MrSamson's Guitar Background

I figured that it was the least...
that I could do for Stonedragon since he has helped me so much since I ran into him just over a year ago.

Before I get started...let me tell you a little about myself and how I got started playing guitar...

Briefly...I grew up with no music played by anyone in my family. Neither my mother nor my father played an instrument of any kind, so my musical exposure to other musicians was quite limited. My father did however play a lot of instrumental type guitar music like old surf Venture type stuff and Dwayne Eddy, hence my current liking to play that type of music.

Anyway, in high school I concentrated on sports, football to be exact. I have always been someone to do things in excess, and my commitments to football landed me a full scholarship at an NCAA school called Montana State, located in Bozeman, Montana. Where? That is exactly what I said, but hey, they were willing to pay the bills, so I went...and it was COLD!! But overall, I loved it. MUSICALLY, I again only had limited exposure to musicians, and a lot of exposure to women, keggers, and bars, so I am not complaining.

After graduating from Montana State, I moved to Vancouver Washington, where I am still today, and enrolled in graduate school at Lewis and Clark College in 1998. This is where I am still at today. About that time I realized there was something missing in my life, so I began to take an interest in playing an instrument. I honestly thought I would like playing a Saxophone best, but then something magical happened.

About that time, it was some time that summer of 1998, I took a trip to San Jose, CA to visit a friend of mine. I stayed there for a week because I had taken the time off from work, but he could not get the time off. He had a Gibson guitar, not sure of the model, but I asked him to show me how to play something...he showed me the power chord...and I was blown away. I had 20 some songs by the end of the week, none of them any good, but to me...they kicked butt because I was actually playing guitar!!

And, here I am today.

So, how did I meet Stonedragon?

Well, upon returning from San Jose, I starting parusing the local music stores, touring them almost daily, until finally one of them got sick of me coming in all the time, and made me a deal on a Ibanez guitar and a Marshall practice amp I could not pass up.

So, just like everyone else, I went home and practiced my power chords. Well, it didn't take long for that to get old, as you can imagine. So I started looking for teachers, and at about that time, I posted a question in a guitar newsgroup asking what I should do to learn how to practice...several people messaged me, one of them being Stonedragon.

He stated that he wanted to start a guitar lesson page and that he needed a true, raw, dedicated beginner to test the different lessons he was to post on it. That way he could monitor my progress to see how things were going.

Well folks, that was almost two years ago, I think around the end of July 1998, and Stonedragon and I have never looked back since.

I hope that the lessons pages helps you as much as it helped me, and I look forward to meeting you on StoneDragons guitar forum, Jam Session!!!

Click here to go back to the welcome page.

Other odd but fun tidbits...

MrSamson's guitar lessons guide.

MrSamson's current song list of MP3s. (April 7, 1999)

MrSamson's current list of guitar tabulature books.

MrSamson's "Make Your Fingers Bleed" practice regimen.

MrSamson's method of learning songs in the 21^st century.