The Ibanez AW54JR is on the small end of full-sized and features a solid mahogany top with a sleek forearm relief inlay that considerably eases right hand reach.
Picking up guitar in one’s forties, you may discover, requires hubris, humility, serendipity, and time.
It might begin with the literal picking up of a guitar that is, in simplest terms, a joy to hold, and thus not something you want to put down or leave behind. Thus, that unexpected dash to the music store in early March just before closing time (shop and world both) can get serious fast. Innocent browsing is over the instant you feel the weight of its body and its texture against your skin. (Sound seems insignificant at this point, but later you understand there had to have been frequencies you recognized.) Before you know it, you’re in full flip from recon mission to decision combat and you surrender without hesitation. Some fires just ignite without warning.
Let’s go back a bit. Yes, picking up guitar requires that there is a guitar for you to pick up. Yours might not come from a music store. Yours might not be the solid mahogany top Ibanez AW54JR. In fact, it likely won’t be, because why should the guitar that fits me like a glove even come close to fitting you?
Curious what made you want to look at guitars in the first place? You’ll have to blame your own unique sequence of reasons. Mine featured an attempt to sing with a band for a night and the blinding four-day-long migraine event that followed, but really it began with voice lessons years ago. Rhythm is how I bleed out. I came for a transfusion.
Why guitar and not piano, say, since you already have one of those? The reasons multiply. You delight in the sound, no explanations necessary. You enjoy sudden secret-handshake status with other guitarists (actual guitarists, that is), who don’t seem to mind that you’re on your baby steps (if they hear you), or have no reason not to think that you are wildly good (if they merely see you carrying). Now it gets interesting: Guitars, unlike pianos, send vibrations through the player’s body. Sitting at a piano can make the beginner tight all over, but the guitar invites the opposite. There’s more: On a piano, you have one long sequence of separate, consecutive sounds, whereas on a guitar you have six much shorter sequences that largely overlap. This means that, with the exception of the five highest and five lowest notes, each can be found on at least two different guitar strings; most can be found on three or four. Here’s what’s amazing: You’re playing the same note, but the tones you produce are subtly or clearly different. Darker, brighter, fuller, finer, deeper, cleaner, reedier, varying degrees of metallic. It’s your own orchestra, and you can take it anywhere.
For some, picking up guitar in midlife will not require choosing a teacher. At first I thought that such a loose approach suited my aggressive independence. But independence wound up no match for incompetence and impatience, so good advice triumphed and a teacher tuned precisely to my frequencies of reluctance was found. I can’t compare Michał Przerwa-Tetmajer’s guitar method with anybody else’s, but over the years I have watched many tutors at work: voice coaches, piano instructors, yoga teachers, college mentors, financial advisors. Most folks compelled to teach others or to help them grow are driven by an urgency to share what they know: they burn so hot exuding enthusiasm that their capacity for cool observation and attention to detail can be lacking. I’m discovering I get more from a quieter, more laser-focused approach—and much of it even applies directly to playing guitar.
This brings up the question of how quickly or how much you might learn, should you decide to pick up guitar in your forties. Short answer: it won’t matter. Learn you will, and the surge of wonder will align with that constant dividend growth model your money guy talks about. Modest, but dependable. Perfect, really, in these uncertain times. With every day of practice you’ll be either pleased or stunned to realize that you’re just a little bit better than you were yesterday. (At guitar, too, guaranteed.)
If your mind is keen on allusion, picking up guitar might sweep you up into full-blown transformative mode. Every tip from your teacher and every new challenge you face may rise to the ranks of a Zen-inflected life lesson. It is never too late to start something new: nurture openness. A chord already played is a past event: let it go and move on. Pace isn’t the goal, accuracy is: focus on precision, not on speed. Observe the way you bundle movements automatically: separate actions that are needlessly conjoined and study singular control over motion. Notice stray tension: welcome looseness in everything that does not unequivocally demand strength. Allow effort to dissipate: no sudden countereffort is the answer. Remember that you are a limited capacity processor: isolate sequences and complex tasks into primary parts. (Your sensei directs your attention to these observations, but you imbue them with tremendous stature all by yourself.)
One of the first things you’ll be taught is that you will have to tune your guitar every time you reach for it. You may find that this becomes a soothing activity rich with symbolism.
If your palms are sweaty, like mine sometimes get, picking up guitar might mean you leave streaky marks on it when you play, especially if you’re trying something new. This will not be a problem.
Interestingly, playing may not entail the use of a guitar pick. Not that there’s anything wrong with one, they say, but you might find no desire even to experiment with what one might feel like in your hand.
You may discover that what others described as soreness or pain was more of a tingling or a strange dissipation of sensitivity in the fingers. In fact, you might find there was very little pain, or none at all.
Picking up guitar after you hit your forties might be a lot like getting around to it when you’re still a kid, though you won’t have to ask anybody to pay for your lessons and you might catch yourself analyzing things a bit more.
In the end, all that’s really required is that you pick up your guitar pretty often. It is nice when it’s a lightweight acoustic that totally fits your frame.
