![]() ![]() He showed me a real discipline for learning the guitar fingerboard that I transferred to the mandolin and fiddle. Later I took lessons from a guy in Denver named Dale Bruning. I took about a dozen guitar lessons from a couple people at the time, but mostly it was watching others and learning stuff from records, slowing the 33rpms down to 16rpms on the turntable. Would you comment on being described as a self-taught musician?įor someone who considers himself or herself self-taught, I got a lot of instruction! I learned some of the basics of music in grade school and then in high school, I took the chorus elective and learned some challenging harmony. It becomes very important to set up some sort of process to work through, in order to keep evolving. Sometimes I need to find somebody that’s got their own thing, some new thing, that I can learn from and respond to. I had that experience with Darrell Scott in Nashville, and with Steve Cooney in Ireland when I met him. Some people, you meet them and play a few bars together and know immediately they’re kindred spirits. My sister knows my phrasing better than anyone -she probably taught it to me. After a while, those musical friends can make music they’ve never made before, with less work and almost no discussion, because they know each other’s language better. As a result, you tend to do more with the stuff that works naturally, and you keep heading in the same direction together. Some people really click when playing together and some don’t so much. Certain things work and certain other things don’t. You watched for the right chemistry and then you used it in your favour. Later, especially after becoming the front man in Hot Rize, I started paying more attention to precision and direction. I was lame at sports, so music helped my self-esteem. I reached into any situation I could as a guitarist, though, not just because it was fun, but because it was something I could do. The stakes were low, and we just had fun. That was a great thing in the mid 60’s and after, everyone was playing music informally. That set things up so I could make lots of them! Then you really learn. I guess as a result, I wasn’t afraid of making mistakes. And soon after I learned a few scales and chords, I could make up simple lines to go with stuff. Singing in church or at camp, I was always able to find harmony parts. Please talk about musical chemistry with other musicians – instant karma versus learned synergy, versus family familiarity or something like that. He wasn’t around much when I was growing up, but we’ve since become really close. He taught me a Latin beat on the bongos before I learned guitar. My cousin Tony Ames plays first chair percussion in the National Symphony in Washington DC, he’s about ten years older than me. My mom’s brother played piano well, and there are various cousins on my dad’s side that play and sing, though I wasn’t much aware of that fact until much later. My parents sang for fun, just a verse or two in the middle of doing something else. My sister started singing and playing before me, and my oldest brother sang some doo-op for fun. I was able to get her to sing harmony on two songs on my next record. You’ve put out a few CDs with your sister Mollie. If for some reason, you absolutely could not make music now, what would you do instead? After unloading a truckload of flagstone one day, my back told me to work harder on my guitar playing. There was some hard physical labour there and I didn’t hold up to too well. After I quit school, I worked at a tree nursery to save money to buy a car and go on my walkabout. I taught skiing there, believe it or not, and at one point I drove tourists around on a little train. I worked in the public park in my hometown, picking up trash, then graduated to more responsibility. Have you had to do other jobs to support yourself along the way to where you are now, and if so, what was the most interesting or the most odd? ![]() One of my earliest memories is running into the kitchen to tell my mom that the cowboys were on TV. My friends had cheap electric guitars and I’d been learning riffs on one string – like the theme from Peter Gunn - from them before I got my own guitar.Īs a child, did you ever want to be anything other than a musician – you know, the usual – truck driver, fireman, pilot etc? “Go Tell Aunt Rhodey” and “Down in the Valley” with one the one finger C chord and the one ginger G7 chord. I learned a few Christmas songs that November and then got a little Harmony guitar and taught myself from a beginner’s guitar book. I was 12 years old and my sister was taking piano lessons and I had started fooling with the piano, so my parents offered to give me lessons. When, for example, did you first pick up an instrument, and what were the circumstances? Tell us a bit about the young Tim O’Brien.
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