Sunday, July 24, 2005
Harmony Sovereign
Spent part of yesterday reacquainting myself with my guitar, which Mama ER bought me in 1977 or 1978, when I was 13 or 14. It is black. I LOVED Johnny Cash.
Here is a link to a Harmony Sovereign page.
I love my guitar. It's the only acoustic I've ever owned. Never learned to read music. But I know enough chords and can pick some. I'm a word man, you know. Music is just something to enhance a story, to me.
Besides that, the best music, to me, is stripped down stuff that tears your heart out: Jimmie Rodgers, Hank Williams Sr., Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Dwight Yoakum. Notice my favorites are heavy on the Bakersfield sound.
Other early musical influences of mine were The Beatles, Stones, America, Mark Lindsay(sp?) and Paul Revere and the Raiders, Steppenwolf, Jethro Tull and other 8 Tracks that Big Brother ER played when I was a little ER, and Roger Miller, Charlie Walker, Boots Randolph and, of course, Hank Williams, which are the records Mama ER had.
I went full-time country when disco left me cold, as someone once said. Came back in the mid-1980s, but never totally left country.
This is just a ramble. Sorry it's not a "story" or "essay." I am off work for the next week, and since I write for a living, I'm letting my inner "writer" relax some.
Anyway, yesterday I restrung my guitar. The strings had been on there since 1997, the year Dr. ER and I got married, which was the last time I played it much. Went from nearly every day as a 33-year-old bachelor to hardly ever. I tended then to string words together and call 'em songs only when I was sad and lonesome or otherwise distraught, which was pretty much all the time. I quit being sad and lonesome when I got married.
I've picked my guitar back up because after the ordeal of grad school, I find I have more mental energy, and time, than I know what to do with -- especially with Bird in college (she'll be heading back in a couple of weeks).
Took a couple of stabs at getting the new strings on! I'da been embarrassed, if I'da had any of my former two or three guitar-pickin' buds around to see.
Strung one string on the wrong post. Got another one strung and tuned, but through the wrong, ah, whatever you call it, the channel the strings rest in up just below the tuners.
Broke the little E string and had to run buy another, so I picked up a couple while I was at it. Got some new Fast Fret, too, and a whole backup set of Martin mediums.
Finally got it done, and was so ready to play around with it some -- I have the new Dwight Yoakum CD and couldn't wait to try to do a couple of the tunes on there -- that I didn't trim the strings from the tuners. Which greatly amused Dr. ER, who had never seen such, she being a classically trained cellist and all.
Anyway, got-r-done. Played some. It's been so long that today my fretting fingers ACHE. They're not blistered. They're, like, bruised inside. That's OK. It'll take time.
Meanwhile, I got some words coming. I think maybe I might can write about things and situations I've seen and otherwise know about now, not just stuff I've personally lived, which was always a limitation on my lyric-writin' ability before -- but not TOO Much, 'cause while some people like to pretend their life has its own soundtrack, mine has all been real. Sort of "Gator McClusky(sp) Finds Jesus Then Meets Cheech y Chong and They All Go to College." Or something.
I mean, you can't make up havin' once been, in turn, a gospel radio deejay, farm editor and Texas dancehall bouncer. You can't make up a NASCAR tire in the livin' room.
And you can't make up marryin' a Ph.D., and me earnin' a master's in history, either. But's it's pretty hard to get "pee aytch dee" to rhyme or make sense in a country song -- although somebody *did* work medula oblongotta(sp?) into a song several years ago.
Note: The story linked above, like most of stories about Dwight Yoakum, seems impressed with his "edginess." People forget how edgy Buck Owens was in the 1960s. For the story of how an Oklahoma City furniture dealer helped *make* ol' Buck, go here.
--ER
Here is a link to a Harmony Sovereign page.
I love my guitar. It's the only acoustic I've ever owned. Never learned to read music. But I know enough chords and can pick some. I'm a word man, you know. Music is just something to enhance a story, to me.
Besides that, the best music, to me, is stripped down stuff that tears your heart out: Jimmie Rodgers, Hank Williams Sr., Buck Owens, Merle Haggard, Dwight Yoakum. Notice my favorites are heavy on the Bakersfield sound.
Other early musical influences of mine were The Beatles, Stones, America, Mark Lindsay(sp?) and Paul Revere and the Raiders, Steppenwolf, Jethro Tull and other 8 Tracks that Big Brother ER played when I was a little ER, and Roger Miller, Charlie Walker, Boots Randolph and, of course, Hank Williams, which are the records Mama ER had.
I went full-time country when disco left me cold, as someone once said. Came back in the mid-1980s, but never totally left country.
This is just a ramble. Sorry it's not a "story" or "essay." I am off work for the next week, and since I write for a living, I'm letting my inner "writer" relax some.
Anyway, yesterday I restrung my guitar. The strings had been on there since 1997, the year Dr. ER and I got married, which was the last time I played it much. Went from nearly every day as a 33-year-old bachelor to hardly ever. I tended then to string words together and call 'em songs only when I was sad and lonesome or otherwise distraught, which was pretty much all the time. I quit being sad and lonesome when I got married.
I've picked my guitar back up because after the ordeal of grad school, I find I have more mental energy, and time, than I know what to do with -- especially with Bird in college (she'll be heading back in a couple of weeks).
Took a couple of stabs at getting the new strings on! I'da been embarrassed, if I'da had any of my former two or three guitar-pickin' buds around to see.
Strung one string on the wrong post. Got another one strung and tuned, but through the wrong, ah, whatever you call it, the channel the strings rest in up just below the tuners.
Broke the little E string and had to run buy another, so I picked up a couple while I was at it. Got some new Fast Fret, too, and a whole backup set of Martin mediums.
Finally got it done, and was so ready to play around with it some -- I have the new Dwight Yoakum CD and couldn't wait to try to do a couple of the tunes on there -- that I didn't trim the strings from the tuners. Which greatly amused Dr. ER, who had never seen such, she being a classically trained cellist and all.
Anyway, got-r-done. Played some. It's been so long that today my fretting fingers ACHE. They're not blistered. They're, like, bruised inside. That's OK. It'll take time.
Meanwhile, I got some words coming. I think maybe I might can write about things and situations I've seen and otherwise know about now, not just stuff I've personally lived, which was always a limitation on my lyric-writin' ability before -- but not TOO Much, 'cause while some people like to pretend their life has its own soundtrack, mine has all been real. Sort of "Gator McClusky(sp) Finds Jesus Then Meets Cheech y Chong and They All Go to College." Or something.
I mean, you can't make up havin' once been, in turn, a gospel radio deejay, farm editor and Texas dancehall bouncer. You can't make up a NASCAR tire in the livin' room.
And you can't make up marryin' a Ph.D., and me earnin' a master's in history, either. But's it's pretty hard to get "pee aytch dee" to rhyme or make sense in a country song -- although somebody *did* work medula oblongotta(sp?) into a song several years ago.
Note: The story linked above, like most of stories about Dwight Yoakum, seems impressed with his "edginess." People forget how edgy Buck Owens was in the 1960s. For the story of how an Oklahoma City furniture dealer helped *make* ol' Buck, go here.
--ER
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Sometimes the similarity between us scares me, ER. I too, once played an acoustic guitar and don't anymore. I too, love everyone of those different artists you listed, and for the same reasons. Disco drove me to country too.
My shining moment in the sun took place at the Annual Winfield KS National Flat Picking Championship, Bluegrass Festival,and Art Fair, in 1984, where I accompanied a friend of mine as he competed in the National Mountain Dulcimer Contest. He didn't win. But it was a heckuva rush for me!
My shining moment in the sun took place at the Annual Winfield KS National Flat Picking Championship, Bluegrass Festival,and Art Fair, in 1984, where I accompanied a friend of mine as he competed in the National Mountain Dulcimer Contest. He didn't win. But it was a heckuva rush for me!
Amongst the instruments I own: a guitar my mama bought me for my 14th birthday, with S&H Green Stamps; two banjos; a fiddle; a mountain dulcimer; a fiddle; a psaltery; two pennywhistles; a harmonica, and my baby grand piano.
The one I can really play is the piano, but I want so much to become proficient with the others as well. I'd also love to have a hammered dulcimer and a mandolin.
The one I can really play is the piano, but I want so much to become proficient with the others as well. I'd also love to have a hammered dulcimer and a mandolin.
Mark,
The fact that I had heard of the bluegrass festival helped keep me alive in Washington, D.C., where I was a congressional intern, back in '86.
A 22-year-old ER wadn't too bright back then, 'specially after a few drinks.
At the Hawk & Dove, there on Capitol Hill (Jenkins Hill, actually, I reckon), me and some of my fellow interns, all full of ourselves, were drinkin' and carryin' on, all still in our spiffy work clothes, havin' just walked over after a typical long day on the Hill.
Across the way there at the Hawk & Dove, I spied a burr-haircutted, tight T-shirt wearin' punk, high-water jeans on, pair of Converse tennis shoes, puffin' on a cig, pack rolled up in a shirt sleeve, and I intoxicatedly (and too loudly, it turned out), said something to the effect of "look at THAT guy."
In a blink, he was in my face, switchblade out and against my ribs. "What'd you say?" he said. I glanced at his T-shirt, which was from the Winfield bluegrass festival, and said, "I said. 'Look at that guy in that shirt.' I've always wanted to go to the Winfield bluegrass festival. I'm from Oklahoma. It's not that far."
He was fairly caught off guard. Later, I figured he may or may not have known jack about the festival. Who knows hwere he came up with the shirt? Coulda been homeless. Coulda got it in a Goodwill store. I don't know.
He glared at me awhile. Kept his knife in my ribs. I bought him a beer. In a few minutes, he said, "Hey, you want to buy some pot?" His knife in my ribs, (and I swear this sounds made up), I said, "Dude. Wha-?" "I'm selling. You owe me. (Or something like that). Come on."
He pockets his blade and we go into the bathroom. In a flash, he has his knife out again, and pulls out a big "bud" of marijuana. Not that I had ever seen one before. Ahem.
Anyway, he basically forces me at knifepoint to buy this damn weed from him! In Washington, D.C.! At the Hawk & Dove! I swear I am not making this up.
I give him, like, $60, stick the damn "bud" -- about as big as my hand -- in my jacket pocket. He splits. I go back to the table with my fellow interns -- none of whom knew what had gone down, since none of them, in the loudness of the joint, and with the guy's deftness with his blade, ever realized what what happening.
I was sick to my stomach. Got up, excused myself. Left. Started walking home. Tossed the dope close to the Capitol. Walked to the Capitol South Metro stop, took it one stop to L'Enfant (I think, it's been awhile), and walked on back to my apartment, at Eighth and G, SW.
Retained one helluva memory and the longterm effects of a brush with death (or maiming, at least) and-or a trip to the DC pokey.
True story.
The fact that I had heard of the bluegrass festival helped keep me alive in Washington, D.C., where I was a congressional intern, back in '86.
A 22-year-old ER wadn't too bright back then, 'specially after a few drinks.
At the Hawk & Dove, there on Capitol Hill (Jenkins Hill, actually, I reckon), me and some of my fellow interns, all full of ourselves, were drinkin' and carryin' on, all still in our spiffy work clothes, havin' just walked over after a typical long day on the Hill.
Across the way there at the Hawk & Dove, I spied a burr-haircutted, tight T-shirt wearin' punk, high-water jeans on, pair of Converse tennis shoes, puffin' on a cig, pack rolled up in a shirt sleeve, and I intoxicatedly (and too loudly, it turned out), said something to the effect of "look at THAT guy."
In a blink, he was in my face, switchblade out and against my ribs. "What'd you say?" he said. I glanced at his T-shirt, which was from the Winfield bluegrass festival, and said, "I said. 'Look at that guy in that shirt.' I've always wanted to go to the Winfield bluegrass festival. I'm from Oklahoma. It's not that far."
He was fairly caught off guard. Later, I figured he may or may not have known jack about the festival. Who knows hwere he came up with the shirt? Coulda been homeless. Coulda got it in a Goodwill store. I don't know.
He glared at me awhile. Kept his knife in my ribs. I bought him a beer. In a few minutes, he said, "Hey, you want to buy some pot?" His knife in my ribs, (and I swear this sounds made up), I said, "Dude. Wha-?" "I'm selling. You owe me. (Or something like that). Come on."
He pockets his blade and we go into the bathroom. In a flash, he has his knife out again, and pulls out a big "bud" of marijuana. Not that I had ever seen one before. Ahem.
Anyway, he basically forces me at knifepoint to buy this damn weed from him! In Washington, D.C.! At the Hawk & Dove! I swear I am not making this up.
I give him, like, $60, stick the damn "bud" -- about as big as my hand -- in my jacket pocket. He splits. I go back to the table with my fellow interns -- none of whom knew what had gone down, since none of them, in the loudness of the joint, and with the guy's deftness with his blade, ever realized what what happening.
I was sick to my stomach. Got up, excused myself. Left. Started walking home. Tossed the dope close to the Capitol. Walked to the Capitol South Metro stop, took it one stop to L'Enfant (I think, it's been awhile), and walked on back to my apartment, at Eighth and G, SW.
Retained one helluva memory and the longterm effects of a brush with death (or maiming, at least) and-or a trip to the DC pokey.
True story.
Oh, Trixie, Dr. ER and I acquired a mandolin a few years ago, but have allowed life to distract us from learnin' how to do anythign with it.
ER, Like Mark, I too find the similarities erie.
I have been playing guitar pretty regularly for about twenty years. I played in a band from about 1996 until 2002.(Grunge rock, modern rock and of course, a ton of originals...) We played in bars and clubs for money every weekend for about 3 years, met a few famous people, and generally had a blast. When I met my wife, it just didn't seem as important anymore.
I still have a pretty neat collection of guitars and such, including a pre-historic Ovation accoustic, a really nice Ibanez accoustic, an ESP H-301 solid body electric and a brand new Ibanez RG, with the Floyd Rose bridge and graphite hardware. (Birthday present from the wife...She ROCKS!!) I also have a full Marshall Stack in my living room, and a Carvin lap steel, and a Banjo that is over 120 years old. I play when I can, but working 60 - 65 hrs a week, my playing time is limited...
I think that if we lived around the corner from each other, we would be great friends...
I have been playing guitar pretty regularly for about twenty years. I played in a band from about 1996 until 2002.(Grunge rock, modern rock and of course, a ton of originals...) We played in bars and clubs for money every weekend for about 3 years, met a few famous people, and generally had a blast. When I met my wife, it just didn't seem as important anymore.
I still have a pretty neat collection of guitars and such, including a pre-historic Ovation accoustic, a really nice Ibanez accoustic, an ESP H-301 solid body electric and a brand new Ibanez RG, with the Floyd Rose bridge and graphite hardware. (Birthday present from the wife...She ROCKS!!) I also have a full Marshall Stack in my living room, and a Carvin lap steel, and a Banjo that is over 120 years old. I play when I can, but working 60 - 65 hrs a week, my playing time is limited...
I think that if we lived around the corner from each other, we would be great friends...
Tug, I'blieve yer right.
I'm wonderin' whether I should slow down and take some lessons, before all my old non-musially-educated bad habits get woke up. ... Waylon played by ear and by feel, though. ...
I'm wonderin' whether I should slow down and take some lessons, before all my old non-musially-educated bad habits get woke up. ... Waylon played by ear and by feel, though. ...
Well, I've never had a lesson in my life, but I believe I can hold my own...
It was always just easy for me, but then everyone is different.
My advice to anyone who wants to learn to play, or just get better than they are is pick the dang thing up and noodle with it.
The more time you put in, the more you will learn and understand how it works.
It was always just easy for me, but then everyone is different.
My advice to anyone who wants to learn to play, or just get better than they are is pick the dang thing up and noodle with it.
The more time you put in, the more you will learn and understand how it works.
By the way, you can't beat a 1939 Martin herringbone. Of course you can't find one for less that about 5,000 either.
After playing country music and standards in pubs and clubs in Scotland for 30 years. I stopped playing guitar until two months ago,when I decided to go back to my first love, bluegrass. I too had to harden my fingers! I bought a new Seagull guitar handmade in Canada and it's the best acoustic guitar I have ever owned. I did have a Harmony Sovereign at one time but I never really took to it. I also have a blog which might interest you. http://dundeefolkclub.blogspot.com/2005/10/dundee-folksong-club-as-it-was-then.html
It will let you see what was happening in Scotland folkwise in the sixties.
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It will let you see what was happening in Scotland folkwise in the sixties.
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