It’s been a week, so now time for my traditional review of the book I recently completed reading. This particular piece of literature/documentary was given to me as a gift from my brother Ron due to the similarities of the author’s late endeavor to learn the guitar and my own efforts to master the instrument. The premise of this book is the chronicling of Will Hodgkinson’s commitment to performing a gig. The catch is the author does not know how to play the guitar, but set the date of the live audience event around 6 months out. Having lived (actually still living) through the hardships of understanding the fundamentals of the guitar, this particular book really hit home and if nothing else provided some badly needed therapy to know someone else out there has struggled as much as I have. I must admit, I was impressed with his commitment to immerse himself not only into the efforts to learn enough about the guitar to perform at his gig, but also to go underneath the technique and travel throughout the music world to meet with pioneers in the guitar field – including a tour through the deep south of the US to get closer to the birthplace of the blues. I am not sure if this book would appeal to an individual that couldn’t relate to the hardships of learning the guitar, but I found it a very entertaining and actually looking forward to reading his sequel (Song Man) also given to me by my brother.
Now on to those items that stuck with me after finally putting the book down:
