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<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<The Acoustic Guitar Wire<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
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1. Welcome to the Acoustic Guitar Wire No. 5
2. Music news: Fahey, Guitar Talk Open Mics
3. Meet David Hamburger, the Classical Corner, and more!
4. Tips and advice: amazing guitar myths debunked
5. Highlights from upcoming issues of Acoustic Guitar
6. Breezy Ridge news
7. RainSong jumbo guitar giveaway
8. Vintage Guitars: An essential new book from SLP
9. Win a free CD!
10. A tale from the limelight
11. A.G. Wire archives

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Welcome to the Acoustic Guitar Wire No. 5.
We bring you the latest acoustic music news, information
about happenings on-line, advance notice of special offers
and giveaways, previews of new publications and recordings
from String Letter Publishing, and a few jokes, plus tips
and advice about guitars, gear, and playing.
This newsletter is best viewed in 10-point Courier.
Our hyperlinks are formatted to be "hot" in most mail
readers. If your reader doesn't support click-through
linking from e-mail, just cut and paste the URLs into your
Web browser.

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Music News
In Memory: John Fahey Guitar Talk Open Mics
For many of us, John Fahey was our first introduction to the
world of fingerstyle guitar. It is with great sadness that
we note the passing of the legendary guitarist in Salem,
Oregon, on Thursday, February 22. Fahey was among the 20th
century's most influential guitarists, with a style that
embraced country blues, mountain music, Indian ragas, jazz,
Tin Pan Alley, and psychedelia. His eccentric instrumental
musings paved the way for much of today's modern fingerstyle
guitar music. We will run a complete obituary in the next
issue of Acoustic Guitar. In the meantime, read more about
Fahey at http://www.johnfahey.com

Guitar Talk Open Mics
Two events this month bring together members of the Guitar
Talk forums for real-world connections. These Guitar Talk
Open Mics will be an opportunity for on-line pals to meet,
greet, compare axes, pick a little, and get to know one
another beyond the limits of the virtual guitar village.
On Saturday, March 24, folks from the left-hand coast gather
in Livermore, California at the Fretted Friends music shop.
On Saturday, March 31, the good folks in the heartland
gather at Front Porch Music in Valparaiso, Indiana.
Get the details in the Guitar Talk Players Forum, or go to
http://www.acousticguitar.com/outreach/meetag.shtml

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Whew! Lots going on at Acoustic Guitar Central this week.
Meet David Hamburger! David is a regular contributor to
Acoustic Guitar magazine, and his thoughtful articles and
zippy lessons are always a highlight. David will be our
guest host in the Playing Guitar forum in Guitar Talk this
Friday, March 16. This is your opportunity to ask David
about all aspects of slide, blues, and swing guitar playing.
To read more about David Hamburger, go to
http://www.acousticguitar.com/forum/hamburger.html

To join the chat, just go to Guitar Talk. If you aren't
already a registered user, sign up today and enter to win a
free Seiko electronic tuner.
http://www.acousticguitar.com/ubbcgi/Ultimate.cgi?action=agree

By the way, there is a new free guitar lesson with David
Hamburger on-line at
http://www.acousticguitar.com/lessons/slide/1.shtml

This lesson from our new Acoustic Guitar Slide Basics book
will help you learn the fundamentals of single-string melody
playing on acoustic slide guitar in open-D tuning. You'll
learn how to embellish a basic melody with grace notes,
triplets, and muting, and you'll learn how to use these
elements to play a simple blues piece.

Introducing: The Classical Corner
We've added a new forum to Guitar Talk for classical-guitar
enthusiasts, Latin-music fans, flamenco mavens, twelve-fret
chauvinists, and anyone who has questions or opinions about
the craft, lore, and technique of the nylon-string guitar.
Your host and moderator for this ongoing forum is Pauline
Leland, but the editors of Acoustic Guitar will be chiming
in, too. Have fun!

And did we mention. . .

We updated www.acousticguitar.com this week with new content
from the April issue of Acoustic Guitar magazine. Read an
exclusive interview with English folk sensation Kate Rusby.
http://www.acousticguitar.com/issues/ag100/feature100.shtml

We also added the latest CD reviews, new artists' gear
profiles, and more. See it all at
http://www.acousticguitar.com

Meet A.G.
We have a new section on our Web site so that you can find
out about the events where you can meet members of the
Acoustic Guitar team. Discover where Scott Nygaard will be
next week when you go to:
http://www.acousticguitar.com/outreach/meetag.shtml

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Tips and Advice: Two More Common Guitar Myths Debunked
The Acoustic Guitar Owner's Manual is chock-full of handy
information for keeping your instrument in good playing
condition. In one chapter, contributing editor Richard
Johnston of Gryphon Stringed Instruments debunks common
myths about the acoustic guitar. We've been sharing these
tips with A.G. Wire readers each month. Here are two more.

Myth No. 5:
Cracks in the top ruin the sound.
Actually, lots of people are afraid cracks anywhere in a
guitar hurt the sound. Believe it or not, multiple cracks in
the soundboard of a guitar will not harm the sound at all if
repaired properly, unless they've caused loose braces or
other structural weakness. While cracks in the back and
sides should also be repaired to prevent them from
spreading, they have even less effect on tone or volume.
This is not to say that cracks don't hurt the value of a
guitar, however.

Myth No. 6
Scalloped-brace guitars always sound better than ones made
with straight or merely tapered bracing.
The same logic found in the tight-grained tops myth above
can be applied here, and many top-ranked builders do not
scallop their top's braces. But in the bad old days, big
manufacturers often overbraced their guitars to prevent any
chance of a warranty claim, regardless of the string gauge
used or how the guitar was mistreated. When scalloped-brace
guitars were first made available again 20-plus years ago,
they often did sound better than the stiffly braced guitars
common to that era.

For more tips and advice, be sure to check out the
Acoustic Guitar Owner's Manual:
http://www.acousticguitar.com/books/Guidebooks.html#agom

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Highlights from upcoming issues of Acoustic Guitar magazine:
The May issue (No. 101) will be hitting the newsstands in a
couple of weeks, and it's our big blues special.
Look for feature stories on Keb' Mo', Eric Bibb, and Jerry
Ricks, with lots of music to play. Plus a review of
beginner guitar kits, music to play by Joni Mitchell and
more.

Coming Soon:
-The Man in Black--Johnny Cash--graces our June cover.
-July features the Classical Guitar Special.
-Emmylou Harris gives us an exclusive in the August issue.
-Gear, gear, gear! (Did we mention gear?)
Don't miss out on any of these great features! Subscribe to
Acoustic Guitar today. Sign up on-line at
www.acousticguitar.com/service/service.html#subscribe or
call toll free (800) 827-6837.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~SPONSOR~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
John Pearse® Strings & Breezy Ridge® are proud to be the
first official sponsors of the Acoustic Guitar Wire! We
invite you to visit our revamped Web site at
http://www.jpstrings.com
You'll be surprised at the variety of John Pearse® string
sets we offer--or custom design your own set with our
Singles Selection. Our new Nuages® Guitare Manouche strings
are gaining recognition worldwide! The New Products Page
includes the K'Saire(tm) Humidifying System and Li'l
Nipper(tm) String Winder. The Luthiers, Dealers and
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Endorsees Page shows who is using them!
"Music Really Does Make the World a Better Place!"
Thank you!

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Giveaways
Enter our to win a great new JM1000 jumbo guitar from
RainSong. Get the details at
http://www.acousticguitar.com/giveaway2/rainsong/index.html

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New from Stringletter Publishing
Vintage Guitars: A Musical History
Reserve your special limited edition copy at a savings of
20%
Vintage Guitars: A Musical History is the first pictorial
reference work to offer guitar enthusiasts, players, and
collectors an opportunity to explore the eventful, perpetual
give-and-take between musicians and instrument makers that
produced America's popular music and its quintessential
instrument.
--Generously illustrated with more than 150 photographs of
players, instruments, catalog pages, and other memorabilia.
--Features everything from the elegant American guitars of
the 19th century to the evolving dreadnought, jumbo, 12-
string, archtop, resophonic, and more--the original
instruments as well as contemporary incarnations and
reissues.
--Spotlights the guitars of Leadbelly, Jimmie Rodgers, the
Everly Brothers, Tony Rice, Emmylou Harris, Ben Harper, and
others.

**You are invited to acquire the limited edition now, in
advance of publication. If your order is received before
June 1, 2001, your price is $80.00, a savings of 20%. You
will receive your book by the beginning of July 2001.**

**Only three hundred hardbound volumes will be produced and
will not be reprinted. Each slip-cased limited edition is
individually numbered and signed.**

Vintage Guitars, Limited Edition (152 pp.) #21330781
$80.00 (if ordered before 6/1/01)
http://www.acousticguitar.com/books/Guidebooks.html

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Win a Free CD!
We're giving away a free CD of acoustic-guitar music to the
contributor of the best music joke or gig story. To enter,
simply send your favorite music joke or anecdote about a
gig from hell to mailto:jokes@stringletter.com. Be sure to
include a mailing address in case you win. We'll award a
new prize with each edition. Our prizewinner this month is
Karl Fergen, who relates this tale from his gig diary.

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The Big Gig
I had auditioned for a new band on Saturday. The audition
went well and they asked me join the band, telling me the
next practice was going to be Monday. When I showed up on
Monday they informed me that we had a gig on Saturday, the
last night that a popular local club was going to be open.
No worry, I had almost 5 days to learn 30 originals. The
night of the gig came and off we traveled the 40 miles to
the club. We were to be the opening act for a "local" band
with a good following. Setup, sound check, and all the
prelims went well, so off we went for dinner. We returned
later to find close to 500 people in the bar. No worries,
we were cool. The time comes and we hop on stage. This is
1983 and the band's music is best described as pop/rock/new
wave--lots of energy and heavy on the bass guitar--that's
me. The first song starts off kind of mellow with a bass and
guitar intro then slaps into the main drive riff. Everything
is fine until we hit this point. As we hit the first big
note I turn and step towards the lead guitarist and suddenly
my sound is gone. I'm looking around trying to find the
reason; checking my amp then my stomp box when out of the
corner of my eye I see the sound man--fortunately a good
friend--waving at me and then making a motion like plugging
in a guitar. Looking down I see that in my haste to axe up I
had forgotten to put my cord through my strap as I normally
would and with my first big step I had planted my foot
firmly on my cord and unplugged myself! Luckily the stage
lights masked what must have been a full red flush from my
embarrassment. Luckily the rest of the set went without a
hitch.

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Free back issues of the A.G. Wire are available on-line at:
http://www.acousticguitar.com/wire_archive/index.shtml

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mailto:agwire@stringletter.com
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