The instructor

We got my nephew a guitar for Christmas this past year. I think I had only a vague idea of what I was getting myself into; I've been giving him free guitar lessons every week for the last few months. Not that I mind, really. Family's family, right? And yesterday, he came bearing pizza.

He's learned very fast. In reality, I have no idea how to be a guitar teacher. I've done no research in how to put together lesson plans, and I haven't practiced at communicating musical ideas to the novice guitarist. But somehow, it has worked out - he has progressed faster than anyone I can remember, other than me. Mostly, that's due to the work he put into it, which is what I told him at the outset was how I learned. There's no magic to it, nor is it about being a "natural." It's about putting in the hours, making your fingers bleed as Bryan Adams might say.

Yesterday, we worked on "Sweet Home Alabama." Our family camp is coming up, so we've got to have good campfire songs. Ronnie Van Zant, Lynyrd Skynyrd's singer, always looked like he was fresh from the campfire... Grizzly Adams' campfire that is.

After he left, my wife went to go fetch my daughter at the mall. So I went into the basement and finished an instrumental number I put together as a tribute for a friend of mine. I'd recorded the whole thing the night before, and it sounded terrible. Then my portastudio's card got reformatted on me, and I lost it all.

Last night, everything went down in one take. I played the acoustic guitar, then the electric over top of it, recorded a shuffling bass line, too. Then I looked at my Yamaha organ. It was buried underneath an old computer. Normally laziness kicks in - Oh, I can't be bothered, I say to myself. But I new the song would turn out nicely with organ pads in the background. So I moved the computer, added the organ pads, and then I went up to the computer to mix it. This time, the card did not reformat on me, and it worked out perfectly.

In fact, here it is - a little blues instrumental. If I did this regularly, would it qualify as blues blogging?

What surprised me is how naturally this came. When I do the pop songs, which in many respects are easier to play since there are no dynamics or subtleties, I have to work at getting a good recording of the parts. But for the blues... I don't have to worry about the metronome. I have the beat, and I'm right on it. And I'm usually happy with what I get, such that I don't have to re-record or punch in little repair parts to the song.

Maybe that's why I still like playing the blues. It fits like an old shoe.