I have always liked music. I believe a love of music can be passed down through the generations just like a good strudel recipe, but the desire to "cook" has to be in your blood. When I make music, I really feel like I'm cookin'!
Some of my earliest memories are of my mother singing to me as she rocked me to sleep. These songs were ones that her parents may have sung to her, because I have never heard them anywhere else. Some were kind of depressing, like the one about a girl and boy that had no mother or father, and ended up frozen to death on the steps of the church. Yeah, that’s bazaar, but it was a soothing bedtime song the way she sang it.
My mother also tells stories about me as a toddler never going anywhere without clutching two little yellow records. Yes, they did have vinyl in the Stone Age! She also tells of pre-heating the oven once when I was that age, only to open the door to see a golden slumping pancake that at first she thought was a piece of cheese, but discovered it to be one of my little yellow records. Yup, I loved those little records!
My dad also liked music, particularly jazz. He was a frustrated sax player, although I never heard him play but he kept his sax until I sold it to buy some worthless trinket when I was around 5th or 6th grade. He had some Stan Getz albums and a bunch of other jazz, swing, and big band music he would play on occasion.
My parents must have discussed and exposed me to a wide variety of music as I grew up because I pretty much enjoy all styles. I have often referred to my musical tastes as extending to all styles of music that haven’t been taken to their extreme. For instance, I love jazz, but can’t get into the progressive stuff. I think it sounds like everyone is playing a different song! Or heavy rock, metal if you know the genre. I like the standards like Led Zeppelin or Boston, which current metal heads might argue aren’t even metal, but I just can’t listen to the thrash and death metal that is playing today.
Anyway, my roots go deep and some of my best memories involve music. We had an old upright piano in the basement that we all would bang on. I started taking lessons, but my parents canceled them when I didn’t practice. I figured, “why practice when I can play it without?” I took lessons for a whole week!
I remember being at a church function where a group of people got up and did a little skit. One of them had a small banjo ukulele like I had never seen before. Well, they must have not wanted it much because my dad saw it lying around, and after a while asked if he could have it. He played some tunes on it like “My Old Kentucky Home” and “Has Anybody Seen My Gal” from a little how-to book, and I thought that was pretty cool. I picked it up and with a little practice was able to play them as well!
This led to my first guitar, a Montgomery Wards special that played like crap but I didn’t know the difference. With my ukulele experience, I played the bottom four strings of the guitar and had a heck of a time putting on shows for the neighbor kids with my sister Dinee singing with me. We did some Kingston Trio and Peter, Paul, and Mary stuff. It probably sounded like somebody strangling a cat, but we were rock stars!
I remember the Sunday that the Beatles were on Ed Sullivan. Wow, what a show! Back in my fourth grade class the next morning, all the guys were talking about how they were going to get guitars and be cool like The Beatles. I already had one, and could play it!
I was in the sixth grade when for Christmas I got an electric guitar and amp, a used St. George with a brushed aluminum pick guard. The kid across the street got a drum set that year and we spent the next few months in his basement finding new ways to strangle that cat! It was the mid Sixties and there was an abundance of three-chord songs out there to choose from. We played all the fun tunes from the period.
With a couple of other guys, we entered a school talent contest and won playing “Gloria” G-L-O-R-I-A Glo-ria! What were they thinking?!? Oh yeah, it was by popular vote of the kids, and kids love rock-n-roll.
Well I played those two crappy guitars until about my Senior year when My folks bought me a real nice Epiphone acoustic. Compared to what I had been playing, this thing was a Stradivarius. This is the guitar that would accompany me on camping trips, through the military, and all through life until now.
I didn't play guitar much until I pulled it out while in the Air Force. I spent a lot of time on Alert, which is mostly trying to fill your time until the horn goes off, and then you run like crazy to your airplane and fly off to war. Well, obviously that never happened, but the military loves being prepared, so we would live in the Alert Facility for seven days straight. Every aspect of life; eating, sleeping, a small amount of work making sure everything on the aircraft was right, and a whole lot of time to do nuthin'. Most guys read or watched TV, played cards or pool, but I started bringing my guitar with me. It was a time when I really started to see improvements in my ability because I was playing six to eight hours a day! I really felt like it could lead to something, I just wasn't sure what.
When I got out of the military, I still played occasionally, but I started doing other things and slowly lost interest until over the years I rarely played. I would get it out, figure out a song which would renew my interest for a while, but then I would neglect it again for months. I was to the point of not playing at all when around 2005 I was reading the church bulletin and there was a request for musicians, guitarists especially.
It had been so long and I knew they played songs I didn't know so I was apprehensive about responding. I started playing just to get my calluses back and played for a couple of weeks before I contacted the worship leader to see if they still needed someone. He set up an audition and gave me some music to learn. I spent some time practicing the music and auditioned a week or so later getting the official nod to join the rotation as an acoustic guitarist. After all of these years, to finally have a purpose to my music was very exciting. I have been playing in the Praise Band now for a couple of years and it is still challenging and fun. I spend a lot of time trying to get the music to sound right. I don't read music so it all has to be done by chord charts and a careful listen to the CD we are given of the performance material. I actually took part in cutting a CD that is available online at KentwoodCommunityChurch.com
I am now also in a Classic Rock cover band called Strumble Head. It consists of me and three other guys from the KCC WAM Band that have been getting together in my basement every week to play songs we like. We have played out a few times and have had a blast. We are scheduled to play GR Festival of the Arts on Saturday June 5th 2010. Check out the Strumble Head web site for more information about the band.
I have also done some song writing and recording in my basement "studio", which is a computer, microphone, small mixer, keyboard, and the guitars. It is not very professional but I have fun with it. You can hear a sampling of what I have recorded here on the web site. Find and click "My Music" to give it a listen.