It's been a while since my first post but I'm back again, this time with some actual songwriting under my belt. I won't even remotely claim to know what I'm doing as a songwriter but in the last year and a half I've been in 3 bands, each one progressively more important to my personal musical development. My guitar teacher, Jeff Adkins, told me a few years ago "you're ready-you just need to join a working band!"
It's one thing to sit and play along to a "record" and another to actually play with live humans.
Thoughts on my next posts:
- the obsession with technical virtuosity versus creativity
- how to start from scratch (work in progress)
- letting yourself make mistakes
Monday, August 1, 2011
Monday, February 1, 2010
Hello
Hi! I'm Rich B. and I live in the Orlando area. I started this blog to allow those who love to play and create music to share thoughts and ideas on their creative process.
The title here is from the model name of my favorite guitar, the Gibson Songwriter Deluxe. I first heard one played in Baltimore in 2008 in a little club in Fell's Point. A girl named Bonnie was rocking the house with her one-woman show. She was something to listen to: she had soul, a great voice and she knew how to play her Gibson. Once I heard it I knew I had to have one (a Gibson songwrtiter deluxe cutaway, that is.) A month later and after many late nights on eBay, I had one in my possession. She's my pride and joy so I call her "PJ."
It has been a lifelong dream of mine to "play out." I've always loved to sing and when I was a kid, I decided to take up guitar to accompany myself. It's been a slow process and I've been discouraged along the way and have "given it up" more than once. That was what was so remarkable about PJ. I was so taken by the sound that I wanted to keep playing. It made me a better musician and has helped me get to where I am today with my music.
After almost three decades of playing, I'm finally in a cover band and we are doing it. We have been together now for about seven months and have played out several times. Some were good, some not so much. But you should hear us in rehearsal. We're getting better all the time and our pace of learning a song well enough to play out has gone from one song per month to one a week. And it's not about the money; it's about the joy of making music.
The next step: creating original music. And it starts here. I want to share my creative process with you and hopefully I can get some ideas from you, too. That's enough for now. I wrote my first song today, at least the first draft of it. In the coming days, I'll write about how I did it and some of the things I encountered along the way.
Rock on!
Rich B.
The title here is from the model name of my favorite guitar, the Gibson Songwriter Deluxe. I first heard one played in Baltimore in 2008 in a little club in Fell's Point. A girl named Bonnie was rocking the house with her one-woman show. She was something to listen to: she had soul, a great voice and she knew how to play her Gibson. Once I heard it I knew I had to have one (a Gibson songwrtiter deluxe cutaway, that is.) A month later and after many late nights on eBay, I had one in my possession. She's my pride and joy so I call her "PJ."
It has been a lifelong dream of mine to "play out." I've always loved to sing and when I was a kid, I decided to take up guitar to accompany myself. It's been a slow process and I've been discouraged along the way and have "given it up" more than once. That was what was so remarkable about PJ. I was so taken by the sound that I wanted to keep playing. It made me a better musician and has helped me get to where I am today with my music.
After almost three decades of playing, I'm finally in a cover band and we are doing it. We have been together now for about seven months and have played out several times. Some were good, some not so much. But you should hear us in rehearsal. We're getting better all the time and our pace of learning a song well enough to play out has gone from one song per month to one a week. And it's not about the money; it's about the joy of making music.
The next step: creating original music. And it starts here. I want to share my creative process with you and hopefully I can get some ideas from you, too. That's enough for now. I wrote my first song today, at least the first draft of it. In the coming days, I'll write about how I did it and some of the things I encountered along the way.
Rock on!
Rich B.
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