Very few guitarists play nylon-string. They don't know how to get the sound out of them. That's something I've spent a lot of time on.
Each acoustic guitar has its own character and personality. On a particular day, I might pick one up and start noodling around, looking for some emotional content in the chords.
Your sound is in your hands as much as anything. It's the way you pick, and the way you hold the guitar, more than it is the amp or the guitar you use.
The way I play guitar is very, very hard and I bloody myself incredibly without the tape. And the nails are my picks.
The classical guitar has a dynamic to it unlike a regular acoustic guitar or an electric guitar. You know, there's times when you should play and there's times when you gotta hold back. It's an extremely dynamic instrument.
I had been playing single note instruments and I wanted to hear a guitar played as a piano.
I always lived with guitarists. When they would leave, I would just pick up their acoustic guitars and start doing finger picking and write.
I discovered early on that I was more of a strummer than a picker.
My father started me off on the guitar, and we learned classical guitar together.
I'm not a really good classical guitarist by any means, but what I learned from this is a way of working very slowly on solo pieces and I enjoyed working on these pieces of John's. They were not written for solo guitar but a lot of them were easy to adapt.
I've been playing since I was about 7. I never really used a pick very much. I mean, once in a while, if you're in a festive mood, you might draw a little blood, but nothing significant... But my hands aren't abused, really.
I have some good books of Bach keyboard music transcribed for guitar, and there's always a nylon-string guitar hanging on the wall in my house and a bunch of classical guitar books to grab. I kind of do that just for fun.
Among the guitarists, Wes Montgomery is fantastic. He's always good to let you know what the art form is all about. It's the same still life that everybody is painting, but in comes Wes Montgomery, and it's right there!
