Last weekend I drove to Spring, Texas and Baton Rouge, Lousiana, for a couple of gigs. One of my Fingerstyle Five students, Jim Taylor, had helped put the Baton Rouge show in motion, and Richard Smith had pointed me towards the venue in Spring.
Jim played the opening set Saturday night, and after seeing his name in live stream chats for the past couple of years, it was so cool to finally hang out in
person and hear him play his original tunes onstage. He also knew where to get the best breakfast in town, which is also important.
It's not hard to get to Baton Rouge from Austin. From my house, you basically head uptown, turn right, and go straight for 437 miles. So it was nice to stop in somewhere along the way and play, and even better when I found out one of the owners of the Spring venue was a fingerstyle guitar freak.
One of the last times I left the
house to play music, I spent some time at the Olde Town Pickin' Parlor in Arvada, Colorado. At the end of last summer's Rocky Mountain Guitar Camp, I spent an evening hanging out with the owner, Kit Simon, learning about some of the outrageously cool instruments he's collected over the years.
Eventually, I wound up filming him talking about various instruments in the collection, and made a few videos of us playing them as well. Somehow, I've let them languish on my hard drive
– until now.
In today's Youtube video, Kit talks about his 1930 National Duolian before I play a few choruses of blues in E on it. You can find it at the link below:
Blues In E On A 1930 Vintage National Duolian
This month in the Fingerstyle Five membership, you can learn how to add drop D blues
licks to "Statesboro Blues." To join us, and get everything you need to play better fingerstyle blues guitar, go to:
The Fingerstyle Five
...and sign up.
Finally, if you live in or near Austin, I'll be at the New World Deli in Hyde Park this Saturday, May 3rd, at 7pm. Come on
down!
More soon,
David