Instead of mimicking the mantra posted by a half-dozen of our former members, "I'm taking my ball and going home", I decided to go a different way. I set out to learn all of the alledged 300 songs being dropped from our library as of today. Success!
It was quite an effort, particularly so because I followed my own rule of thumb, i.e., don't move on from a new piece until the one being learned can be played three times in a row without error. T'was a big job, it was.
Needless to say my voice is a shambles (some who know me would say, 'how can you tell?') and my fingers are a mess. There's blood everywhere and my once pristine Martin and Gibson are looking kinda ragged. My 12-string Ovation stayed in its case, above the fray... and spared the frayed strings and frayed fingers.
Still, I am proud of my accomplishment and the large boost of my own repertoire. After the week's intense work I set out to count the number of newly learned songs to confirm the three hundred number but I fell asleep with my head on my keyboard. When I woke up the blood on the keys had coagulated and my face was stuck to home row. I had to call for help which wasn't easy given my faded voice.
So... I'm pretty proud of my accomplishment and amazed by what I got for GT's regular price of 50¢ per day (hardly more than a quarter if one is lucky enough to score GT's occasional discount). But, in my present condition I might have to wait until next April 1st before I do anything like this again.
john
edited
-- Chet Atkins
