Strings

I remember my grandfather struggling to play a four string banjo. He’d lost his right thumb, so his once fluid, award-winning fingerings were blunted and awkward. He concentrated, as only a behind-the-times southern man could. He closed his eyes, and sat back in the kitchen chair, as the notes of the song echoed off the kitchen walls of a simple, north-Alabama home. The tempo became steadier, and the pure, bell-like notes rang out from an instrument which had once belonged to his grandfather.

Four generations sat silently—respectfully, and watched, as the old man slowly matched the movements of his fingers to the tempo of his tapping foot. His head began to move in time to the music. His fingering, at first unsure and soft, rose to a pure ring, and then gently subsided to a pristine, nearly muted rhythm.

Fully into his music, the old man leaned back in the chair, drawing the front chair legs inches off the pine floor. The creaking chair, the worn floor and a tapping right foot, combined with his steady fingered rhythm, as they blended the heartbeats of the generations into one.

His voice unexpectedly broke into a wavering falsetto, as he sang a song which told of cold, swirling mists, flowing softly down a mountainside. The tune was unlike anything I’d ever heard, and it wasn’t until years later that I realized he was singing harmony to a lead only he could hear. It was the only time I’ve ever heard the song, but half a century later, I can close my eyes and hear it.

First one, then another, and finally all of his sons joined in the song. The combined voices created a harmony born of respect for their father, and a love of the song. The oldest sang the lead, as his brothers, and then his sisters, wove a seamless shawl of harmony with which to gently surround the old man. Throughout it all, the banjo stayed steady and true.

The banjo, traded for a heifer calf, had been handed down from the old man’s grandfather, to his father, then, to my grandfather. Later that evening, with a few quiet words, the old man would entrust it to his eldest son. “Take it, boy, it’s yours now.”

The old man’s banjo picking and the family music it helped define, were the inspiration for my father to learn to play the guitar. I was raised in a house colored by intricate jazz chords, incessant re-tuning and the struggle to push a stubborn talent forward.

I watched my father's hands, and slowly learned how to make the chords which make the music.

I was the first, and only, left-handed guitarist of the clan. There was money for only one guitar, so I learned to play upside down and backwards. The fact that no other way occurred to me, was an accurate predictor of the path my life would take.

The last guitar I played in Vietnam cost the equivalent of seven dollars. I used it as the ultimate escape, and then gave it to one of the Vietnamese Rangers with whom I worked. It was a going away present. I was going away. He was staying. I thought he needed every shred of comfort he could find. My war ended in a plane ride. His ended in death.

After twenty years, and some success as a guitarist, my wife presented me with a beautiful Ovation acoustic/electric classical guitar as a 30^th birthday present. At her urging, I restrung the instrument, and learned to play it “correctly.”

It was during the weeks of transition, that my wife christened the guitar, “Junior.” It seemed she felt I was paying more attention to the guitar than to my three, non-acoustic/electric children.

I played that guitar, and many others, wherever my military career would lead me. Always an available, non-demanding partner, I slowly realized that those six strings afforded me solace and comfort during some of the darkest of my nights.

They still do.

The six strings introduced me to some of the closest friends I’ve known. We shared not only the instrument, but the love of the music. Those same six strings afforded another path upon which I could walk with my children. I hold my memories of watching them play and hearing them sing, in the most private and secluded part of my heart.

On her 17^th birthday, I handed my youngest daughter, my oldest guitar, the Ovation. She had long shown both the interest and the aptitude. That evening, holding her new guitar, she became the latest recipient of a six-generation tradition of music, and assumed her place (tearfully) as the caretaker of what would eventually become a seventh generation.

The technology of the 21^st Century recently allowed me to hear the voice of that generation. He is six years old, and has every bit of his parent’s talent and a little to spare. His crystal clear, pitch-perfect voice will doubtlessly be joined soon by the half size guitar, which showed up, addressed to him, on his doorstep.

There must be a law somewhere which allows a grandpa to send a gift non-Christmas/birthday gift.

Psychologists, musicologists and educators agree that music can play a pivotal role in the life and development of a child.

So can the love of a parent who recognizes and meets the unique needs and talents of their child—or any child.

I seriously doubt that my grandfather’s grandfather spent much time contemplating the ripples a traded calf would continue to make over one hundred years after his death. Sometimes, we simply follow the path we are shown, without worrying about where it leads.

One of the treasures of my life is a small, framed photograph of my youngest daughter’s oldest son. He is sitting on the floor, his long, curly blond hair threatening to engulf the camera—on his lap, his Mommy’s Ovation guitar. His great-grandfather had strummed those strings, as had his grandfather, and his mother.

The tradition lives.

It didn’t begin with my grandfather, James Lafayette, nor will it end with his grandfather’s great-great-great-great grandson.

Somewhere, a banjo beckons the musician, and the tradition is born anew.