April 24, 2025 • 70 mins
Five awesome Teaching Artists—Isa Burke, Lisa Liu, Mamie Minch, Sean McGowan, and Thu Tran—want to help you grow as a guitarist!
They're sharing engaging insights and invaluable guitar wisdom each and every week in the Acoustic Guitar Patreon community. To celebrate the launch of this new series, we hosted a live hangout with the TAs. It was a whole lot of fun and featured songs, stories, and a window into the musical lives of these great guitarists. We hope you enjoy this replay of the event!
Join the Acoustic Guitar Patreon Community at the Supporter tier (or higher) to get the Teaching Artist benefits. That’s one new video lesson each week, plus virtual concerts and regular roundtable discussions with the TAs. You’ll also get instant access to the TAB and notation in our Song of the Month club, invitations to participate in live monthly workshops, and more.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Joey (00:01):
Welcome to the Acoustic Guitar Podcast.
For this episode, we're sharingour recent Meet the Acoustic
Guitar Teaching Artists Hangout.
Our five teaching artists areIsa Burke, lisa Liu, mamie Minch
, sean McGowan and Thu Tran, andthey all want to help you grow
as a guitarist.
You can access exclusivelessons and be invited to future
Hangouts when you become asupporter-level member of our
(00:22):
Patreon community.
You'll find more informationabout all the benefits of
membership and more about eachof the TAs in the show notes for
this episode.
Now let's tune in to hear somegreat music and stories.
So if you are just tuning in,thank you so much for joining us
.
I'm Joey Lusterman.
I'm the creative director forAcoustic Guitar.
I'm joined here by Thu Tran,Isa Burke, sean McGowan, lisa
(00:43):
Liu and Mamie Minch, who are ourfive acoustic guitar teaching
artists, and they are here todayto talk to you a little bit
about what is up with theAcoustic Guitar Teaching Artist
Program.
What's up with them?
They're going to play somemusic and maybe give us a little
bit of.
They're definitely going togive us a little bit of their
(01:04):
musical history, a little bit,maybe a couple tips on playing
guitar, based on what's going ontoday and I am blabbering again
and I am so sorry, but that'sjust how it's going to be.
So thank you all for coming andwe're going to start by
introducing everybody.
So you've heard me introducemyself a few times now.
I'm the creative director forAcoustic Guitar.
(01:25):
What does that mean?
It means that I take a lot ofphotos and videos of guitars and
guitarists and lessons andperformances.
If you've ever watched anAcoustic Guitar session, you
haven't seen me, but I've beenbehind the camera for over a
hundred of those.
I also did all the layouts forthe books and some of the
magazines and all sorts of funacoustic guitar stuff.
(01:49):
And you'll probably recognizesome of these other names here
of our acoustic guitar teachingartists.
And let's start withintroductions.
Sean, I'm going to start withyou, if you can unmute yourself
and say hello to everybody.
Sean (02:03):
Hey everybody, so nice to be here and with these
incredible colleagues, andthanks for tuning in or watching
this later.
If you're going to tune in onYouTube, I'm guessing my name is
Sean and I literally listen toand love all different styles of
music.
I know that's kind of a clicheanswer or response, but it's
true and I have a 16-year-oldson currently, so we're
(02:26):
listening to a lot of punk oldschool punk at the moment and
going to punk shows in Denver,where I live.
I've been teaching guitar forquite a long time various styles
finger style, jazz, compositiontheory.
I've been a professor of musicat the University of Colorado,
denver for 18 years now and I'vebeen writing articles for
(02:47):
acoustic guitar for 21 years now.
So it's been really fun workingwith AG over the years.
And yeah, I think we all love todo summer camps as well, and
over the years I've taught at abunch of summer camps, which are
always fun.
I've taught at Alex Degrassi'sMendocino Guitar Workshop.
(03:08):
I taught at the SwannanoaGathering for 13 years and Frank
Vignola's Big Jersey Camp andit's really fun kind of toggling
back and forth.
I like to live simultaneouslyin jazz circles as well as
acoustic circles and it's a lotof fun.
So, yeah, thanks for joining ustoday.
Joey (03:27):
All right, thanks, sean Isa.
Want to do a littleintroduction on yourself, please
.
Isa (03:32):
Yes, hello everyone.
My name is Isa Burke and I amcoming to you from my very
recent home of Durham, northCarolina.
But I'm originally from Maineand, yeah, I also, like Sean,
play and listen to a big varietyof different styles of music.
(03:56):
I grew up in the kind oftraditional folk music world.
I grew up going to fiddle campsand my dad used to play for
Contra Dances.
My dad also.
His name was David Surratt andhe wrote for acoustic guitar a
bit.
So I'm an acoustic guitar nevobaby, that's what I'm saying,
(04:20):
but I'm very pleased to be hereand, yeah, so I grew up in kind
of folk world.
Both my parents were guitarteachers, so that kind of came
naturally to me as well, and Ialso play fiddle and so I've
been playing and teaching guitarand fiddle for a bunch of years
.
I used to have a band calledLula Wiles and for the last few
(04:43):
years I've been mostly playingas a hired side musician with a
lot of different bands andartists.
I've spent a couple yearstouring with Aoife O'Donovan and
right now I have been playingwith Lindsay Lou and the
Mountain Goats, carsey, blanton,darlingside.
Those are kind of the main onesrecently and I also play
(05:06):
electric guitar and I kind ofcan't I can't commit to any one
instrument or style of music,and a lot of.
I think what is most excitingto me is music that blends a lot
of different styles andinfluences and yeah, so that's
kind of that's kind of the dealwith me and I'm really glad to
be here.
Thanks for having me.
Joey (05:27):
Great.
Thank you so much.
Okay, moving right along to,can you do a little introduction
please?
Thu (05:34):
Yeah, I'm so pleased to be among this super diverse and
talented group of musicians.
My name's Tu Tran group ofmusicians.
My name's Tu Tran.
I play in a band, a duo calledthe Singer and the Songwriter.
I've been not to call you out,sean this is meant to be a
(05:59):
compliment, but I've beenplaying guitar for about as long
as Sean's been writing forAcoustic Guitar Magazine.
It turns out acoustic guitarmagazine.
It turns out.
And yeah, I actually am aself-taught player.
My parents are Vietnameseimmigrants and so I didn't grow
(06:20):
up with any really guitar-basedmusic around the house.
And in high school I decided myfriend had a Yamaha guitar that
had no strings on it and he waslooking to get rid of it and so
I took it to.
I got it.
It had a big crack in the neckand I took it to a guitar center
and they strung it for me and Itaught myself how to play.
(06:41):
And I think my guitar and musicjourney is such that, like I
only picked up the guitar tolearn how to play a few, my goal
, my like ultimate goal was toplay a few chords and strum
along while I sang some songsand through just curiosity and
(07:03):
how much like, how much I lovethe sound of the instrument, I
just kept going down the rabbithole of like eventually learning
uh, you know theory and um, Ijust never imagined that I'd be
playing, I'd be improvising orplaying solo lines or doing
(07:23):
finger style or anything that Ilove doing, which is like all
now, all styles of guitar, andjust because it's, it's just
continually kind of roped meback in, no loyalty to any
(07:54):
lineage or of guitar style orguitar learning.
So I'm kind of exploratory inmy style and I've also been
teaching for a few years.
I teach private lessons andI've taught at Miles of Music
Camp over you know you've donethere too, so that's me.
Joey (08:06):
So pleased to be here.
Great, thank you so much, andwe're going to go over to Mamie
now.
If you could please introduceyourself.
Mamie (08:15):
Sure Joy.
Hey everyone, my name is MamieMinch.
I'm coming to you from New YorkCity, lower East Side.
This is such an inspiring andawesome group of artists
musicians to be part of, sothanks for having me.
Yeah, my background is that Igrew up as a weird teenager
listening to a lot of really oldmusic on cassettes in my
(08:39):
bedroom, picking out guitarparts.
I really felt like acousticblues was something that I'd I
like, sort of cracked open a boxand I didn't know anybody else
who liked it and I thought itwas like my thing.
And I was 11 and 12 and itreally was kind of my thing, and
so I started picking this stuffout.
My parents were, you know,supportive.
I ended up teaching myself alot of stuff and then getting
(09:02):
homespun tapes with happy traum,which was like one of my adult
um, deep pleasures wasco-teaching with happy trauma at
different guitar camps, andevery time I saw him I would
tell him the story over and over.
Um, so yeah, anyway, um, fastforward.
I went to art school, all thethings.
Now I'm, uh, working luthier,uh, repair and restoration
(09:23):
luthier.
In new york city.
I have a shop I've written forAcoustic Guitar Magazine.
I had basically like a write-inadvice column called Ask the
Expert, which was a flatteringtitle and mostly told people to
humidify their guitars as muchas possible.
That was mostly my message.
Yeah, and my shop iswomen-owned and run At this
(09:44):
point.
I teach private lessons, Iteach a lot of guitar camps, I
organize and run the AshokanAcoustic Guitar Week and it's a
lot of work but it's really fun.
What else I mostly play?
I'm interested in music thatsounds a little bit out of place
and time, so that's what reallykind of lights me up.
I listen to a lot of differentkinds of music.
I love that Tu was saying thathe's non-denominational and I
(10:09):
feel a bit like that.
Like this week I've seen likean Iranian trance show, a punk
show and like a French chansonshow.
So that's the other great partabout living in New York city
it's all available to us.
(10:29):
Anyway, blah, blah, blah.
I'll be doing videos that haveto do with musical stuff and
guitar care and maintenance andknowledge.
So hopefully that would empowerpeople who are interested in
guitar and enjoy guitar in a newway for owning this like
special object that you'd liketo maintain and really take care
of so that's me.
Lisa (10:59):
Thank you so much.
That's great, lisa.
Please if you could introduceyourself, sure, hey everybody,
I'm lisa lu and like else here,I've had a really diverse
background.
I grew up in LA, I spent 24years in New York and now
recently have moved back toCalifornia and now I'm based in
San Francisco.
And my musical journey startedwhen I was six, you know, child
(11:21):
of Chinese immigrants.
So my mom started me inclassical piano lessons and then
, at the age of 13, I reallywanted to play guitar and at the
time my dad was working atYamaha and so I begged and I
begged and I begged him to getme a guitar and he gave me like
the basic entry model and fromthere I, you know, learned three
(11:41):
chords and was playing folktunes and um, and then, when I
moved to New York, uh, at 21,that's when, uh, my musical
journey really, really opened upand and I went on a lot of
different uh styles.
I first was playing in a lot ofpost-punk bands and then, um,
(12:04):
probably about 10 years ago, I Iwanted to come back and to my,
my first love of jazz, and so,uh, put my 10,000 hours in and
I've been playing Manoosh, gypsyjazz guitar.
So that's what I've, uh, forthe last 10 years I've been
doing.
And then recently, uh, when Iwas at the Rocky Mountain Arch
(12:26):
Top Guitar Festival, I met RogerSadowski about two or three
years ago and he put one of hisguitars into my hands it was the
Jim Hall Arch Top Guitar modeland that really opened me up
into straight ahead into bebop.
So you know, the evolution ofthe musical journey continues
and as such, I was asked by theSanta Rosa Junior College Jazz
(12:50):
Big Band to arrange a couple oftunes for them and I performed
them last week and that was areally amazing milestone, as you
know, to be able to work with abig band and arrange for the
first time.
It was a dream come true and Iliterally just watched some
YouTube videos and kind ofwinged it.
And luckily I had a reallygreat friend here.
(13:12):
His name is Will Byrne, he's asaxophone player and just showed
me the ropes of transpositionand all the different
instruments.
So you know, it just kind ofcontinuously evolves and it
feels really great to be backhere in California and refinding
the West Coast California self.
And you know I'm a swimmer andI get to swim in the ocean every
(13:34):
day, and that's very much apart of my practice as well.
I feel like swimming and musicare very much related with the
flow.
So that's what's going on.
I've also taught at a bunch ofacoustic and guitar camps, such
as Django in June, the RockyMountain Artshub Guitar Festival
, and this summer I'll beteaching at the Puget Sound
(13:58):
Guitar Workshop, week three inAugust.
So that's what's going on.
Joey (14:05):
Great.
Thank you all so much for that,and I feel like I may have
neglected to tell everybody inthe audience what these people
are doing.
So the Teaching Artists Programis going to be taking place on
the Acoustic Guitar Patreon page, and what it is is a new lesson
every week from one of thesefive great artists video lessons
, some with tab and notation.
(14:27):
We're going to be covering lotsof different things.
As you can tell by theirbackgrounds, they each have a
unique approach to guitar andareas of interest, obviously.
So you can expect to get somelessons on fingerstyle blues,
rhythm playing, of course, somemusic theory, some jazz, travis
picking, and that's just in thefirst month.
So lots more after that.
(14:48):
So that's again.
That's what we're all doinghere, and just everybody who's
watching.
Thank you for watching.
And I also forgot to say if youhave any questions, please type
them in the chat and we'll getto them towards the end of this
during our question and answerperiod.
So thank you for tuning in Nowwhere we have reached Ooh, I
(15:09):
forgot to do my snazzypresentation here.
Hang on a sec.
Ooh, look at that.
So that's what we're doing theacoustic guitar teaching artists
Yay, so welcome.
We said that.
What is this?
We just said that greatlightning round.
Okay so, this is how we'regoing to get to know everybody.
I'm going to ask a bunch ofquick, one or two sentence
(15:31):
questions, brief questions andanswers for all of our teaching
artists.
Now, let's get this out of here, okay so, and then we're just
gonna go around the horn.
Everybody can unmute themselvesand chime in um.
Thu (15:43):
First question, I'm gonna direct it to two, and then we'll
go from there to what is analbum you've been listening to
on repeat recently.
You know, um, I have the lastalbum that I had on repeat.
(16:04):
It was maybe, it's like,released like last year's adrian
lanker's um bright future album, um, and since then I've been
jumping around because I've been, uh, learning, I've been trying
to teach myself differentthings and right now I'm working
on ted green's solo guitaralbum, trying to slowly learn um
ted green stuff.
So it's been that, but beforethen it was all adrian lanker
(16:25):
great, maybe album you've beenlistening to on repeat um, hurry
for the riffraff.
Mamie (16:30):
The past is still alive.
It's so good, yeah.
I'm writing is so great, yeahgreat album.
Joey (16:35):
Uh, alinda was on the cover of acoustic guitar a few
issues ago.
Talking about that record I gotto go to their two of their
shows and take the photos forthat story.
So really cool.
They are an awesome person andgreat musician.
Lisa (16:51):
So, yes, lisa album you've been listening to on repeat
barelli legrand's storyteller,and he's an amazing minutiae
guitar player, but this album isreally, uh, he's playing
acoustic guitar and playing jazzand it's fusion and it's swing
and it's bebop and it'sabsolutely killer.
Sean (17:11):
So uh, I love his first track off the album so sweet.
I was just gonna say if youhaven't checked out his duo
recordings with savan lu, two ofthe all-time greats, those are
just so good.
But I've been on kind of aclassical guitar binge recently.
I saw David Russell in concerta couple of weeks ago in Denver.
It was just unbelievablyphenomenal.
(17:32):
He's just such an incrediblemusician and the repertoire was
all Spanish and it was amultimedia show.
So since then I've beenlistening to a lot of him doing
a deep dive with.
There's this incredible Chineseclassical guitarist that I've
fallen in love with, named, ifI'm pronouncing it correct,
shufei Yang.
And boy she's incredible.
She does Brazilian repertoire,spanish repertoire, the standard
(17:54):
classical repertoire, but shealso has a record of, like it's
called, sketches of China, whereshe can make her guitar sound
like any instrument.
It's really incredible.
And another one I've beenreally loving is Evangelina
Moscardi, and in my opinionshe's like the world's foremost
interpreter of Bach and Weiss,and she actually plays the lute
(18:16):
as well as guitar.
So yeah, I've been going downthe rabbit hole of classical.
Joey (18:21):
Great Issa album you've been listening to on repeat.
Isa (18:25):
Yeah, I think the album I've been most listening to on
repeat lately is Sam Amidon'snew album, salt River.
He is one of my just all timefavorite musicians, bar none.
He does a lot of liketraditional folk music, but
interpreted in like a reallykind of unique and experimental
way, and I just I will listen toanything he does forever.
Joey (18:47):
I was listening to that this morning.
Nice, okay, switching it up.
Mamie, what is the guitar youdream about owning or what
guitar in your arsenal is yourfavorite?
Mamie (18:59):
Whoa, that's a big one for a gal like me.
Um, I'd love to have anoriginal gibson advanced jumbo
from the 30s.
It's a big, fat rosewooddreadnought.
They're really rare and theysmell incredible.
Have you guys ever gotten upclose with one of those?
You must smell old guitars ifyou are to really experience
(19:20):
them, so you get a whiff of itand it's like rosewood perfume.
They have this beautiful littlestiletto heel and they just
sound like, um, there's justlike a lot happening.
They move air.
You know there's yeah, soprobably that one.
But this is my 30s um national.
That's, uh, I really love again, it's like a big growly sound.
It's more of a warm soundingnational and less of a metallic
(19:42):
sounding national, even thoughit is metal.
Yeah, I like that.
I love a lot of guitars, I'measy.
Joey (19:51):
Sean same question.
Sean (19:53):
Yeah, me too.
I would have to say like an oldGibson L5, you know like would
be wonderful.
Of course those are like wellpriced, beyond my limit.
But I do have a friend, acollector, here in Denver who
has a 1927 L5, same year asEddie Lang's, and a few years
ago I did a concert tribute toEddie Lang and Joe Venuti and he
(20:15):
loaned me that guitar for a fewmonths.
So that was really cool, sothat would be pretty nice.
But I'm really lucky.
I have a lot of really nicearch top guitars.
This one that I'm playing rightnow I thought it would be fun to
share.
It's not mine, it's owned bythe Arch Top Foundation, but
it's on loan for a little while.
And this is by this incredibleluthier in California named
Tyler Wells of LHT Guitars, andI don't know how well you can
(20:38):
see it, but this is his latestcontribution to the Blue Guitars
Project, which was somethingthat was from the 90s that put a
lot of contemporary luthiers onthe map.
People like you know, I meanBill Cummins and Linda Manzer
and Brad Nickerson and all youknow.
(20:58):
Benedetto was part of that, andso in the past few years, via
the Rocky Mountain Arch TopFestival, the Arch Top
Foundation has commissioned newluthiers, so this was part of
the batch, along with MeganWells' new blue guitar and Mario
Beauregard's, and so WyattWilkie is contributing to that
and what's really cool, insteadof these just hidden away in a
private collection or a museumor something somewhere.
(21:19):
A museum would be fine, butsomebody's closet would be
terrible way in a privatecollection or a museum or
something somewhere.
A museum would be fine, butsomebody's closet would be
terrible.
The Arch Top Foundation isgenerously loaning out these
instruments to a lot of playersin New York and elsewhere, so
I'm really stoked to be able toplay this.
This is a really cool ergonomicarch top that's multi-scaled,
and I've never played amulti-scale instrument before.
But a lot of times people willask is it hard?
And my answer answer is as longas you don't look down, it's
(21:41):
okay, but it's actually a loteasier than it looks when you're
looking at it, you know so,yeah, so this is tyler wells's
blue feud guitar great, and twodream guitar or one you cherish
the most um yeah, dream sean,exactly sean's uh dream guitar.
Thu (22:00):
Gibson l5 from late 20s Eddie Lang style is like.
There's some very similar atSchoenberg guitars over here in
the Bay.
You can go and admire it fromin person.
Also, joey, I don't know iflightning round having
(22:21):
guitarists talk about guitar islightning round at all could
ever be.
My, my like cherished guitar isbehind me.
Here is.
It's a 1949 Sherwood Deluxewhich was like K guitars.
They made them to sell in likeMontgomery Awards catalogs and
it's been Frankensteined by Ibought it Frankensteined by
(22:43):
Ruben Cox down in old style atold style guitars down in LA,
and so it's got 60s gold foilpickups on it and a bunch of
weird things about it that soundreally cool.
Joey (22:57):
Great.
And if you want to learn moreabout Ruben Cox, head on over to
acousticguitarcom.
We have a nice little profileon him.
Lisa, if you could tell me yourdream guitar or the one in your
possession you cherish the most?
Lisa (23:11):
Wow, Well, I've been super lucky where you know, as I
think.
I think instruments are.
They're mystical, they find you, you know, and I've been really
fortunate to play and be inpositions in some really amazing
guitars and you know, I alwaysfeel that I'm the student, like
(23:32):
the guitar is teaching me allthe time.
So you know, the first guitarthat really taught me and I had
to rework my technique intominutiae is made by a French
luthier named Jean-Noel LeBreton and it's very classic.
It's very classic Selmer style.
But he was also reallyinnovative and made a classical
(23:54):
bracing on the sound hole to theend of the guitar.
So I tend to love guitars thathave a little bit of like old
school and then new schooltechnology or design, and so,
for instance, this one this ismade by a Montreal luthier, it's
(24:15):
a Selmer style guitar.
It's made by Larkspur Luthier,by this guy named Josh Greenberg
.
But I was really, really I wasdoing a lot of travel and flying
on planes and so I wanted aneck that could detach and so he
made this with a stopper styleneck and there's a bolt here and
then if you take the bolt out,the neck comes off and and I'm
able to to get it on the plane.
(24:37):
Um, another cherished guitar ofmine is Roger Sadowski's Jim
Hall model, which you know.
Playing any of Roger'sinstruments I feel like defies
genre.
You have anybody from like JimHall to Radiohead playing his
music and I think I think thatreally is a testament to just
Roger who is so broad, broad asfar as wants.
(24:58):
I have this amazing Santa Cruzguitar OM model, and I'm very
lucky to be an artist ambassadorfor them, but I'd love to get
one with a cutaway.
Sean mentioned Megan Wells.
She's an amazing arch topbuilder here in Sonoma and she's
(25:25):
just magical arch top builderhere in Sonoma and she's just
magical.
She's.
Every guitar of hers there's.
You know, you play, you playher her guitars and, uh, there's
a.
I don't know what she does, butthe feeling that you get out of
it is, it's very um, ittransports you.
So you know there's a long waitlist for Megangan, but you know
, if things align, I'd love toget one of her guitars too.
Joey (25:44):
So those, those are my two wants another luthier who you
can read more about on in aprofile on acoustic guitarcom.
Uh, isa, if you want to tell usabout your dream guitar or most
cherished guitar in yourinventory yes, um, I'm gonna.
Isa (26:00):
I'm gonna make this actual lightning round.
My dream guitar is.
I'm not a huge nerd about years, but like I played a couple old
Gibson J45s that set my heartaflutter.
And right now I'm playing anold Gibson, but a small old
Gibson.
This is a LG3 from 1957 and itis my BFF.
Joey (26:23):
All right, okay, next one Lightning round Two what's your
favorite tuning?
Have to go standard.
All right, sean favorite tuning.
Sean (26:36):
Standard.
But a close runner up would bethe low tuning that was just in
last month's issue, which is lowto high, c, g and then standard
the rest of the way D, g, b, eand that gives you, like a
cello-like tuning, fifths in thebottom and it's a common
Hawaiian slack key tuning.
That one's a good one.
Joey (26:53):
Yeah, there's a great lesson from Sean on that
acousticguitarcom right nowBrand new, very popular good
tuning.
Okay, mamie favorite tuning.
Mamie (27:03):
I love Standard but probably Open D.
Joey (27:07):
Lisa favorite tuning.
Isa (27:10):
Standard.
Joey (27:12):
Isa.
Isa (27:13):
Drop D.
Joey (27:15):
All right, okay, lightning round, sean.
What's your favorite meal tocook?
Oh, toast, lisa, favorite thingto cook.
Lisa (27:28):
I'm a real big fan of the slow cooker.
I like things really, reallycooked, so usually I just do
like a Provencal chicken in theslow cooker for eight hours.
Joey (27:41):
Nice Isa favorite thing to cook.
Isa (27:44):
Right now it's a smoothie, because my mom got me a really
good blender for Christmas andso I've been using that pretty
much every day.
Mamie (27:53):
I just got back from a trip to southern India and I
took a cooking class while I wasthere and I'm crazy for coconut
rice and a lot of these likedry curries that they make there
.
So right now it's um, it's likea vegetable curry all right.
Thu (28:07):
Two favorite thing to cook uh comfort meal is gonna be
heinanese chickens, just poachedchicken, and chicken with the
uh stock chicken stock rice withuh ginger fish.
That sounds good.
Mamie (28:22):
When can we come over?
Joey (28:27):
Oh, you're muted, but I'm guessing you said anytime, yes,
anytime.
Feel free to tune the lightningdown a little bit and
extrapolate on this one, but ifwe could go around and hear
about a favorite memory from amusic workshop or a music camp
or a music festival that youeither attended or taught at,
and, issa, if we could startwith you?
Isa (28:49):
Yeah, so Tu mentioned Miles of Music, which is an amazing
camp in New Hampshire that takesplace on an island in the
middle of Lake Winnipesaukee,and I first went there as a
camper when I was I think it waslike after my first year of
(29:10):
college and then since 2018, Ithink I've been teaching there a
number of years, and it's justa number.
A number of years, um, and it'sit's just a really, really
special place.
It's kind of based on the modelof like traditional folk music
camps, but there's a lot of alldifferent kinds of music there.
(29:30):
It's kind of like, if you putlike traditional fiddle tune
camp and like rock camp in ablender, uh, and put it on an
Island, it's really, it's reallymagical.
Um, a blender and put it on anisland, it's really magical.
And a number of years ago, onenight, there was a bunch of us
wanted to play some old timetunes and we kind of wanted to
(29:53):
like keep it to a sort of smallnumber of people, so we wanted
to find somewhere to play.
That was like a little bit outof the way, um, and so we went
into the boathouse and likeclimbed into a motorboat and
started playing old time tunesand um dinty child who's a
(30:15):
member of the band sessionAmericana and he's like one of
the main guys who runs miles ofmusic.
Um, he came upon us, uh,playing, and he's the off-season
manager of the island.
He's like the reason that thecamp happens on that island.
Um, so he came upon us playingtunes and we were like mid-tune
and he just like climbed intothe boat, started up the boat
and drove us out into the middleof the lake and we were just
(30:38):
playing tunes under the starsand we went on a little little
cruise, um, and we were likegoing past these people's like
vacation homes and they werelike sitting out on their docks,
like this like boat full ofpeople passes by them playing
tunes.
Um, so that was really magicaland will stay with me forever
that sounds great.
Joey (30:58):
All right sean favorite musical memory from a camp,
workshop, workshop or festival.
Sean (31:03):
There's so many.
I think any camp is going tohave at least one incredible
memories, but I remember one jamsession.
This made me think of itlistening to Issa's story.
It's true a lot of times atvarious camps maybe the teachers
will try to get away and havetheir own little jams and find a
private place on campus.
So one year when I was at theSwannanoa Gathering, we found
(31:24):
this front porch and a bunch ofus started jamming.
And one of the things that'sreally great about the Swannanoa
Gathering Guitar Week is thatit's, you know, it's
non-denominational in the sensethat it's all about guitar, so
all genres are welcome.
So as a result, you have anamazing cast of faculty people
from all different styles, butwe seem to have a common bond
(31:46):
with, like swing tunes or Djangotunes, like everybody can play
in that if they like toimprovise.
So there's a bunch of us justplaying on this porch somewhere,
and I think it was like me Imentioned names just because
they're friends of a lot ofpeople here tuning in and also
the TAs here, but it was like meand Grant Gordy and Greg Ruby,
clive Carroll was there, hiroyoSkimoto and Gonzalo Bergara,
(32:12):
who's this really greatRoma-style player from South
America.
So we're in the woods of NorthCarolina and there's bugs
everywhere and there's spiderseverywhere and they're like big
spiders, like I'm just hangingout on the spider webs at night,
kind of thing, you know.
And so we're, we're playing andwe're just trading solos and
(32:32):
and and Grant's take Grant Gordyis taking a solo and he's got
his eyes closed.
He's kind of into it and just atthat moment, like out of
nowhere, right behind hisshoulder, this just enormous
spider shows up and then startslike kind of making its way.
And so forgive the accent, butGonzalo Bergara, this is in his
(32:53):
South American accent.
I just mentioned this becausethis is a funny part of the
story.
He goes Grant, grant, big, bigspider, grant, big spider, grant
back back, big spider back, andgrant kind of opens his eyes.
He's like no, I don't know anybig spider back tunes.
It was a pretty funny moment oh, that's hilarious.
Joey (33:17):
Okay, thank you.
The spider went away, just forthe end.
Sean (33:21):
He wasn't.
It didn't land on him, he wentthe other direction.
Joey (33:25):
Grant is still alive and playing music.
Lisa, if you could share afavorite memory from a camp or a
work.
Lisa (33:34):
Oh, wow.
Well, this was just recently.
I was at the Rocky MountainArts Shop Festival in September
September, and it just happenedto be over my I love tacos and
so, uh, everyone, the everyonejust chipped in and and uh,
(34:09):
broke out into happy birthdayfor me, and then we had a taco
party, a taco party and abirthday cake and we all just
like, played and ate tacos andand that was definitely, um, uh,
a real, a real highlight, as Iwas doing a lot of traveling and
getting able to, to spend,spend my birthday with with
(34:31):
really great players.
And uh, another one wasactually with with greg ruby it
was a couple years ago and and,uh, he asked me to play with in
his band in Django FestNorthwest and that happens in
Whidbey Island in Washington,and it was my first time it was
a few years ago going up thereand it's absolutely stunning,
it's beautiful and and then youknow there are all these you
(34:54):
know separate private jams thatwere happening and I was able to
to find, like the women innon-binary jam and then get to
meet all the players there, andthat was that was super cool and
just it was really inspiring toto see, to see everyone you
know, kicking ass and playingreally really well and and then,
(35:17):
um, so yeah, those, those aremy.
Those are my two really greatmemories.
Joey (35:22):
Great.
Thank you, Mamie, if you couldshare your favorite memory from
a workshop or festival or camp.
Mamie (35:29):
Yeah, sure thing I love these stories.
By the way, this has been a lotof fun to listen to.
I have a short one, and youknow, one of the things that I
love about playing music andplaying this kind of music and
in this sort of likenon-hierarchical way where we
all hang around with each otheris that I get to share space and
(35:52):
time with like great old guys.
So one of my favorite great oldguy players was Guy Davis.
You guys know him.
I think he would be okay withme saying that he's probably 70
something now, and so I hiredhim for this guitar camp that I
organized.
The Ashokan camp was a coupleof years ago and he lives in the
Bronx.
So I'm driving up and I think,okay, I haven't really hung out
with this guy before he seems Idon't know how he's going to be,
what's it going to be like?
(36:12):
What am I going to, what kindof music am I going to play in
the car Driving Guy Davis threehours upstate?
So go get him, him at the Bronx, and I come up with this cool
idea I'm in an all-woman TomWaits cover band that travels in
Europe.
It's one of the more randomthings that I do?
We don't impersonate Tom Waits,we just like redecorate the
songs because the songwriting isso good.
(36:32):
So I have this cool album ofJohn Hammond, the blues guy,
covering Tom Waits tunes, and itcame out in 2000 or something,
I you know it's.
It turned me on to a lot ofsongs I had didn't know before.
So I'm playing this and I pickup Guy Davis and he gets in the
car and he's a little bit gruffand I don't know if he's like
that or if he's in a mood orwhat.
So I turn on the music andwe're sort of trekking along for
(36:55):
a minute or two, not long andhe goes is that John Hammond?
And I said yeah, and he goes.
Huh, he turns it down and hepicks up his phone.
John, how's it going, you know?
Sean (37:07):
oh, I was just thinking about you.
Mamie (37:08):
Yeah, no, how's your wife ?
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And he hangs up and turns itback up and we're driving on the
highway.
I'm like, did you just callJohn Hammond from my car, you
know?
And he says yeah, he's a reallygood friend of mine.
And so then it broke the iceand we were hanging out and so I
feel like I made the rightchoice.
Joey (37:27):
That's great.
Thank you for sharing All righttwo.
Thu (37:35):
Favorite moment from a music festival, camp or workshop
I'm going to.
It's so funny becauseeverybody's such great stories
about like all these momentsoutside of the camp curriculum
and my one of my favoritememories is just actually the
curriculum itself.
It was at miles of music campand they there was.
I think in 2020.
(37:57):
We started this thing called achallenge accepted, which was
like they would post a littlesong writing prompt every
morning on the bulletin boardand by late, you know, five
o'clock later that day, you justcome and you share what you
wrote.
And so one year after that, whenI was, I got to teach and
facilitate that, that sort ofdaily workshop and the prompt
(38:20):
that I had come up with waswrite a bad song, write an
intentionally bad song, and justwhat everybody shared was so
hilarious and also veryinteresting and good.
You know what I mean.
It's like to try and once youtry to write any song, right, if
you have something in your mind, even if you're like I'm gonna
(38:41):
pick all the worst tropes, butthe intentionality of trying to
compose stuff that you hate, butyou've just intentionally done
it, it just comes together andit's like it was kind of
interesting actually and uh, itwas really, really fun and um,
we ended up um, the a group offolks ended up, uh, continuing
on this tradition off season.
(39:03):
So there's an online versioncalled the Imperfectionist
Songwriting Society.
It's all like prompt basedcomposition and songwriting.
That's been a really, reallywonderful community to be part
of.
Joey (39:15):
Great.
Thank you all so much.
Okay, we're going to do onemore question in the lightning
round and then we're going toswitch over to playing, hearing
and playing some music.
So last question and, mamie,we're going to start with you
what's a music or method or songbook that you have returned to
the most?
Mamie (39:34):
Oh, what a great question .
You know I've recently comeback around to this great book
by gosh it's not right here, butit's called it's Country Blues
Guitar and it's basically like arepertoire book.
It's 200 songs or somethingCountry Blues Guitar.
I got it when I was a teenager.
I loved it, kind of wore it out.
(39:54):
All the pages were falling outand I stuck it in a box and it
came back out.
I am really interested inrethinking old songs and taking
things that are familiar oralmost in our sort of cultural
DNA and thinking about themagain from a modern, feminist,
you know, perspective.
(40:15):
So I yeah.
That may not be exactly whatyour question was, but that's
one that I found myselfliterally picking back up after
25 years of, you know, gettingit for the first time.
Joey (40:26):
That's what my question was.
Thank you, I'll have to hear,maybe cover, one of those songs
in a lesson in the future.
All right, sean.
What's your most read orrecently revisited method book,
song, book, music book?
Sean (40:41):
My favorite is just the guitar book by Pierre Bensoussan
and I have both the Englishversion and the French version
and I just love it because it'sso artistic and written in such
a unique way, especially at thetime because I think it was
published in maybe 1980 or early80s at the time, because I
think it was published in maybe1980 or early 80s.
So I've had that book and it'sjust, it's really delightful
(41:02):
because it's got poetry and artand recipes in there as well as
his composition.
So yeah, it's fun for me tojust to drop into Dadgad and try
playing some of his music andjust kind of living with that
book.
I love it.
Joey (41:16):
Great Lisa favorite song book music book, method book.
Lisa (41:23):
Wow.
Well, you know I just did.
I think my kickoff video, myteaching artist video, was the
Segovia Scales.
So that's what I warm up withevery time I play and I feel
like I'm hearing harmony andjust getting the physicality of
(41:44):
playing the guitar happening andhearing the major scale and
then the melodic minor scale andthe natural minor scale, and I
just feel like it's just more.
It preps my brain and warms mybody up to get into music mode.
So that's part of my dailypractice and I would say that's
(42:08):
something I return to all thetime.
Joey (42:12):
Great Issa.
Isa (42:20):
I've been thinking this whole time about what I will say
in response to this question,because I don't really use books
to learn music very often, Um,I really just learn by listening
to music, um, and I really it's.
It's when I talk to otherguitar teachers I'm like, oh
right I.
I like I'm sort of shocked bythe own degree to which I don't
(42:40):
use like anything that's writtendown ever.
Um, but if we're thinking aboutlike the proverbial songbook in
the sense of like a certainartist's repertoire, um, there's
a songwriter named ConnieConverse, um, who, yay, got some
Connie Converse heads in thegroup.
We love to see it.
(43:01):
She was this incredible singersongwriter kind of before the
term singer, songwriter wasreally part of the common
parlance and she wrote theselike.
She was an incredible guitarplayer, wrote these like super
bizarre songs that are likereally kind of sweet and
interesting and sound superclassic in some ways but also
sound like they're from anotherplanet.
(43:21):
And I feel like anytime that Iam not feeling super inspired.
If I find a Connie Conversesong and learn to play it, that
always kind of like gets me backinto the zone of my guitar and
music in general.
Joey (43:39):
Great, Well, sounds like we have some research to do.
Two same question.
Thu (43:47):
I have considered.
The Lilies by Connie Congressis just such an inspiring song.
It's a great pick, isa.
I have two books.
One is called Practicing AMusician's Return to Music by
Glenn Kurtz.
It's actually more of a memoir,but it's such a beautiful and
inspiring book about how topractice, what the purpose of
(44:09):
practicing is and how really allmusic making is.
About learning how to learningyour own relationship with the
art of practicing.
And I returned to it, I rereadit all the time, just because
it's really meditative, it'sbeautifully written.
And then the other one isEffortless Mastery by Kenny
(44:30):
Warner.
Just like really got me out ofa.
You know, when I startedtouring I started to feel a lot
of anxiety and tension and Ijust could not play or could not
enjoy playing, and that bookreally gave me some tools on how
to, yeah, get right withperforming.
Joey (44:55):
Great.
Thank you all very much.
Okay, that concludes thelightning round.
I think that counts aslightning.
There were some quick answersin there, lots of back and forth
.
That's what we want.
So thank you all so much forbeing part of that, and now
we're going to move forward intothe making some noise part of
this section, which is music.
(45:17):
So yay, make some noise.
Sean (45:20):
Okay.
Joey (45:22):
Thank you.
Does anybody want to go first,or shall I start pointing my
finger?
Okay, I'm going to startpointing my finger.
Sean, you've got your guitar.
You're the only one with theguitar on right now, so you're
going to go first.
Speaker 3 (45:37):
Okay, all right you hear that, okay, assuming.
(46:09):
Yeah, okay, do, do, do, do, do.
(47:21):
Thank you.
Do, do, do, do, do, all right.
Sean (48:40):
Let's see Trying to keep it down, let's see Trying to
keep it going.
Joey (48:42):
Not a great, yeah.
What was the name of that tune?
Sean (48:45):
Oh, that was a jazz standard by Harry Warren called
there Will Never Be Another you.
Joey (48:50):
I agree with the sentiment , sean.
There will never be another youeither, but there will be
someone up next.
Mamie, do you want to play next?
Mamie (49:00):
All right, Okay, now for something completely different.
Yeah, how's this?
Can better Okay cool.
Speaker 3 (49:26):
Alright.
Oh, I have lost my one child.
I'm afraid it's a long time.
(50:06):
You know we'd prefer the silentpast to the present.
It's far with my mother and hisfortified body Once I had my
(50:27):
wounds, for my tear drops.
Once I had a room.
That's far from lost, but hedid freely spend the night.
Tossin' is, oh, the blackestground I've ever felt.
(51:27):
He would surely turn to light,oh, I found the right to get
back, but I gave it to him.
I forget my feet.
My day will turn over.
My day will turn to gold, oh.
(51:49):
I've had my fill Stand at theend of my feet Next to him,
laying by him, so I leave himasleep.
All that he needs is love tolive, and is love to live, oh.
Joey (52:55):
Thank you very much.
What was the name of that song?
Mamie (52:58):
Fortified Wine Blues, and I wrote it when I was a
security guard at the Met Museum.
Oh wow, yeah, I had a lot oftime with my thoughts.
Joey (53:09):
I'll bet what wing were you in?
Mamie (53:14):
All wings, but mostly European paintings.
Joey (53:17):
Cool, all right, isa, you're up next.
If mostly European paintingsCool, all right, isa, you're up
next if you're ready.
Isa (53:25):
Yeah, I think I'm going to make a last-minute change of
plans.
I have a little bit of a coldso I wasn't going to sing, but I
brought up Connie Converse andpeople got excited about it, so
I feel like I will do up ConnieConverse and people got excited
about it, so I feel like I willdo a Connie Converse song.
And, uh, any of you who'venever heard me sing before, this
(53:46):
is not what it normally soundslike, um, but this is one of my
uh favorites of hers.
Um, and it's called, uh,talking like parentheses Two
Tall Mountains.
In between two tall mountainsthere's a place they call
(54:12):
lonesome.
Don't see why they call itlonesome.
I'm never lonesome when I gothere.
See that bird sitting on mywindowsill Well, he's saying
(54:34):
whip or will all the nightthrough.
See that brook running by mykitchen door Well, it couldn't
talk no more if it was you.
Up that tree.
There's sort of a squirrelthing.
Sounds just like we did when wewere quarreling.
In the yard I keep a pig or two.
(54:57):
They drop in for dinner likeyou used to do.
I don't stand any need ofcompany With everything I see
talking like you.
Up that tree.
There's sort of a squirrelthing.
Sounds just like we did when wewere quarreling.
(55:19):
You may think you left me allalone, but I can hear you talk
without a telephone.
I don't stand any need ofcompany With everything I see
Talking like you.
See that bird sitting on mywindowsill well, he's saying
(55:40):
whippoorwill all the nightthrough just whippoorwill, all
the night through.
In between two tall mountains,there's a place they call
lonesome.
Don't see why they call itlonesome.
(56:06):
I'm never lonesome.
Now I live there.
Joey (56:16):
Beautiful.
Thank you so much for playingthat and singing.
It sounded really nice, Iwouldn't have known you had a
cold if you hadn't prefaced it.
Thank you, okay, two, it's yourwar.
Up now, please.
Thu (56:33):
Awesome, Wow.
This one's called Future.
This is an original compositionof mine in Issa's Favorite
Tuning drop D guitar solo doThank you.
Speaker 3 (57:03):
guitar solo do do Thank you.
Joey (59:48):
Great.
Thank you so much for playingthat.
All right, Lisa, you're up next, please.
Lisa (59:58):
All right, Lisa, you're up next, please.
All right, here we go.
Thank you.
Joey (01:00:08):
Thank you All right, excellent, what was the name of
(01:02:23):
that song, lisa?
Lisa (01:02:25):
Oh, that was a composition by Django Reinhardt called Duke
and Dookie and he named itafter two kittens after he went
on tour with Duke Ellington asan homage to Duke Ellington
Right on Sounded great.
Joey (01:02:38):
Thanks everybody, so much for playing, and we have now
reached the point of the eventwhere we're coming up against
the clock.
But if anybody in the audiencehas any questions for these fine
teaching artists, you can typethem in the chat and I can show
them to everybody in a way suchas this oh everybody.
In a way such as this ohbeautiful.
I agree, those were somebeautiful performances.
(01:03:00):
Thanks to you everybody.
Chris says hi, lisa, and let'ssee Two.
This was during yourperformance.
What a lovely originalcomposition.
I agree with that as well,thank you, thank you.
Okay, we've got a question.
Okay, we're going to dosomething a little bit different
(01:03:21):
here.
Sean, this is your cue.
So today happens to be thebirthday of one of our lovely
Patreon acoustic guitar people,devin, so Sean's going to play.
Sean (01:03:33):
A little happy birthday for you all right happy birthday
(01:04:15):
, thank you okay, so, like Isaid before, happy birthday Evan
.
Joey (01:04:17):
Happy birthday.
Okay.
So, like I said before, whenyou sign up for the Acoustic
Guitar Patreon page, you'll geta new lesson every week from one
of our five teaching artists.
You'll also get tons of othercool stuff.
Song of the Month Club you geta new song transcription every
month.
We do live workshops everymonth, interactive workshops,
(01:04:39):
kind of like this, but oneteacher, one focus topic and
everybody's on their camera andplaying along.
And we'll do some more funhangouts with everybody, like
this.
We'll do some open mic nightswhere the TAs will play and the
audience will play and all sortsof great acoustic guitar
lessons, community, everythingyou could possibly want and more
(01:05:01):
.
And, just like Tripp Clark says, this has been great and thank
you so much.
I'm also inspired by all theirplaying, so you heard it there
first, folks.
If anybody has any otherquestions, you can type them in
the chat.
But besides that, thank you allso much for being here To the
five of you, thank you Toeveryone who was watching, thank
(01:05:22):
you and thank me for notscrewing this up.
Isa (01:05:28):
Thank you, Joey.
Joey (01:05:30):
Yeah, thanks, joey.
Oh no, I didn't really wantthat.
Isa (01:05:34):
Thank you so much.
It looks like we do have acouple questions.
Joey (01:05:39):
Oh yes, here's a question from Devin, if anybody wants to,
and feel free to jump in andanswer any of these.
When playing a cover of a song,how do you remain faithful to
the song while making enoughspace for your own voice or
style?
Anybody want to jump in, issa?
Isa (01:06:00):
Yeah, this is a really good question.
I feel like we're all kind ofjust thinking about it because
it is.
I think it's something anyonespends a lot of time thinking
about.
I mean, I think, to some extent, just by virtue of learning a
song and translating it intoyour own voice on the guitar or
singing or whatever it is likethere are things that are going
(01:06:21):
to change in that process oftranslation and um, so I I try
not to worry too too much aboutum, like having to make it super
different.
Um, and I think sometimes, likethe way I played that Connie
Converse song was like almostlike note for note, how she does
it, and I think sometimes Iwant to present a cover as more
(01:06:44):
of a like tribute to theoriginal performance and
sometimes I want to change it upa little bit.
I think it really just dependson, like, if I learn a song, how
it feels in my voice, and Ialso think that sometimes it's
about like paying attention tothe original and deciding, like,
what feels like a core part ofthe song and what feels like a
(01:07:04):
stylistic, like something thatis stylistically inherent to the
original performer, and so thethings that feel really core to
the song I will keep, and thethings that feel like they have
to do more with the originalperformer style, I might try to
find some other way of doing it.
Yeah, anybody else have anythoughts on that?
Sean (01:07:30):
I'll dive in real quick.
So this is kind of the worldthat I live in and I'm not a
singer songwriter.
I have so much admiration forpeople who write incredible
lyrics, but I'm not asinger-songwriter.
I have so much admiration for,you know, people who write
incredible lyrics, but you knowI'm living mostly in the jazz
world, so of course we do thisall the time.
I think you know the melody issacred.
You want to, of course, staytrue to that, but as a jazz
musician recording standards,for example, songs, have been
(01:07:52):
like all the things you are,stella by Starlight, those are
tunes that have been recordedlike millions of times.
So how do you make it your own?
So I think one answer isharmony and reharmonization.
So I think you know that can goa long way, but just a
different, even a different timesignature or a groove,
(01:08:14):
different keys, different vibes,and I think that translates
really well in the pop world aswell.
I mean I always think of likeEarth, wind, fire's version of
you know Got to Get you Into myLife.
You know the story goes thatPaul McCartney, after he heard
their version, never wanted toplay that song again.
Or I remember a long time agofirst hearing Tori Amos play her
version of Smells Like TeenSpirit by Nirvana, and it was so
cool, it's just such abeautiful, stark song.
(01:08:35):
And then halfway through ityou're like, oh, this is that
Nirvana song, but she made ither own and in that case it was
just her voice in theinstrumentation of solo piano
and it's so brooding and I justthought that was a beautiful
rendition.
So, yeah, I think you maybedecide what to you is sacred
obviously the lyrics and maybethe melody, but there's a lot
you can do with mood and vibeand texture and instrumentation
(01:09:00):
and arrangement and certainlythe harmony.
Joey (01:09:03):
I got a question sent to me directly Mamie, what is the
name of your Tom Waits band?
Mamie (01:09:11):
That band is called the Letters VKB VKB band.
It's with Rachelle Garnier andAmanda Homme.
We mostly tour in Germany,Austria, Switzerland.
Joey (01:09:22):
Alright, so we've got lots of thank yous.
Fantastic, this was really cool.
I love being a Patreon member.
That's what I want to hear.
Thank you so much.
I think that's about it me.
Just check my double check mynotes here.
Questions yes, we did thequestions.
(01:09:45):
I think we can move to slideseven.
Aka.
Thank you all for coming andfarewell.
So yeah, I'm just going to saythat again a few more times.
Thanks everybody so much.
This was a lot of fun for me.
I think it gave us a good ideaof what we're gonna get into for
the over the coming months withthese five teaching artists.
(01:10:06):
Like I said, lots of lessons,lots of things like this hanging
out talking about music,talking about guitar playing,
songs, learning playing.
What else could you want?
Thank you all so much.
I'm going to hit end streamhere, unless anybody has
something they are dying to getoff their chest.
(01:10:27):
No, okay.
Isa (01:10:31):
Thanks everybody.
Joey (01:10:32):
Thank you all Thanks.
Mamie (01:10:34):
Thank you.
Isa (01:10:35):
Great to spend time with you all.
Thank you, yeah.
Welcome to the Acoustic Guitar Podcast.
For this episode, we're sharingour recent Meet the Acoustic
Guitar Teaching Artists Hangout.
Our five teaching artists areIsa Burke, lisa Liu, mamie Minch
, sean McGowan and Thu Tran, andthey all want to help you grow
as a guitarist.
You can access exclusivelessons and be invited to future
Hangouts when you become asupporter-level member of our
(00:22):
Patreon community.
You'll find more informationabout all the benefits of
membership and more about eachof the TAs in the show notes for
this episode.
Now let's tune in to hear somegreat music and stories.
So if you are just tuning in,thank you so much for joining us
.
I'm Joey Lusterman.
I'm the creative director forAcoustic Guitar.
I'm joined here by Thu Tran,Isa Burke, sean McGowan, lisa
(00:43):
Liu and Mamie Minch, who are ourfive acoustic guitar teaching
artists, and they are here todayto talk to you a little bit
about what is up with theAcoustic Guitar Teaching Artist
Program.
What's up with them?
They're going to play somemusic and maybe give us a little
bit of.
They're definitely going togive us a little bit of their
(01:04):
musical history, a little bit,maybe a couple tips on playing
guitar, based on what's going ontoday and I am blabbering again
and I am so sorry, but that'sjust how it's going to be.
So thank you all for coming andwe're going to start by
introducing everybody.
So you've heard me introducemyself a few times now.
I'm the creative director forAcoustic Guitar.
(01:25):
What does that mean?
It means that I take a lot ofphotos and videos of guitars and
guitarists and lessons andperformances.
If you've ever watched anAcoustic Guitar session, you
haven't seen me, but I've beenbehind the camera for over a
hundred of those.
I also did all the layouts forthe books and some of the
magazines and all sorts of funacoustic guitar stuff.
(01:49):
And you'll probably recognizesome of these other names here
of our acoustic guitar teachingartists.
And let's start withintroductions.
Sean, I'm going to start withyou, if you can unmute yourself
and say hello to everybody.
Sean (02:03):
Hey everybody, so nice to be here and with these
incredible colleagues, andthanks for tuning in or watching
this later.
If you're going to tune in onYouTube, I'm guessing my name is
Sean and I literally listen toand love all different styles of
music.
I know that's kind of a clicheanswer or response, but it's
true and I have a 16-year-oldson currently, so we're
(02:26):
listening to a lot of punk oldschool punk at the moment and
going to punk shows in Denver,where I live.
I've been teaching guitar forquite a long time various styles
finger style, jazz, compositiontheory.
I've been a professor of musicat the University of Colorado,
denver for 18 years now and I'vebeen writing articles for
(02:47):
acoustic guitar for 21 years now.
So it's been really fun workingwith AG over the years.
And yeah, I think we all love todo summer camps as well, and
over the years I've taught at abunch of summer camps, which are
always fun.
I've taught at Alex Degrassi'sMendocino Guitar Workshop.
(03:08):
I taught at the SwannanoaGathering for 13 years and Frank
Vignola's Big Jersey Camp andit's really fun kind of toggling
back and forth.
I like to live simultaneouslyin jazz circles as well as
acoustic circles and it's a lotof fun.
So, yeah, thanks for joining ustoday.
Joey (03:27):
All right, thanks, sean Isa.
Want to do a littleintroduction on yourself, please
.
Isa (03:32):
Yes, hello everyone.
My name is Isa Burke and I amcoming to you from my very
recent home of Durham, northCarolina.
But I'm originally from Maineand, yeah, I also, like Sean,
play and listen to a big varietyof different styles of music.
(03:56):
I grew up in the kind oftraditional folk music world.
I grew up going to fiddle campsand my dad used to play for
Contra Dances.
My dad also.
His name was David Surratt andhe wrote for acoustic guitar a
bit.
So I'm an acoustic guitar nevobaby, that's what I'm saying,
(04:20):
but I'm very pleased to be hereand, yeah, so I grew up in kind
of folk world.
Both my parents were guitarteachers, so that kind of came
naturally to me as well, and Ialso play fiddle and so I've
been playing and teaching guitarand fiddle for a bunch of years
.
I used to have a band calledLula Wiles and for the last few
(04:43):
years I've been mostly playingas a hired side musician with a
lot of different bands andartists.
I've spent a couple yearstouring with Aoife O'Donovan and
right now I have been playingwith Lindsay Lou and the
Mountain Goats, carsey, blanton,darlingside.
Those are kind of the main onesrecently and I also play
(05:06):
electric guitar and I kind ofcan't I can't commit to any one
instrument or style of music,and a lot of.
I think what is most excitingto me is music that blends a lot
of different styles andinfluences and yeah, so that's
kind of that's kind of the dealwith me and I'm really glad to
be here.
Thanks for having me.
Joey (05:27):
Great.
Thank you so much.
Okay, moving right along to,can you do a little introduction
please?
Thu (05:34):
Yeah, I'm so pleased to be among this super diverse and
talented group of musicians.
My name's Tu Tran group ofmusicians.
My name's Tu Tran.
I play in a band, a duo calledthe Singer and the Songwriter.
I've been not to call you out,sean this is meant to be a
(05:59):
compliment, but I've beenplaying guitar for about as long
as Sean's been writing forAcoustic Guitar Magazine.
It turns out acoustic guitarmagazine.
It turns out.
And yeah, I actually am aself-taught player.
My parents are Vietnameseimmigrants and so I didn't grow
(06:20):
up with any really guitar-basedmusic around the house.
And in high school I decided myfriend had a Yamaha guitar that
had no strings on it and he waslooking to get rid of it and so
I took it to.
I got it.
It had a big crack in the neckand I took it to a guitar center
and they strung it for me and Itaught myself how to play.
(06:41):
And I think my guitar and musicjourney is such that, like I
only picked up the guitar tolearn how to play a few, my goal
, my like ultimate goal was toplay a few chords and strum
along while I sang some songsand through just curiosity and
(07:03):
how much like, how much I lovethe sound of the instrument, I
just kept going down the rabbithole of like eventually learning
uh, you know theory and um, Ijust never imagined that I'd be
playing, I'd be improvising orplaying solo lines or doing
(07:23):
finger style or anything that Ilove doing, which is like all
now, all styles of guitar, andjust because it's, it's just
continually kind of roped meback in, no loyalty to any
(07:54):
lineage or of guitar style orguitar learning.
So I'm kind of exploratory inmy style and I've also been
teaching for a few years.
I teach private lessons andI've taught at Miles of Music
Camp over you know you've donethere too, so that's me.
Joey (08:06):
So pleased to be here.
Great, thank you so much, andwe're going to go over to Mamie
now.
If you could please introduceyourself.
Mamie (08:15):
Sure Joy.
Hey everyone, my name is MamieMinch.
I'm coming to you from New YorkCity, lower East Side.
This is such an inspiring andawesome group of artists
musicians to be part of, sothanks for having me.
Yeah, my background is that Igrew up as a weird teenager
listening to a lot of really oldmusic on cassettes in my
(08:39):
bedroom, picking out guitarparts.
I really felt like acousticblues was something that I'd I
like, sort of cracked open a boxand I didn't know anybody else
who liked it and I thought itwas like my thing.
And I was 11 and 12 and itreally was kind of my thing, and
so I started picking this stuffout.
My parents were, you know,supportive.
I ended up teaching myself alot of stuff and then getting
(09:02):
homespun tapes with happy traum,which was like one of my adult
um, deep pleasures wasco-teaching with happy trauma at
different guitar camps, andevery time I saw him I would
tell him the story over and over.
Um, so yeah, anyway, um, fastforward.
I went to art school, all thethings.
Now I'm, uh, working luthier,uh, repair and restoration
(09:23):
luthier.
In new york city.
I have a shop I've written forAcoustic Guitar Magazine.
I had basically like a write-inadvice column called Ask the
Expert, which was a flatteringtitle and mostly told people to
humidify their guitars as muchas possible.
That was mostly my message.
Yeah, and my shop iswomen-owned and run At this
(09:44):
point.
I teach private lessons, Iteach a lot of guitar camps, I
organize and run the AshokanAcoustic Guitar Week and it's a
lot of work but it's really fun.
What else I mostly play?
I'm interested in music thatsounds a little bit out of place
and time, so that's what reallykind of lights me up.
I listen to a lot of differentkinds of music.
I love that Tu was saying thathe's non-denominational and I
(10:09):
feel a bit like that.
Like this week I've seen likean Iranian trance show, a punk
show and like a French chansonshow.
So that's the other great partabout living in New York city
it's all available to us.
(10:29):
Anyway, blah, blah, blah.
I'll be doing videos that haveto do with musical stuff and
guitar care and maintenance andknowledge.
So hopefully that would empowerpeople who are interested in
guitar and enjoy guitar in a newway for owning this like
special object that you'd liketo maintain and really take care
of so that's me.
Lisa (10:59):
Thank you so much.
That's great, lisa.
Please if you could introduceyourself, sure, hey everybody,
I'm lisa lu and like else here,I've had a really diverse
background.
I grew up in LA, I spent 24years in New York and now
recently have moved back toCalifornia and now I'm based in
San Francisco.
And my musical journey startedwhen I was six, you know, child
(11:21):
of Chinese immigrants.
So my mom started me inclassical piano lessons and then
, at the age of 13, I reallywanted to play guitar and at the
time my dad was working atYamaha and so I begged and I
begged and I begged him to getme a guitar and he gave me like
the basic entry model and fromthere I, you know, learned three
(11:41):
chords and was playing folktunes and um, and then, when I
moved to New York, uh, at 21,that's when, uh, my musical
journey really, really opened upand and I went on a lot of
different uh styles.
I first was playing in a lot ofpost-punk bands and then, um,
(12:04):
probably about 10 years ago, I Iwanted to come back and to my,
my first love of jazz, and so,uh, put my 10,000 hours in and
I've been playing Manoosh, gypsyjazz guitar.
So that's what I've, uh, forthe last 10 years I've been
doing.
And then recently, uh, when Iwas at the Rocky Mountain Arch
(12:26):
Top Guitar Festival, I met RogerSadowski about two or three
years ago and he put one of hisguitars into my hands it was the
Jim Hall Arch Top Guitar modeland that really opened me up
into straight ahead into bebop.
So you know, the evolution ofthe musical journey continues
and as such, I was asked by theSanta Rosa Junior College Jazz
(12:50):
Big Band to arrange a couple oftunes for them and I performed
them last week and that was areally amazing milestone, as you
know, to be able to work with abig band and arrange for the
first time.
It was a dream come true and Iliterally just watched some
YouTube videos and kind ofwinged it.
And luckily I had a reallygreat friend here.
(13:12):
His name is Will Byrne, he's asaxophone player and just showed
me the ropes of transpositionand all the different
instruments.
So you know, it just kind ofcontinuously evolves and it
feels really great to be backhere in California and refinding
the West Coast California self.
And you know I'm a swimmer andI get to swim in the ocean every
(13:34):
day, and that's very much apart of my practice as well.
I feel like swimming and musicare very much related with the
flow.
So that's what's going on.
I've also taught at a bunch ofacoustic and guitar camps, such
as Django in June, the RockyMountain Artshub Guitar Festival
, and this summer I'll beteaching at the Puget Sound
(13:58):
Guitar Workshop, week three inAugust.
So that's what's going on.
Joey (14:05):
Great.
Thank you all so much for that,and I feel like I may have
neglected to tell everybody inthe audience what these people
are doing.
So the Teaching Artists Programis going to be taking place on
the Acoustic Guitar Patreon page, and what it is is a new lesson
every week from one of thesefive great artists video lessons
, some with tab and notation.
(14:27):
We're going to be covering lotsof different things.
As you can tell by theirbackgrounds, they each have a
unique approach to guitar andareas of interest, obviously.
So you can expect to get somelessons on fingerstyle blues,
rhythm playing, of course, somemusic theory, some jazz, travis
picking, and that's just in thefirst month.
So lots more after that.
(14:48):
So that's again.
That's what we're all doinghere, and just everybody who's
watching.
Thank you for watching.
And I also forgot to say if youhave any questions, please type
them in the chat and we'll getto them towards the end of this
during our question and answerperiod.
So thank you for tuning in Nowwhere we have reached Ooh, I
(15:09):
forgot to do my snazzypresentation here.
Hang on a sec.
Ooh, look at that.
So that's what we're doing theacoustic guitar teaching artists
Yay, so welcome.
We said that.
What is this?
We just said that greatlightning round.
Okay so, this is how we'regoing to get to know everybody.
I'm going to ask a bunch ofquick, one or two sentence
(15:31):
questions, brief questions andanswers for all of our teaching
artists.
Now, let's get this out of here, okay so, and then we're just
gonna go around the horn.
Everybody can unmute themselvesand chime in um.
Thu (15:43):
First question, I'm gonna direct it to two, and then we'll
go from there to what is analbum you've been listening to
on repeat recently.
You know, um, I have the lastalbum that I had on repeat.
(16:04):
It was maybe, it's like,released like last year's adrian
lanker's um bright future album, um, and since then I've been
jumping around because I've been, uh, learning, I've been trying
to teach myself differentthings and right now I'm working
on ted green's solo guitaralbum, trying to slowly learn um
ted green stuff.
So it's been that, but beforethen it was all adrian lanker
(16:25):
great, maybe album you've beenlistening to on repeat um, hurry
for the riffraff.
Mamie (16:30):
The past is still alive.
It's so good, yeah.
I'm writing is so great, yeahgreat album.
Joey (16:35):
Uh, alinda was on the cover of acoustic guitar a few
issues ago.
Talking about that record I gotto go to their two of their
shows and take the photos forthat story.
So really cool.
They are an awesome person andgreat musician.
Lisa (16:51):
So, yes, lisa album you've been listening to on repeat
barelli legrand's storyteller,and he's an amazing minutiae
guitar player, but this album isreally, uh, he's playing
acoustic guitar and playing jazzand it's fusion and it's swing
and it's bebop and it'sabsolutely killer.
Sean (17:11):
So uh, I love his first track off the album so sweet.
I was just gonna say if youhaven't checked out his duo
recordings with savan lu, two ofthe all-time greats, those are
just so good.
But I've been on kind of aclassical guitar binge recently.
I saw David Russell in concerta couple of weeks ago in Denver.
It was just unbelievablyphenomenal.
(17:32):
He's just such an incrediblemusician and the repertoire was
all Spanish and it was amultimedia show.
So since then I've beenlistening to a lot of him doing
a deep dive with.
There's this incredible Chineseclassical guitarist that I've
fallen in love with, named, ifI'm pronouncing it correct,
shufei Yang.
And boy she's incredible.
She does Brazilian repertoire,spanish repertoire, the standard
(17:54):
classical repertoire, but shealso has a record of, like it's
called, sketches of China, whereshe can make her guitar sound
like any instrument.
It's really incredible.
And another one I've beenreally loving is Evangelina
Moscardi, and in my opinionshe's like the world's foremost
interpreter of Bach and Weiss,and she actually plays the lute
(18:16):
as well as guitar.
So yeah, I've been going downthe rabbit hole of classical.
Joey (18:21):
Great Issa album you've been listening to on repeat.
Isa (18:25):
Yeah, I think the album I've been most listening to on
repeat lately is Sam Amidon'snew album, salt River.
He is one of my just all timefavorite musicians, bar none.
He does a lot of liketraditional folk music, but
interpreted in like a reallykind of unique and experimental
way, and I just I will listen toanything he does forever.
Joey (18:47):
I was listening to that this morning.
Nice, okay, switching it up.
Mamie, what is the guitar youdream about owning or what
guitar in your arsenal is yourfavorite?
Mamie (18:59):
Whoa, that's a big one for a gal like me.
Um, I'd love to have anoriginal gibson advanced jumbo
from the 30s.
It's a big, fat rosewooddreadnought.
They're really rare and theysmell incredible.
Have you guys ever gotten upclose with one of those?
You must smell old guitars ifyou are to really experience
(19:20):
them, so you get a whiff of itand it's like rosewood perfume.
They have this beautiful littlestiletto heel and they just
sound like, um, there's justlike a lot happening.
They move air.
You know there's yeah, soprobably that one.
But this is my 30s um national.
That's, uh, I really love again, it's like a big growly sound.
It's more of a warm soundingnational and less of a metallic
(19:42):
sounding national, even thoughit is metal.
Yeah, I like that.
I love a lot of guitars, I'measy.
Joey (19:51):
Sean same question.
Sean (19:53):
Yeah, me too.
I would have to say like an oldGibson L5, you know like would
be wonderful.
Of course those are like wellpriced, beyond my limit.
But I do have a friend, acollector, here in Denver who
has a 1927 L5, same year asEddie Lang's, and a few years
ago I did a concert tribute toEddie Lang and Joe Venuti and he
(20:15):
loaned me that guitar for a fewmonths.
So that was really cool, sothat would be pretty nice.
But I'm really lucky.
I have a lot of really nicearch top guitars.
This one that I'm playing rightnow I thought it would be fun to
share.
It's not mine, it's owned bythe Arch Top Foundation, but
it's on loan for a little while.
And this is by this incredibleluthier in California named
Tyler Wells of LHT Guitars, andI don't know how well you can
(20:38):
see it, but this is his latestcontribution to the Blue Guitars
Project, which was somethingthat was from the 90s that put a
lot of contemporary luthiers onthe map.
People like you know, I meanBill Cummins and Linda Manzer
and Brad Nickerson and all youknow.
(20:58):
Benedetto was part of that, andso in the past few years, via
the Rocky Mountain Arch TopFestival, the Arch Top
Foundation has commissioned newluthiers, so this was part of
the batch, along with MeganWells' new blue guitar and Mario
Beauregard's, and so WyattWilkie is contributing to that
and what's really cool, insteadof these just hidden away in a
private collection or a museumor something somewhere.
(21:19):
A museum would be fine, butsomebody's closet would be
terrible way in a privatecollection or a museum or
something somewhere.
A museum would be fine, butsomebody's closet would be
terrible.
The Arch Top Foundation isgenerously loaning out these
instruments to a lot of playersin New York and elsewhere, so
I'm really stoked to be able toplay this.
This is a really cool ergonomicarch top that's multi-scaled,
and I've never played amulti-scale instrument before.
But a lot of times people willask is it hard?
And my answer answer is as longas you don't look down, it's
(21:41):
okay, but it's actually a loteasier than it looks when you're
looking at it, you know so,yeah, so this is tyler wells's
blue feud guitar great, and twodream guitar or one you cherish
the most um yeah, dream sean,exactly sean's uh dream guitar.
Thu (22:00):
Gibson l5 from late 20s Eddie Lang style is like.
There's some very similar atSchoenberg guitars over here in
the Bay.
You can go and admire it fromin person.
Also, joey, I don't know iflightning round having
(22:21):
guitarists talk about guitar islightning round at all could
ever be.
My, my like cherished guitar isbehind me.
Here is.
It's a 1949 Sherwood Deluxewhich was like K guitars.
They made them to sell in likeMontgomery Awards catalogs and
it's been Frankensteined by Ibought it Frankensteined by
(22:43):
Ruben Cox down in old style atold style guitars down in LA,
and so it's got 60s gold foilpickups on it and a bunch of
weird things about it that soundreally cool.
Joey (22:57):
Great.
And if you want to learn moreabout Ruben Cox, head on over to
acousticguitarcom.
We have a nice little profileon him.
Lisa, if you could tell me yourdream guitar or the one in your
possession you cherish the most?
Lisa (23:11):
Wow, Well, I've been super lucky where you know, as I
think.
I think instruments are.
They're mystical, they find you, you know, and I've been really
fortunate to play and be inpositions in some really amazing
guitars and you know, I alwaysfeel that I'm the student, like
(23:32):
the guitar is teaching me allthe time.
So you know, the first guitarthat really taught me and I had
to rework my technique intominutiae is made by a French
luthier named Jean-Noel LeBreton and it's very classic.
It's very classic Selmer style.
But he was also reallyinnovative and made a classical
(23:54):
bracing on the sound hole to theend of the guitar.
So I tend to love guitars thathave a little bit of like old
school and then new schooltechnology or design, and so,
for instance, this one this ismade by a Montreal luthier, it's
(24:15):
a Selmer style guitar.
It's made by Larkspur Luthier,by this guy named Josh Greenberg
.
But I was really, really I wasdoing a lot of travel and flying
on planes and so I wanted aneck that could detach and so he
made this with a stopper styleneck and there's a bolt here and
then if you take the bolt out,the neck comes off and and I'm
able to to get it on the plane.
(24:37):
Um, another cherished guitar ofmine is Roger Sadowski's Jim
Hall model, which you know.
Playing any of Roger'sinstruments I feel like defies
genre.
You have anybody from like JimHall to Radiohead playing his
music and I think I think thatreally is a testament to just
Roger who is so broad, broad asfar as wants.
(24:58):
I have this amazing Santa Cruzguitar OM model, and I'm very
lucky to be an artist ambassadorfor them, but I'd love to get
one with a cutaway.
Sean mentioned Megan Wells.
She's an amazing arch topbuilder here in Sonoma and she's
(25:25):
just magical arch top builderhere in Sonoma and she's just
magical.
She's.
Every guitar of hers there's.
You know, you play, you playher her guitars and, uh, there's
a.
I don't know what she does, butthe feeling that you get out of
it is, it's very um, ittransports you.
So you know there's a long waitlist for Megangan, but you know
, if things align, I'd love toget one of her guitars too.
Joey (25:44):
So those, those are my two wants another luthier who you
can read more about on in aprofile on acoustic guitarcom.
Uh, isa, if you want to tell usabout your dream guitar or most
cherished guitar in yourinventory yes, um, I'm gonna.
Isa (26:00):
I'm gonna make this actual lightning round.
My dream guitar is.
I'm not a huge nerd about years, but like I played a couple old
Gibson J45s that set my heartaflutter.
And right now I'm playing anold Gibson, but a small old
Gibson.
This is a LG3 from 1957 and itis my BFF.
Joey (26:23):
All right, okay, next one Lightning round Two what's your
favorite tuning?
Have to go standard.
All right, sean favorite tuning.
Sean (26:36):
Standard.
But a close runner up would bethe low tuning that was just in
last month's issue, which is lowto high, c, g and then standard
the rest of the way D, g, b, eand that gives you, like a
cello-like tuning, fifths in thebottom and it's a common
Hawaiian slack key tuning.
That one's a good one.
Joey (26:53):
Yeah, there's a great lesson from Sean on that
acousticguitarcom right nowBrand new, very popular good
tuning.
Okay, mamie favorite tuning.
Mamie (27:03):
I love Standard but probably Open D.
Joey (27:07):
Lisa favorite tuning.
Isa (27:10):
Standard.
Joey (27:12):
Isa.
Isa (27:13):
Drop D.
Joey (27:15):
All right, okay, lightning round, sean.
What's your favorite meal tocook?
Oh, toast, lisa, favorite thingto cook.
Lisa (27:28):
I'm a real big fan of the slow cooker.
I like things really, reallycooked, so usually I just do
like a Provencal chicken in theslow cooker for eight hours.
Joey (27:41):
Nice Isa favorite thing to cook.
Isa (27:44):
Right now it's a smoothie, because my mom got me a really
good blender for Christmas andso I've been using that pretty
much every day.
Mamie (27:53):
I just got back from a trip to southern India and I
took a cooking class while I wasthere and I'm crazy for coconut
rice and a lot of these likedry curries that they make there
.
So right now it's um, it's likea vegetable curry all right.
Thu (28:07):
Two favorite thing to cook uh comfort meal is gonna be
heinanese chickens, just poachedchicken, and chicken with the
uh stock chicken stock rice withuh ginger fish.
That sounds good.
Mamie (28:22):
When can we come over?
Joey (28:27):
Oh, you're muted, but I'm guessing you said anytime, yes,
anytime.
Feel free to tune the lightningdown a little bit and
extrapolate on this one, but ifwe could go around and hear
about a favorite memory from amusic workshop or a music camp
or a music festival that youeither attended or taught at,
and, issa, if we could startwith you?
Isa (28:49):
Yeah, so Tu mentioned Miles of Music, which is an amazing
camp in New Hampshire that takesplace on an island in the
middle of Lake Winnipesaukee,and I first went there as a
camper when I was I think it waslike after my first year of
(29:10):
college and then since 2018, Ithink I've been teaching there a
number of years, and it's justa number.
A number of years, um, and it'sit's just a really, really
special place.
It's kind of based on the modelof like traditional folk music
camps, but there's a lot of alldifferent kinds of music there.
(29:30):
It's kind of like, if you putlike traditional fiddle tune
camp and like rock camp in ablender, uh, and put it on an
Island, it's really, it's reallymagical.
Um, a blender and put it on anisland, it's really magical.
And a number of years ago, onenight, there was a bunch of us
wanted to play some old timetunes and we kind of wanted to
(29:53):
like keep it to a sort of smallnumber of people, so we wanted
to find somewhere to play.
That was like a little bit outof the way, um, and so we went
into the boathouse and likeclimbed into a motorboat and
started playing old time tunesand um dinty child who's a
(30:15):
member of the band sessionAmericana and he's like one of
the main guys who runs miles ofmusic.
Um, he came upon us, uh,playing, and he's the off-season
manager of the island.
He's like the reason that thecamp happens on that island.
Um, so he came upon us playingtunes and we were like mid-tune
and he just like climbed intothe boat, started up the boat
and drove us out into the middleof the lake and we were just
(30:38):
playing tunes under the starsand we went on a little little
cruise, um, and we were likegoing past these people's like
vacation homes and they werelike sitting out on their docks,
like this like boat full ofpeople passes by them playing
tunes.
Um, so that was really magicaland will stay with me forever
that sounds great.
Joey (30:58):
All right sean favorite musical memory from a camp,
workshop, workshop or festival.
Sean (31:03):
There's so many.
I think any camp is going tohave at least one incredible
memories, but I remember one jamsession.
This made me think of itlistening to Issa's story.
It's true a lot of times atvarious camps maybe the teachers
will try to get away and havetheir own little jams and find a
private place on campus.
So one year when I was at theSwannanoa Gathering, we found
(31:24):
this front porch and a bunch ofus started jamming.
And one of the things that'sreally great about the Swannanoa
Gathering Guitar Week is thatit's, you know, it's
non-denominational in the sensethat it's all about guitar, so
all genres are welcome.
So as a result, you have anamazing cast of faculty people
from all different styles, butwe seem to have a common bond
(31:46):
with, like swing tunes or Djangotunes, like everybody can play
in that if they like toimprovise.
So there's a bunch of us justplaying on this porch somewhere,
and I think it was like me Imentioned names just because
they're friends of a lot ofpeople here tuning in and also
the TAs here, but it was like meand Grant Gordy and Greg Ruby,
clive Carroll was there, hiroyoSkimoto and Gonzalo Bergara,
(32:12):
who's this really greatRoma-style player from South
America.
So we're in the woods of NorthCarolina and there's bugs
everywhere and there's spiderseverywhere and they're like big
spiders, like I'm just hangingout on the spider webs at night,
kind of thing, you know.
And so we're, we're playing andwe're just trading solos and
(32:32):
and and Grant's take Grant Gordyis taking a solo and he's got
his eyes closed.
He's kind of into it and just atthat moment, like out of
nowhere, right behind hisshoulder, this just enormous
spider shows up and then startslike kind of making its way.
And so forgive the accent, butGonzalo Bergara, this is in his
(32:53):
South American accent.
I just mentioned this becausethis is a funny part of the
story.
He goes Grant, grant, big, bigspider, grant, big spider, grant
back back, big spider back, andgrant kind of opens his eyes.
He's like no, I don't know anybig spider back tunes.
It was a pretty funny moment oh, that's hilarious.
Joey (33:17):
Okay, thank you.
The spider went away, just forthe end.
Sean (33:21):
He wasn't.
It didn't land on him, he wentthe other direction.
Joey (33:25):
Grant is still alive and playing music.
Lisa, if you could share afavorite memory from a camp or a
work.
Lisa (33:34):
Oh, wow.
Well, this was just recently.
I was at the Rocky MountainArts Shop Festival in September
September, and it just happenedto be over my I love tacos and
so, uh, everyone, the everyonejust chipped in and and uh,
(34:09):
broke out into happy birthdayfor me, and then we had a taco
party, a taco party and abirthday cake and we all just
like, played and ate tacos andand that was definitely, um, uh,
a real, a real highlight, as Iwas doing a lot of traveling and
getting able to, to spend,spend my birthday with with
(34:31):
really great players.
And uh, another one wasactually with with greg ruby it
was a couple years ago and and,uh, he asked me to play with in
his band in Django FestNorthwest and that happens in
Whidbey Island in Washington,and it was my first time it was
a few years ago going up thereand it's absolutely stunning,
it's beautiful and and then youknow there are all these you
(34:54):
know separate private jams thatwere happening and I was able to
to find, like the women innon-binary jam and then get to
meet all the players there, andthat was that was super cool and
just it was really inspiring toto see, to see everyone you
know, kicking ass and playingreally really well and and then,
(35:17):
um, so yeah, those, those aremy.
Those are my two really greatmemories.
Joey (35:22):
Great.
Thank you, Mamie, if you couldshare your favorite memory from
a workshop or festival or camp.
Mamie (35:29):
Yeah, sure thing I love these stories.
By the way, this has been a lotof fun to listen to.
I have a short one, and youknow, one of the things that I
love about playing music andplaying this kind of music and
in this sort of likenon-hierarchical way where we
all hang around with each otheris that I get to share space and
(35:52):
time with like great old guys.
So one of my favorite great oldguy players was Guy Davis.
You guys know him.
I think he would be okay withme saying that he's probably 70
something now, and so I hiredhim for this guitar camp that I
organized.
The Ashokan camp was a coupleof years ago and he lives in the
Bronx.
So I'm driving up and I think,okay, I haven't really hung out
with this guy before he seems Idon't know how he's going to be,
what's it going to be like?
(36:12):
What am I going to, what kindof music am I going to play in
the car Driving Guy Davis threehours upstate?
So go get him, him at the Bronx, and I come up with this cool
idea I'm in an all-woman TomWaits cover band that travels in
Europe.
It's one of the more randomthings that I do?
We don't impersonate Tom Waits,we just like redecorate the
songs because the songwriting isso good.
(36:32):
So I have this cool album ofJohn Hammond, the blues guy,
covering Tom Waits tunes, and itcame out in 2000 or something,
I you know it's.
It turned me on to a lot ofsongs I had didn't know before.
So I'm playing this and I pickup Guy Davis and he gets in the
car and he's a little bit gruffand I don't know if he's like
that or if he's in a mood orwhat.
So I turn on the music andwe're sort of trekking along for
(36:55):
a minute or two, not long andhe goes is that John Hammond?
And I said yeah, and he goes.
Huh, he turns it down and hepicks up his phone.
John, how's it going, you know?
Sean (37:07):
oh, I was just thinking about you.
Mamie (37:08):
Yeah, no, how's your wife ?
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And he hangs up and turns itback up and we're driving on the
highway.
I'm like, did you just callJohn Hammond from my car, you
know?
And he says yeah, he's a reallygood friend of mine.
And so then it broke the iceand we were hanging out and so I
feel like I made the rightchoice.
Joey (37:27):
That's great.
Thank you for sharing All righttwo.
Thu (37:35):
Favorite moment from a music festival, camp or workshop
I'm going to.
It's so funny becauseeverybody's such great stories
about like all these momentsoutside of the camp curriculum
and my one of my favoritememories is just actually the
curriculum itself.
It was at miles of music campand they there was.
I think in 2020.
(37:57):
We started this thing called achallenge accepted, which was
like they would post a littlesong writing prompt every
morning on the bulletin boardand by late, you know, five
o'clock later that day, you justcome and you share what you
wrote.
And so one year after that, whenI was, I got to teach and
facilitate that, that sort ofdaily workshop and the prompt
(38:20):
that I had come up with waswrite a bad song, write an
intentionally bad song, and justwhat everybody shared was so
hilarious and also veryinteresting and good.
You know what I mean.
It's like to try and once youtry to write any song, right, if
you have something in your mind, even if you're like I'm gonna
(38:41):
pick all the worst tropes, butthe intentionality of trying to
compose stuff that you hate, butyou've just intentionally done
it, it just comes together andit's like it was kind of
interesting actually and uh, itwas really, really fun and um,
we ended up um, the a group offolks ended up, uh, continuing
on this tradition off season.
(39:03):
So there's an online versioncalled the Imperfectionist
Songwriting Society.
It's all like prompt basedcomposition and songwriting.
That's been a really, reallywonderful community to be part
of.
Joey (39:15):
Great.
Thank you all so much.
Okay, we're going to do onemore question in the lightning
round and then we're going toswitch over to playing, hearing
and playing some music.
So last question and, mamie,we're going to start with you
what's a music or method or songbook that you have returned to
the most?
Mamie (39:34):
Oh, what a great question .
You know I've recently comeback around to this great book
by gosh it's not right here, butit's called it's Country Blues
Guitar and it's basically like arepertoire book.
It's 200 songs or somethingCountry Blues Guitar.
I got it when I was a teenager.
I loved it, kind of wore it out.
(39:54):
All the pages were falling outand I stuck it in a box and it
came back out.
I am really interested inrethinking old songs and taking
things that are familiar oralmost in our sort of cultural
DNA and thinking about themagain from a modern, feminist,
you know, perspective.
(40:15):
So I yeah.
That may not be exactly whatyour question was, but that's
one that I found myselfliterally picking back up after
25 years of, you know, gettingit for the first time.
Joey (40:26):
That's what my question was.
Thank you, I'll have to hear,maybe cover, one of those songs
in a lesson in the future.
All right, sean.
What's your most read orrecently revisited method book,
song, book, music book?
Sean (40:41):
My favorite is just the guitar book by Pierre Bensoussan
and I have both the Englishversion and the French version
and I just love it because it'sso artistic and written in such
a unique way, especially at thetime because I think it was
published in maybe 1980 or early80s at the time, because I
think it was published in maybe1980 or early 80s.
So I've had that book and it'sjust, it's really delightful
(41:02):
because it's got poetry and artand recipes in there as well as
his composition.
So yeah, it's fun for me tojust to drop into Dadgad and try
playing some of his music andjust kind of living with that
book.
I love it.
Joey (41:16):
Great Lisa favorite song book music book, method book.
Lisa (41:23):
Wow.
Well, you know I just did.
I think my kickoff video, myteaching artist video, was the
Segovia Scales.
So that's what I warm up withevery time I play and I feel
like I'm hearing harmony andjust getting the physicality of
(41:44):
playing the guitar happening andhearing the major scale and
then the melodic minor scale andthe natural minor scale, and I
just feel like it's just more.
It preps my brain and warms mybody up to get into music mode.
So that's part of my dailypractice and I would say that's
(42:08):
something I return to all thetime.
Joey (42:12):
Great Issa.
Isa (42:20):
I've been thinking this whole time about what I will say
in response to this question,because I don't really use books
to learn music very often, Um,I really just learn by listening
to music, um, and I really it's.
It's when I talk to otherguitar teachers I'm like, oh
right I.
I like I'm sort of shocked bythe own degree to which I don't
(42:40):
use like anything that's writtendown ever.
Um, but if we're thinking aboutlike the proverbial songbook in
the sense of like a certainartist's repertoire, um, there's
a songwriter named ConnieConverse, um, who, yay, got some
Connie Converse heads in thegroup.
We love to see it.
(43:01):
She was this incredible singersongwriter kind of before the
term singer, songwriter wasreally part of the common
parlance and she wrote theselike.
She was an incredible guitarplayer, wrote these like super
bizarre songs that are likereally kind of sweet and
interesting and sound superclassic in some ways but also
sound like they're from anotherplanet.
(43:21):
And I feel like anytime that Iam not feeling super inspired.
If I find a Connie Conversesong and learn to play it, that
always kind of like gets me backinto the zone of my guitar and
music in general.
Joey (43:39):
Great, Well, sounds like we have some research to do.
Two same question.
Thu (43:47):
I have considered.
The Lilies by Connie Congressis just such an inspiring song.
It's a great pick, isa.
I have two books.
One is called Practicing AMusician's Return to Music by
Glenn Kurtz.
It's actually more of a memoir,but it's such a beautiful and
inspiring book about how topractice, what the purpose of
(44:09):
practicing is and how really allmusic making is.
About learning how to learningyour own relationship with the
art of practicing.
And I returned to it, I rereadit all the time, just because
it's really meditative, it'sbeautifully written.
And then the other one isEffortless Mastery by Kenny
(44:30):
Warner.
Just like really got me out ofa.
You know, when I startedtouring I started to feel a lot
of anxiety and tension and Ijust could not play or could not
enjoy playing, and that bookreally gave me some tools on how
to, yeah, get right withperforming.
Joey (44:55):
Great.
Thank you all very much.
Okay, that concludes thelightning round.
I think that counts aslightning.
There were some quick answersin there, lots of back and forth
.
That's what we want.
So thank you all so much forbeing part of that, and now
we're going to move forward intothe making some noise part of
this section, which is music.
(45:17):
So yay, make some noise.
Sean (45:20):
Okay.
Joey (45:22):
Thank you.
Does anybody want to go first,or shall I start pointing my
finger?
Okay, I'm going to startpointing my finger.
Sean, you've got your guitar.
You're the only one with theguitar on right now, so you're
going to go first.
Speaker 3 (45:37):
Okay, all right you hear that, okay, assuming.
(46:09):
Yeah, okay, do, do, do, do, do.
(47:21):
Thank you.
Do, do, do, do, do, all right.
Sean (48:40):
Let's see Trying to keep it down, let's see Trying to
keep it going.
Joey (48:42):
Not a great, yeah.
What was the name of that tune?
Sean (48:45):
Oh, that was a jazz standard by Harry Warren called
there Will Never Be Another you.
Joey (48:50):
I agree with the sentiment , sean.
There will never be another youeither, but there will be
someone up next.
Mamie, do you want to play next?
Mamie (49:00):
All right, Okay, now for something completely different.
Yeah, how's this?
Can better Okay cool.
Speaker 3 (49:26):
Alright.
Oh, I have lost my one child.
I'm afraid it's a long time.
(50:06):
You know we'd prefer the silentpast to the present.
It's far with my mother and hisfortified body Once I had my
(50:27):
wounds, for my tear drops.
Once I had a room.
That's far from lost, but hedid freely spend the night.
Tossin' is, oh, the blackestground I've ever felt.
(51:27):
He would surely turn to light,oh, I found the right to get
back, but I gave it to him.
I forget my feet.
My day will turn over.
My day will turn to gold, oh.
(51:49):
I've had my fill Stand at theend of my feet Next to him,
laying by him, so I leave himasleep.
All that he needs is love tolive, and is love to live, oh.
Joey (52:55):
Thank you very much.
What was the name of that song?
Mamie (52:58):
Fortified Wine Blues, and I wrote it when I was a
security guard at the Met Museum.
Oh wow, yeah, I had a lot oftime with my thoughts.
Joey (53:09):
I'll bet what wing were you in?
Mamie (53:14):
All wings, but mostly European paintings.
Joey (53:17):
Cool, all right, isa, you're up next.
If mostly European paintingsCool, all right, isa, you're up
next if you're ready.
Isa (53:25):
Yeah, I think I'm going to make a last-minute change of
plans.
I have a little bit of a coldso I wasn't going to sing, but I
brought up Connie Converse andpeople got excited about it, so
I feel like I will do up ConnieConverse and people got excited
about it, so I feel like I willdo a Connie Converse song.
And, uh, any of you who'venever heard me sing before, this
(53:46):
is not what it normally soundslike, um, but this is one of my
uh favorites of hers.
Um, and it's called, uh,talking like parentheses Two
Tall Mountains.
In between two tall mountainsthere's a place they call
(54:12):
lonesome.
Don't see why they call itlonesome.
I'm never lonesome when I gothere.
See that bird sitting on mywindowsill Well, he's saying
(54:34):
whip or will all the nightthrough.
See that brook running by mykitchen door Well, it couldn't
talk no more if it was you.
Up that tree.
There's sort of a squirrelthing.
Sounds just like we did when wewere quarreling.
In the yard I keep a pig or two.
(54:57):
They drop in for dinner likeyou used to do.
I don't stand any need ofcompany With everything I see
talking like you.
Up that tree.
There's sort of a squirrelthing.
Sounds just like we did when wewere quarreling.
(55:19):
You may think you left me allalone, but I can hear you talk
without a telephone.
I don't stand any need ofcompany With everything I see
Talking like you.
See that bird sitting on mywindowsill well, he's saying
(55:40):
whippoorwill all the nightthrough just whippoorwill, all
the night through.
In between two tall mountains,there's a place they call
lonesome.
Don't see why they call itlonesome.
(56:06):
I'm never lonesome.
Now I live there.
Joey (56:16):
Beautiful.
Thank you so much for playingthat and singing.
It sounded really nice, Iwouldn't have known you had a
cold if you hadn't prefaced it.
Thank you, okay, two, it's yourwar.
Up now, please.
Thu (56:33):
Awesome, Wow.
This one's called Future.
This is an original compositionof mine in Issa's Favorite
Tuning drop D guitar solo doThank you.
Speaker 3 (57:03):
guitar solo do do Thank you.
Joey (59:48):
Great.
Thank you so much for playingthat.
All right, Lisa, you're up next, please.
Lisa (59:58):
All right, Lisa, you're up next, please.
All right, here we go.
Thank you.
Joey (01:00:08):
Thank you All right, excellent, what was the name of
(01:02:23):
that song, lisa?
Lisa (01:02:25):
Oh, that was a composition by Django Reinhardt called Duke
and Dookie and he named itafter two kittens after he went
on tour with Duke Ellington asan homage to Duke Ellington
Right on Sounded great.
Joey (01:02:38):
Thanks everybody, so much for playing, and we have now
reached the point of the eventwhere we're coming up against
the clock.
But if anybody in the audiencehas any questions for these fine
teaching artists, you can typethem in the chat and I can show
them to everybody in a way suchas this oh everybody.
In a way such as this ohbeautiful.
I agree, those were somebeautiful performances.
(01:03:00):
Thanks to you everybody.
Chris says hi, lisa, and let'ssee Two.
This was during yourperformance.
What a lovely originalcomposition.
I agree with that as well,thank you, thank you.
Okay, we've got a question.
Okay, we're going to dosomething a little bit different
(01:03:21):
here.
Sean, this is your cue.
So today happens to be thebirthday of one of our lovely
Patreon acoustic guitar people,devin, so Sean's going to play.
Sean (01:03:33):
A little happy birthday for you all right happy birthday
(01:04:15):
, thank you okay, so, like Isaid before, happy birthday Evan
.
Joey (01:04:17):
Happy birthday.
Okay.
So, like I said before, whenyou sign up for the Acoustic
Guitar Patreon page, you'll geta new lesson every week from one
of our five teaching artists.
You'll also get tons of othercool stuff.
Song of the Month Club you geta new song transcription every
month.
We do live workshops everymonth, interactive workshops,
(01:04:39):
kind of like this, but oneteacher, one focus topic and
everybody's on their camera andplaying along.
And we'll do some more funhangouts with everybody, like
this.
We'll do some open mic nightswhere the TAs will play and the
audience will play and all sortsof great acoustic guitar
lessons, community, everythingyou could possibly want and more
(01:05:01):
.
And, just like Tripp Clark says, this has been great and thank
you so much.
I'm also inspired by all theirplaying, so you heard it there
first, folks.
If anybody has any otherquestions, you can type them in
the chat.
But besides that, thank you allso much for being here To the
five of you, thank you Toeveryone who was watching, thank
(01:05:22):
you and thank me for notscrewing this up.
Isa (01:05:28):
Thank you, Joey.
Joey (01:05:30):
Yeah, thanks, joey.
Oh no, I didn't really wantthat.
Isa (01:05:34):
Thank you so much.
It looks like we do have acouple questions.
Joey (01:05:39):
Oh yes, here's a question from Devin, if anybody wants to,
and feel free to jump in andanswer any of these.
When playing a cover of a song,how do you remain faithful to
the song while making enoughspace for your own voice or
style?
Anybody want to jump in, issa?
Isa (01:06:00):
Yeah, this is a really good question.
I feel like we're all kind ofjust thinking about it because
it is.
I think it's something anyonespends a lot of time thinking
about.
I mean, I think, to some extent, just by virtue of learning a
song and translating it intoyour own voice on the guitar or
singing or whatever it is likethere are things that are going
(01:06:21):
to change in that process oftranslation and um, so I I try
not to worry too too much aboutum, like having to make it super
different.
Um, and I think sometimes, likethe way I played that Connie
Converse song was like almostlike note for note, how she does
it, and I think sometimes Iwant to present a cover as more
(01:06:44):
of a like tribute to theoriginal performance and
sometimes I want to change it upa little bit.
I think it really just dependson, like, if I learn a song, how
it feels in my voice, and Ialso think that sometimes it's
about like paying attention tothe original and deciding, like,
what feels like a core part ofthe song and what feels like a
(01:07:04):
stylistic, like something thatis stylistically inherent to the
original performer, and so thethings that feel really core to
the song I will keep, and thethings that feel like they have
to do more with the originalperformer style, I might try to
find some other way of doing it.
Yeah, anybody else have anythoughts on that?
Sean (01:07:30):
I'll dive in real quick.
So this is kind of the worldthat I live in and I'm not a
singer songwriter.
I have so much admiration forpeople who write incredible
lyrics, but I'm not asinger-songwriter.
I have so much admiration for,you know, people who write
incredible lyrics, but you knowI'm living mostly in the jazz
world, so of course we do thisall the time.
I think you know the melody issacred.
You want to, of course, staytrue to that, but as a jazz
musician recording standards,for example, songs, have been
(01:07:52):
like all the things you are,stella by Starlight, those are
tunes that have been recordedlike millions of times.
So how do you make it your own?
So I think one answer isharmony and reharmonization.
So I think you know that can goa long way, but just a
different, even a different timesignature or a groove,
(01:08:14):
different keys, different vibes,and I think that translates
really well in the pop world aswell.
I mean I always think of likeEarth, wind, fire's version of
you know Got to Get you Into myLife.
You know the story goes thatPaul McCartney, after he heard
their version, never wanted toplay that song again.
Or I remember a long time agofirst hearing Tori Amos play her
version of Smells Like TeenSpirit by Nirvana, and it was so
cool, it's just such abeautiful, stark song.
(01:08:35):
And then halfway through ityou're like, oh, this is that
Nirvana song, but she made ither own and in that case it was
just her voice in theinstrumentation of solo piano
and it's so brooding and I justthought that was a beautiful
rendition.
So, yeah, I think you maybedecide what to you is sacred
obviously the lyrics and maybethe melody, but there's a lot
you can do with mood and vibeand texture and instrumentation
(01:09:00):
and arrangement and certainlythe harmony.
Joey (01:09:03):
I got a question sent to me directly Mamie, what is the
name of your Tom Waits band?
Mamie (01:09:11):
That band is called the Letters VKB VKB band.
It's with Rachelle Garnier andAmanda Homme.
We mostly tour in Germany,Austria, Switzerland.
Joey (01:09:22):
Alright, so we've got lots of thank yous.
Fantastic, this was really cool.
I love being a Patreon member.
That's what I want to hear.
Thank you so much.
I think that's about it me.
Just check my double check mynotes here.
Questions yes, we did thequestions.
(01:09:45):
I think we can move to slideseven.
Aka.
Thank you all for coming andfarewell.
So yeah, I'm just going to saythat again a few more times.
Thanks everybody so much.
This was a lot of fun for me.
I think it gave us a good ideaof what we're gonna get into for
the over the coming months withthese five teaching artists.
(01:10:06):
Like I said, lots of lessons,lots of things like this hanging
out talking about music,talking about guitar playing,
songs, learning playing.
What else could you want?
Thank you all so much.
I'm going to hit end streamhere, unless anybody has
something they are dying to getoff their chest.
(01:10:27):
No, okay.
Isa (01:10:31):
Thanks everybody.
Joey (01:10:32):
Thank you all Thanks.
Mamie (01:10:34):
Thank you.
Isa (01:10:35):
Great to spend time with you all.
Thank you, yeah.
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