After years of piano, trombone, and even tuba lessons, what’s my oldest son’s instrument of choice? The guitar, for which we never purchased a lesson. That would’ve ruined it.
While in high school, he picked up pointers from a bass-player friend and taught himself to play my old acoustic guitar. Gravitating toward the guitar meant no expectations to practice or perform – just the freedom to explore making music, an independent creative outlet. It also inspired a year-long quest to let his curly mop grow, uncut. Think Joe Cocker, without the contorted singing.
We’re asking Woodson Art Museum visitors to share their guitar stories throughout Medieval to Metal: The Art & Evolution of the Guitar, on view through May 31. On a comment wall adjacent to a stage in the Museum’s Sound Lab, visitors are invited to “Note Your Guitar Experiences.”
Here are a few more:
- Hundreds of hours of playing the badminton racket, pretending I was Paul McCartney.
- When I got my first “Silvertone,” I practiced chords on those “high set” strings until I went to bed the next morning with bloody fingertips. Learned those chords, though!
- Wonderful boyfriend had me pick up a guitar after many years. Now I am learning to play again and he even got me a guitar for my birthday so we can learn together.
- Music Memories: Sunday chicken dinners at my grandparents’ house and my Irish grandfather singing and playing the banjo.
What are your guitar stories? Share them on the Museum’s Facebook page via the link below, and drop in often throughout the coming weeks to riff, jam, and play guitars on the Sound Lab stage and leave notes on the Music Memories wall.
We want to know how guitars resonate with you.
