My New Gu(ria)n

February 24th, 2006

Many years ago, I saw a movie called “My New Gun”. It was a pretty good movie, but its most notable feature was that I saw it during a weekend in New York where I made an ill-advised pass at an old friend, and deeply disappointed another friend in the process. As I grimaced at the wreckage of this particular weekend, I knew that this couldn’t happen again.

This past November, I broke a string.

What was notable about this particular string is that I broke it five minutes into a twenty-minute set opening for Jack Hardy at the Mozaic Room. I couldn’t continue; I didn’t have time to change the string; I didn’t have a second guitar. I was truly stumped, and the only reason I’m not writing you from the performance dungeon is that Jack’s sideman, Bruce Balmer, graciously lent me one of his guitars to finish my set with. As I gingerly made my way through the fifteen remaining minutes, I knew that this couldn’t happen again.

I play a Gurian guitar. It’s an uncommon instrument – for its shape, its sound, its handmade craftmanship, and the fact that only a few thousand were ever made – and I’ve rarely encountered an instrument which suits me as well. So when I found a similar Gurian for sale in Keene, NH, I had to check it out. The shop is called Retro Guitar, and I can recommend them unreservedly; the salesperson was honest, the price was fair, and their stock was really interesting. And I walked out of that shop, pig that I am, with my second Gurian.

Of course, buying a guitar isn’t like making a pass at an old friend; it’s more like marrying someone you met an hour ago. My new Gurian is heavier. It’s got a brighter, cleaner sound. It’s not as punchy. Already, I’m realizing that this instrument is going to serve a very different purpose than I bought it for; I can see a day, not too far from now, where I switch guitars in the middle of a set because the other guitar is, heaven help me, more appropriate for the next song.

I guess the moral is that music, like life, is all about adjustment, compromise, accommodation; just as your friends may want something different from you than you thought, so might your audience, or your instrument. And the only way to honor a painful lesson is to learn something from it.

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