DISCOVERING WILLIE NELSON

I have to tell you as a kid growing up in the inner city, Willie Nelson wasn’t even on the radar for me. My first recollection of him was that horrible duet he did Julio Inglesias because my mom used to play that 45 on repeat. I swear I thought that by the time I was a teenager I would have to be committed into a mental institution.

See I grew up in Brooklyn. it was R&B and hiphop music. Fortunately, my dad did have a pretty eclectic record collection. I remember the Beatles and Santana. And he always played Running on Empty by Jackson Brown. My dad definitely had better taste in music than my mom. But when I was hanging with my friends, it was Kool Moe Dee and Grandmaster Flash, etc.

As an adult and being a record producer I had to open up my mind. I was actually producing a rock band and by that time, my musical tastes did expand greatly. But the thought of Willie Nelson was a definite no no.

When I got into a band that played out the guitar player who definitely came from a rock and blues background picked a lot of the songs because he knew the club abd bar scene and knew what people liked to hear. He picked a song called, Whisky River which admittedly I have never heard because I was totally against anything Willie Nelson. I mean after all if my mom liked it it cant be good, right?

When he played Whisky River I was like wow, i dig this and asked who it was by. When he said Willie Nelson, I spit out my coffee. I was repulsed. I can’t like something Willie Nelson wrote.. But i did. And I am grateful for it. I started to listen to more of his stuff and now I can see why my mom liked his stuff.

A song that stuck out to me was a pretty song he did called Always On My Mind. I immediately listened to it and picked up my guitar to try to learn it. The Always On My Mind chords seemed like something I could learn pretty easily and sing out live with the band.

I searched on YouTube in their vast library of free guitar lessons but they all seemed different or incomplete or utterly wrong. It’s actually really frustrating for someone who really is serious about learning guitar and maybe don’t really have the funds to take private lessons.

I will keep you posted when I find the perfect lesson online and let you know..