Thoughts on Music

I am passionate about music. I have played the guitar since I was fourteen, when my friend Bert taught me how to play the opening chords to Stairway to Heaven over the telephone. We had a cheap classical guitar, and it was never in tune, but it was more quiet than an electric or steel string guitar, so my parents tolerated my un-metered plucking. Soon I was working my way up to classics, like Smoke on the Water and Dust in the Wind.
The problem was, there were already plenty of guitar players at school, so Bert suggested that I take up the bass guitar. Then we could have a band. I fit the physical requirements of a bassist; I was tall and incredibly skinny, I had a massive Adam’s apple, I was hunched over a great deal of the day, and women ignored me. I had found my musical calling!
I bought a second hand bass from a friend and started learning scales. I learned most of these from a book my sister had bought for me called, ‘Jimmy Hendrix Guitar Made Easy.’ One thing that I learned with the bass, the strings are bigger and are rougher on your fingers. I stuck with it, and soon we were playing the rare party, from time to time.
When I was fifteen my mother bought me a Sigma six string guitar and I switched back over. I've been playing regularly ever since then and have developed a certain style that comes from being self taught. I play with a band called Dante's Roadhouse and we've been together for about six years. People ask me if I ever think of trying to make it, but that’s not what I do it for. We play to feel communication through music as a language. When we hit a certain point, and we know we're doing well, and the audience senses it and gives it back to us, that is where the passion comes in.