American Fingerstyle Guitar

Hi all, I got back from the Montreal Guitar Show last week and I was glowing with the energy from that show-still am. I got to play some amazing guitars in mini-concerts for Charles Fox, Jeff Bamburg, Alan Carruth, Sheldon Schwartz, and Josh House, and played some other great instruments made by new friends George Lowden, Brian Galloup, and Paul Woolson and some old friends Bill Tippin, Joe Yanuziello, and Kathy Wingert. For those of you interested in the custom guitar world, mark your calendars for the first weekend of July in 2011 when the next Montreal Guitar Festival takes place. The guitars are incredible, the city and people are phenomenal, and the food is exquisite. Thank God it’s a great walking city so you can burn some of the calories off. (continue reading…)

The past few months has had me thinking deep thoughts about a very under appreciated part of playing the guitar-the strings.

Most of us fingerpickers spend hours thinking about guitars, hours investigating and playing guitars in shops, studios, homes, and ultimately investing thousands and thousands of dollars on guitars. In addition, many of us spend time obsessing about our nails, or our pickups and preamps, or if we record in either the studio or at home we probably obsess about microphones, preamps, and A/D converters. The list is endless. But one of the things you don’t here many folks talk about are strings. Even pros. (continue reading…)