Sure Looks Like It

I just got done with guitar practice.

I still can’t believe the quality of the Epiphone Riviera I bought. The action is better than my Fender’s or my Gibson’s, and the sound is wonderful. God bless the Chinese.

I’m having pain in my right elbow. Evidently, at my advanced age, you can’t just jump to a 1.0-mm Dunlop pick after years of doing nothing. So I’m using a 0.8-mm pick until I feel better. Oddly, my left hand, which I have truly abused, feels fine.

Today I had a big breakthrough. I’m still working on the movable bar chords in Fretboard Fundamentals. Up through yesterday, I could only practice them for about a minute before running around the room screaming in pain (perhaps I exaggerate). Today I’m up to two and a half minutes, and I was able to stand practicing ten minutes, with short breaks!

Yesterday I started working on Fred Sokolow’s Rockabilly Guitar lessons (online), and I thought there was no way I could do what he was asking. But today I’m making the stretch between the first and fifth frets fairly well. This is a huge jump for one day. It gives me hope.

I wish I knew what kind of strings to put on the Riviera. I bought DR brand strings, but I only got them because the kid at Guitar Center likes them. I got 9s because that’s what people say you should use when you play the blues, but it’s hard for me to accept light strings, because my bluegrass experience showed me that the heavier strings are, the better they sound. I got the DRs for the Blueshawk and the Strat, but I haven’t put them on yet. Maybe I could get away with 11s on the Riviera. I believe it has a shorter scale than the Blueshawk, so heavier strings should be easier to get away with.

If I keep up with this, eventually I’ll need a real guitar. Maybe I can make the Strat or the Blueshawk work, but my experience with the Riviera has me thinking about a serious hollow-body guitar with a Bigsby and single-coil pickups. I made myself a promise. Six months from the day I started practicing, I will buy myself an electric guitar that SMOKES. Maybe something crazy like a Collings. Why not? New Gibsons are so expensive, there is no reason not to look at obscure high-end guitars.

A vintage instrument might be a good buy, but I would only want one that had been kept in a closet. I don’t trust guitars that have been played a lot, because they’re more likely to have hidden botched repairs, and they’re more likely to be fakes. Besides, I’m pretty sure the instruments they make now are the best they’ve ever been. That’s true of acoustics, so why shouldn’t it be true of electrics?

Here’s something weird. Today I remembered how to play an entire bluegrass song, and I have no idea what the name is. “Salt” something or other, I think. I’m not sure.

Off to church. On Saturday, CeCe Winans and Papa San are having a concert at our church, and I’m going to be working as an Armorbearer. Nutty, huh? Tonight we’re hosting a band from Australia.

Life rocks.