“Let me see your hands, and Ill tell you if you work for a living" my favorite bartender in Ventura said to the guys at the bar. So I threw her a curve ball with show of my hands.
I wanted to share a little bit about my experience with my guitars and how my hands can get to looking after so many years of consistent dates, long performance sets and especially moist air. My fingers have 1/4 inch calus and the frets on my guitar slowly dent from patterns of repetitive hand positions.
My experience with guitars has been anything but ordinary, starting with my first old faithful Martin DXM that I played to the point of wearing out the frets twice. Yep, over seven hundred dates at Crowne Plaza and even the stainless steel frets couldn't keep up with my calus! Thanks to Byron Knight at Little Rock Frets, who helped to change out my frets each time.
You wonder how I could play the guitar so much that it started falling apart, but when life changed in California form me in 2017, I kicked into overdrive at doing solo gigs and knew the poor thing couldn't handle the amount of gigs I was going to be doing, so I needed to try something new. I purchased a black carbon fiber guitar, Acoustic Composite, made by Peavey at Santa Barbara guitar shop. Wow! I love it! But it too, had to have stainless steel frets replaced by 2019, thanks to Shaun Sanders at Sanders Amps in Carpinteria for his work.
Great tuning and an electric feel. This guitar is practically indestructible and can brave any temperature, making it the perfect match for my intended playing use and schedule. Unfortunately, Peavey stopped servicing and making these but luckily, I managed to snag the last one during the pandemic.
Now, I own two of these acoustic composite carbon fiber guitars which each have the stylistic curve that really feels great against the body, and a strength for a heavy practicing and performing schedule. They have helped me to keep performing on guitar through 500 more gigs at this writing.
Making music isn't just about all the right notes or pouring your soul into the delivery-- its also about the hand that holds and the instrument that allows letting your heartstrings sting.
So here's to the wild ride of making music, one dented fret at a time.
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