Music
The thing that's always there, whether or not my hands are on an instrument.
There's almost always something playing in my head, and most of the time it's me, whatever I'd play if I had a guitar in my hands. It's been like that for as long as I can remember. The guitar is the instrument I can really say what I mean on, the one that feels like my own voice.
When people ask what I play, it really comes down to two things.
The first is classical guitar, solo and in ensemble. It's the disciplined side of my playing, the part that lives on precision and patience, and I love it for exactly that.
The second is improvising. I can hold my own as a jazz guitarist: I know the tunes, and I can speak the grammar. But jazz is really just the most familiar room to do it in. What I love most is making music out of nothing, improvising across any style and following where it goes. That's where I'm happiest as a player.
These days that shows up in a few places: a classical ensemble every week, sitting in with jazz players whenever I get the chance, and lately piano, which is humbling in the best way. There's something good about being a beginner at something again.
More and more, the music I'm drawn to is intimate. I love acoustic playing of every kind, and the dynamics that come with it, the way a phrase can drop to almost nothing. It's a big part of why I don't reach for an amp much anymore.
I'm just as much a listener as a player, and I go hear live music as often as I can.
What I'm listening to
A few of the artists who stay in the rotation, no matter what else comes and goes:
- BachA constant. Something in that music has always settled me.
- Pat MethenyThe soundtrack of my adult life. It's no accident one of my guitars is his signature Ibanez.
- Chris ThileA once-in-a-generation musician. I love everything he's ever done.
- Punch BrothersOne of my favorite bands, full stop.
- Angine de PoitrineHard to describe, but pure joy every time.
- Billy JoelGreat songs, and music that's uniquely New York.
- MuseA genuine breath of fresh air the first time I heard them, and still.
There are a few old videos of me playing floating around online. They aren't recent, but they're still me, and I'm happy to point you to them. I've never made a formal album, and honestly I'm fine with that. For me the playing has always been more about the doing than the recording.
- Live performance Can Spring be Far Behind? Playing with Eric Starr's group on one of his compositions: a tough tune to blow over, and a straight-ahead bebop solo I'm still proud of. →
- Live performance Quietude Another Eric Starr tune, from my synth years, played live through a Mac laptop into NI Reaktor, and still one of the best solos I've ever taken. →
- Lesson clip · TrueFire The Efficient Guitarist: Latin Groove A fully improvised clip from my Efficient Guitarist course: a rare, vivid window into how I actually think on the instrument. →
Gear
A word on gear: I'm not precious about it, with one big exception. Electric guitars come and go for me; I don't think I've held onto any of them more than ten years, and I'm forever swapping them around, though they're almost always built by people whose work I trust: John Suhr, Paul Reed Smith, and Brian Moore. My classical guitars are the opposite. I bought them in college, they were built by John Gilbert in Woodside, California, and they're never leaving the house.
Amps I barely think about. I own a pedalboard and a pile of modelers, and I genuinely love them, but when I do plug in, I'm usually happy going straight into a Fender Princeton Reverb with one cable and a touch of reverb. The one rabbit hole I've gone all the way down is the archtop, especially the designs of Jimmy D'Aquisto. His own instruments are out of my reach, but I've ended up with the next best things: a Fender D'Aquisto Elite, an Ibanez Pat Metheny, and a couple of the wonderful recreations the Japanese maker Aria built in the early 2000s. Most of what I play at home is unplugged anyway, on an archtop or the ES-330, with nothing but the pick and my hands.
One loyalty that hasn't budged in over thirty years: D'Addario. I use just about everything they make (strings, picks, tuners, cables, all of it), and as far as I'm concerned it's the best stuff on earth.
- ClassicalJohn Gilbert (Woodside, CA), since college, lifelong keepers
- ArchtopsFender D'Aquisto Elite and an Ibanez Pat Metheny, plus Aria recreations of Jimmy D'Aquisto designs
- HollowbodyGibson ES-330, a fully hollow thinline
- ElectricAlways rotating, usually Suhr, PRS, or Brian Moore (and of course a Tele; everyone needs one)
- PianoYamaha baby grand
- Amp & effectsFender Princeton Reverb when I plug in; modelers I love but rarely use
- Strings & accessoriesD'Addario, over 30 years and counting: strings, picks, tuners, cables, the best on earth
I also do a little to give back: I sit on the board of a local guitar society, trying to help the instrument find its way to more people.