hughie-thomasson-and-billy-jones-daniel-larsen.jpg

 

 

rct

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Well,, I have never opened for anybody. And I have no cool life stories like that to tell.

That one's gonna be hard to beat.

 

But I can answer the question honestly.

 

Although in my case I use the term "guitar player" loosely... lol

 

But my answer to that question would be,,, my kids.

My kids make my happy I play the guitar. For a few reasons.

 

One, because for several years they didn't even know I played guitar until a couple years ago.

(old story told it a few times yada yada yada)

 

Two, because now they are getting to the point where I can actually play with them.

My boy is drumming and my girl is playing piano. I am trying to write a simple piece we can all play together.

 

Three,, because I do play, I don't feel as guilty forcing them to practice... lol.

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My bandmates. They are nice people and I truly enjoy hanging out with them and socialising (and carrying on like we are a bunch of teenagers again every week). Playing guitar made that happen. Like being in a team sport and taking pride in what we achieve even if its at a basic level in overall terms. Helps keep me young. Priceless.

 

Quapman - I agree too - nice for the kids to see the old man up there prancing around on stage [biggrin]

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My buddy and his brother played with the The Outlaws for a while. The don't list Tom, the guitar player, on the wiki website but his brother Anthony "Nino" Catanzaro is listed as the bassist (1987, 19891990, 19921993). Tom is an amazing guitarist, although I had to give it to him once when he decided to tell me how to play piano. We later watched a Steve Vai video and Tom said "I can play like him." He's great but nobody can play like Vai. After his piano "lesson" to me and Vai comment I had to get back at him. So after an awesome Vai lick I turn to Tom and say "wow, that was a classic minor-flagger to major-flapper turnaround and I haven't heard one of those in years." He just nodded and said "I know" to which I said "there is no such thing!" Great player but knew nothing about theory. He punched me then because I bruised his ego. :)

 

Nowadays my life is filled with administrative duties, managing a huge 8M dollar a year center, coupled with proposal writing and teaching. I long for the days when I can just play around with theory. I'm glad I play guitar because it helps me unwind.

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I'm gonna say my all-time biggest hero: Buddy Guy

 

Revised_BG_Photo.png

 

 

I got to meet the man in person back in the day. I actually got to sit down between him and Junior Wells and talk blues & guitars...

 

Talk about an aspiring Blues guitarist's wet-dream...

 

I was awe-struck and simply mesmerized by the experience and I felt like an acolyte meeting God!

 

He was the kindest, nicest, and most open performer I'd ever met. I happened to catch his attention back stage and he simply invited me over to sit with him and Junior and I had them to myself for like 15 minutes and I simply couldn't believe I had stumbled into such an opportunity...

 

He may have still been playing his Guild Nightbird at that time, I can't quite recall because he didn't have it back stage with him. He introduced me to his wife; (at the time) the mother of his famous rap-star daughter; Shawnna.

 

Looking back I wept about it, but at the time I was so star-struck that I simply enjoyed the moment. Sometimes I still can't believe I got some personal me-time with Buddy Guy...

 

I think I stammered and stuttered alot and basically fawned about him, but he put me right at ease and started a conversation with me about my playing and told me never to stop playing The Blues...

 

when I think about his influence on Eric Clapton, Peter Green, Jimi Hendrix, SRV, and the list goes on, I still can't believe I ever got the opportunity to chat with him for myself!

 

Other than Eric Clapton being my earliest guitar influence, who led me to seek-out and come to learn about Buddy Guy, between those two guys are my biggest influences and I'd have to say I hold Buddy to be my biggest influence and hero!

 

They both make me glad I'm a guitarist for sure!

 

Buddy is 77 goin'-on 78 this year and can still play the pants off anyone around! If you ain't seem him yet yer doin' yerself a disservice! Go see him if you get the chance you won't believe the experience!

 


That and my daughter!

 

Tman, I too had an approx. 20 year hiatus, then one day my daughter was poking around the closet and pulled out my leftover electric axe and asked me what it was... I told her it was an electric guitar, what do you think it is???

 

The rest is history and I started playing again because she wanted me to teach her. That became one of the most rewarding times of my life that still continues to this day! We modified the ol' Squire "Blackie" Strat so it was cooler for her and I started buying guitars so we could play together instead of sharing back and forth and we've never looked back. We both own several guitars now both electric and acoustic and she still amazes me at how good she got at a tender age. I think she was approx. 9 when she found it and by 10 she was writing, arranging, and performing her own original songs. Here's her first ever public appearance @ 10 y/o:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQ8uaq8M4NU

 

 

I can't tell you in words how happy that makes me to be a guitar player and that makes me weep!

 

If it wasn't for her all-star/all-regional/all-conference high school sports career now she'd probably be playing professionally as a Junior in High School.

 

She was also a Jr. Black Sash in Kung-Fu by age 11...

 

I think in life she makes me prouder than anything else, even guitars...

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Once my wife said, "Could you turn the stereo down" and it was just me playing, I believed then that maybe I was a guitar player. Also, I have a friend who plays acoustic rhythm and likes how I play lead to his playing. He makes me glad I am a guitar player.

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I hear you, rct. I feel similarly about Danny Kirwin and Bob Welch from Fleetwood Mac. IMO, the greatest FM era was pre-Buckingham/Nicks. I'm a sucker for great melodies, and Kirwan and Welch had them in spades.

 

Then there was the curse of Fleetwood Mac guitarists, three of whom became certifiably crazy and Bob Welch committed suicide after a debilitating illness.

 

I'm primarily a jazz guy now, but there are many more rock guitarists who rank higher on my list than jazz guitarists. I'm glad I'm a guitar player every time I hear a great player live, and I leave that concert with the motivation that I want to learn to play like that or the angst that I'll never, in a million years, be able to play that.

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Primarily myself. I had dropped it for about 28 years and picked it up again about 4 years ago.

The coolest response was from my brother Rob who came out and saw me play at a blues club in Ottawa a few months ago. We hadn't played together in many years. He has been gigging regularly for years.

His response as well as his wife's and son was "holy sh!t. I had no idea you could play like that". He had tears in his eyes. The pride he had in his younger brother was something I'll never forget.

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hey Rich,

 

a good topic. but it's strange for me cuz I don't have a great answer.

 

I've been doing this for so long, and spend so much time with a guitar in my hands that I can't even think about what I would do if I didn't play.

I also play piano and it seems there's always "many" things I have on my "to do" list.

 

I often think about this: I don't know how people actually find ways to be happy that don't play an instrument.. "so how's that work?".. weird huh?

For me, it's like at the center of everything. so I guess the reason I'm glad is that it's probably about 80% of "Who I am" it's the only skin I know.

 

The rest is life right,, the kids (adults now but still my kdis) / grandkids, my wife (who I'm still madly in love with and thankfully she's quite supportive), then there's a job I do that I sometimes can't frikken stand but most of time, am okay with..

(don't we all have the same story to some degree

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Myself, sounds selfish and I think it is.

 

I do wish I had not stopped playing for 20 years, starting to play as an adult has its advantages and disadvantages and as poorly as I play I enjoy it tremendously.

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Yes to the guys who note that the support from a wife is not only ego-boosting, but also a recognition of the overall value to the picker's life by playing guitar spills over into relationships.

 

Also, I think it's not at all "who," but rather "how." That little realignment of letters to me says it all. Playing guitar simply pleases me. It pleases me not that I'm a marvelous picker, but that it offers a challenge when I feel like one, and a psychological chocolate bar for when I simply play stuff I've known for ages and it's pleasing to my head to do so.

 

I can play in public, or in private, and it's pretty much the same.

 

Dunno much of any other way to put it.

 

m

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Well, I enjoy making music which means singing and playing guitar, bass and drums, as the biggest part of expressing myself. When doing so with my bandmates, this is multiple fun, and for me that's what it's all about. [thumbup]

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Yes.. a bit of an odd question...

 

I think its individual situations rather than a specific who...

 

Like if im jamming and having a good time with whom ever I am playing with it will be that person or people...

 

If im playing at home and learning a lick or playing along to a tune it will be who ever that band or artist is etc...

 

But I guess mostly I make myself glad that I can play (if you can call that playing ;))... Times when ive had an almost spiritual moment playing and the feeling you get from that is like nothing else. That's when im glad that I bothered to take the time to learn to play. Because I don't gig or anything like that its mostly a very personal thing for me I guess?

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Times when ive had an almost spiritual moment playing and the feeling you get from that is like nothing else. That's when im glad that I bothered to take the time to learn to play

 

yes,, this...

 

well said.

 

that was a lot of my motivation to also learn Piano. I found I could take a lot of what I knew with me, I just had to figure out how to make my hands work on 88 keys instead of 6 strings an about 22 frets.

(left hand/right hand independence nearly was the end of my sanity but I got there)

 

ten years after (punn intended) NOT by any stretch a Pianist, but, I get around just fine, and I still just love playing that darned thing. as much as I enjoy guitar..

(I'm just way better on guitar! [biggrin] )

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(left hand/right hand independence nearly was the end of my sanity but I got there)

 

 

 

That's awesome man!

[thumbup]

 

I was able to keep up with my kids on piano up to that point.

Sadly I never had the time to commit to it. So I never did get there.

 

Can't wait to retire... lol.

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I hear you, rct. I feel similarly about Danny Kirwin and Bob Welch from Fleetwood Mac. IMO, the greatest FM era was pre-Buckingham/Nicks.

 

I'm with ya there!

 

Although I will admit I do like Lindsey Buckinham's guitar playing too, I am Danny Kirwan fanatic!

 

His is the guitar player I feel the most affinity for and find a true kindred spirit with...

 

Danny Kirwan has inspired me, probably more than any other guitarist!

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That's awesome man!

[thumbup]

 

I was able to keep up with my kids on piano up to that point.

Sadly I never had the time to commit to it. So I never did get there.

 

Can't wait to retire... lol.

 

yea! that's the kind of time that is needed

 

Oy!..

 

I guess after about 6 months of practicing over and over, my left eye stopped twitching, and I was able to hold down solid food..

 

[wink]

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One evening, I was jamming with some friends and the other guitar player said to me, after we played a song, "You're F-in' Awesome" He actually said the whole word, but you get my point. [biggrin]

 

Many years ago, my "partying" friends always wanted me to bring my equipment to the "quarter barrel" parties we had and just play(alone)while they sat there drinking beer and playing quarters. Loved the attention. [thumbup]

 

These, and probably several other similar experiences, make me glad I learned how to play guitar.

 

Also I should mention the fact that Alex Lifeson is around in my lifetime is a big guitar playing factor. [rolleyes]

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