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I’ve mentioned this before but one of my biggest life mistakes was to slide my classical guitar under the bed thinking it was taking too much time away from my growing daughter.
One day when your kids a grown and out of the house you’ll watch those videos and they will fill you with joy.
HR
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I prefer my flamenco guitar spicy, doesn't have to be fast, should have some meat on the bones, can be raw or well done, as long as it doesn't sound like it's turning green on an elevator floor.
I went to look at a PA system and it was owned by a local singer who it turned out was married to a prominent music critic. He wanted to know how a flamenco guitarist made a living in San Francisco. As it happened I had recently done a high profile gig which he reviewed. He didn't mention my performance but wrote about the headliner. I chided him a bit and he admited he was late to the gig and missed my set.
He went on to tell me that his father had been a flamenco guitarist and he felt he had neglected his family because he spent so much time practicing. I said that flamenco guitar required a lot of time, but I could tell from the look on his face that he didn't buy it. The guy was about 50 years old and still bitter, but I took a lesson from it and decided to never short change my kids over the guitar, or the music business.
Once I took a gig on my daugther's birthday only to find out I was playing for the another persons daughter's birthday party. Last time I ever did that. I never took a guitar on family vacations and pretty much practiced after they went to bed. Went to every dance recital, every softball game, school play, etc.
I think my best memory of them and my music was when I got a couple tunes of mine played on the radio. My kids heard it and were dancing around the room. That was cool. My girls are grown and married. I have great relationships with them and their husbands. Guitar has nothing to do with it. And that is fine. I know they are proud of what I managed to accomplish with music, but it's nothing compared to their respect and love for me as their dad. Now I have a lot of time to play guitar, and zero regrets.
Kids grow up fast, and there is no going back.
quote:
ORIGINAL: ernandez R
I’ve mentioned this before but one of my biggest life mistakes was to slide my classical guitar under the bed thinking it was taking too much time away from my growing daughter.
One day when your kids a grown and out of the house you’ll watch those videos and they will fill you with joy.
Interesting ideas about music, music obsession, and both around kids. Thanks for sharing your stories.
My kids certainly come first. But I want them to hear me playing, I want our house to be a house filled with music, so that they naturally think that's what folk do... play instruments! ... I'm defo guilty of wanting to spend time practicing when my daughter wants me to play some game or other.... she's recently been learning violin and recorder. We jam together! I've never smiled so much. I'm trying to teach her some palmas so I can nail that fast buleria!
Sounds great Stu! I did send the kids to piano lessons, but it didn't take and I didn't push it. I do get to surf with my daughters though and I imagine that is a lot like playing music with them. And no one has to worry about compas, just the occasional shark.
quote:
ORIGINAL: Stu
Interesting ideas about music, music obsession, and both around kids. Thanks for sharing your stories.
My kids certainly come first. But I want them to hear me playing, I want our house to be a house filled with music, so that they naturally think that's what folk do... play instruments! ... I'm defo guilty of wanting to spend time practicing when my daughter wants me to play some game or other.... she's recently been learning violin and recorder. We jam together! I've never smiled so much. I'm trying to teach her some palmas so I can nail that fast buleria!
When I was born my father soon discovered kids can be quite a distraction from your playing. At the time he was a professional musisian and part of a small band that played life music 6 hours a day in the best night/dance clubs around were they played dance music and on top had to accompany numerous artist of all kind including flamencodancers (in the 50ties and 60ties flamencodansers traveling the world rarely did bring their own company, in stead they brought a stag of partitures being played by local orquestres like my dad's. At the time the only one bringing his own guitarist was Manolo Marín). One of those flamencodansers was a midged who was quite a womanizer and walked into my father's dressing room one day finding my father playing his brand new extremely expensive classical 1962 Ramirez guitar. "Your doing that wrong" the midget claimed after which launched an unexpected golpe to show how it should be done damaging my father's guitar in the process (on stage my father used a different guitar for flamenco).
Back to childhood. In order to fight the distractions of his newborn my father decided to take classical guitar lessons in order to force himself to do at least some amound of practice a week. I guess I was about 4 when that kind of nightclubscene stopped to exist (due to the television) after which my father was offered a job as a (classical) guitar teacher at the local music school on condition he would get his official teaching degree at Rotterdam Conservatory. 4 years later he graduated and became the new headteacher of classical guitar at Rotterdam Conservatory.
So as long as I can remember I was surrounded by (classical) guitar music and I guess it was actually the first language I ever learned. From a verry young age whenever my father practiced I used to hum/sing along with him so whenever he stopped a phrase he heard my little voice continuing the song. I soon was able to sing his complete repertoire (including de Bach suites my father would add).
The first time I was alowed to visit one of my father's classical guitar concerts I was verry surprised to hear him play those pieces uninterrupted because at home he used to study bits and peaces. When they told me they had to pay 2,5 Dutch guilders for my entrance my reaction was i would have favored the money (at precent day i'dd gladly pay a 1000 fold to see that concert again) I started playing at the age of 9 (at the time the normal age to start in classical circles) and after my father took me to a flamenco concert at the age of 12 I switched to playing Flamenco. When I was 18 my father bought me a wonderful Ramirez flamencoguitar.
I feel verry lucky good (life) music was part of my life from the verry start.
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The smaller the object of your focus the bigger the result.
So the boy is mine, but the little girl is my friend's daughter. Same girl in the trampoline in the previous video. They were living with us for some months waiting for their big move to California. Unlike my kids she actually ended up getting into guitar and singing and fronts her own rock band now! . Check out black velvet at 36:00:
Same girl in the trampoline in the previous video. They were living with us for some months waiting for their big move to California. Unlike my kids she actually ended up getting into guitar and singing and fronts her own rock band now!
Good stuff! Shame about all the hollering in the background, but that's to be expected.
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The early bird catches the worm. But the second mouse gets the cheese.
Sorry, what do I have to sign into to see this video? I've signed into Flamenco Foro and Google. No difference. Thanks.
This message started appearing on YouTube videos that are linked here, after the foro migrated to a new server or whatever, because it was old and traffic was causing it to crash. It is the typical spam protection, and is an issue on the end of YOUTUBE, due to people not always wanting their videos linked externally. It is not a fault of this foro but of YouTube algorhythms or whatever. If it annoys you, just click the video titles and open them in YouTube app. Otherwise, the message goes away if you simple refresh the foro thread a couple of times.
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Gracias Ricardo. Yes, I got there in the end. I don't think the clicking on the YouTube text thing worked. I also didn't know I'd ever logged into YouTube! But it works.
I do like seeing you play amidst the kids just doing their thing. Normally kids annoy me, but I think it's almost guaranteed they'll grow up well and secure. The music may come later.
Gracias Ricardo. Yes, I got there in the end. I don't think the clicking on the YouTube text thing worked. I also didn't know I'd ever logged into YouTube! But it works.
I do like seeing you play amidst the kids just doing their thing. Normally kids annoy me, but I think it's almost guaranteed they'll grow up well and secure. The music may come later.
Nice playing too, esp. pulgar.
Thanks. I figured, back then, it was a nice excuse for making errors and publishing unedited video. Today, I watched an outtake of some poor young lady screwing up dozens of takes of some guitar solo that in the end was only a 9 second tick tock type thing. These "perfect snap shots" everyone is forcing themselves to produce these days, is robbing people of the joy of playing an imperfect yet full length piece. I am afraid that is the future of music in general.
Meanwhile, people will do 9 hours of podcast discussing non-evidence of aliens and ufos.
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