Category Archives: Guitar

In Days Gone By

Somewhere in the bowels of this website, there’s a post entitled ‘About music’ which I wrote over 10 years ago.  It served as an explanation, reason or excuse for my indulgence in playing the guitar, a journey hampered by limited talent and no knowledge of music theory but fuelled by wishful thinking.  The post provided an account… Read More »

The Sultan of Swing – still rocking after all these years

My mate David, who had made the trek from deepest Dorset, and I were amongst the thousands who flocked to the Royal Albert Hall in London last night to pay homage to the Sultan of Swing, Mark Knopfler. On the London leg of his European ‘Privateering’ Tour, the RAH was rocking to an eclectic mix of recent… Read More »

Some new material: well, work in progress really.

Two new original instrumentals, and two vocals ‘Stay’ and ‘Hidden in my Eyes’, provided by Hayley Carter.  ‘Hidden in my Eyes’ is an original by Hayley.  ‘Aquamarine’ was the last effort that I recorded with my faithful old Yamaha AES620.  It’s gone to a new home, and has been replaced by an Epiphone Ultra-339, which features on… Read More »

Stay; Introducing Hayley Carter

One of the purposes this website has served for me is to give me an outlet to rant, rave or comment about things I enjoy, or about things that get under my skin.  Music has been a regular topic, because that’s what I enjoy; I guess it’s under my skin as well, but in the nicest possible… Read More »

All places on the verandah are taken!

The final three candidates have taken their place in music project No.2, ‘On the Verandah’.  The three, ‘In the Dark’, ‘Cassola’, and ‘In the Cittie’, are in the listing on My Music page, and are also on SoundCloud…….. and now on BandPage, but available here: Acorde on BandPage.  Acorde??? what’s that?  Well I have to… Read More »

What is this instrument?

No, this isn’t a quiz; I’ve owned this instrument for years, but I’ve no idea what it is! I acquired it from my mother-in-law’s antique shop; she didn’t know what it was either.  At the time, I did make a number of enquiries around various local music shops, but to no avail.  Then the internet… Read More »

A victory for Celtic (music)?

If you have been across to My Music pages, you will appreciate that technology has the power to mask deficiencies in musical ability 🙂  Elsewhere, I’ve written a bit about my musical provenance, which, lacking any formal background in music theory, and largely based on a shaky knowledge of three and a bit chords, has… Read More »

More music

Another candidate has made it on to the 2nd phase of my personal music project. This one is called Muppet; there’s a reason for the title, but that’s my secret 🙂 I keep wondering how many ‘latent’ musicians there are in the world. In two recent, and totally unrelated conversations I’ve come across a couple… Read More »

I’m no recording star, and that’s OK.

I read a really interesting blog post by Michael Milton ‘I’m No Guitar Hero and I’m Okay with That (Now)’, and boy, did it resonate with me.  Having devoted a fair proportion of my formative years trying to master a fourth chord to add to my previous portfolio of three, I found that a family… Read More »