“He was one of the first players who got into two-handed tapping, alternate tuning, that kind of stuff. I guess by the time I was 18 or 19 I’d started getting into Phil Keaggy and Michael Hedges, who I consider the Jimi Hendrix of the acoustic guitar. I started out listening to Johnny Cash and then got into the old rockabilly like Carl Perkins and Gene Vincent, then it was the blues and Stevie Ray Vaughan, Clapton, and Hendrix. “There was a period of a couple of years where I went from zero to 60. She taught me the first three or four chords I ever learned and said, ‘Jacob, if all you ever learn on the guitar is these three or four chords, you will always be able to pick up a guitar and play songs for people.’”Īfter that initial introduction, Johnson says he progressed quickly through his teen years. So she played with Ernest Tubb and Hank Snow and a lot of people like that. “When country acts would tour, they would just book a band in whatever city they were playing in. “She played with pickup bands back in the ’40s,” he says. Johnson began playing when he was 10 years old, thanks primarily to his grandmother. His sense of melody is a strong as his virtuosic playing, and his songwriting reveals a modestly bemused look at the world. Johnson glides up and down the fretboard with total confidence in a way that reminds one of Leo Kottke, barely looking at the instrument as he weaves delicate, dazzling melody lines with the occasional percussive thump on the strings. To watch Jacob Johnson play guitar is to watch someone do what he was born to do.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |