An Article I Wrote For Making Music Magazine

Music Offers a New Beginning

by David J. Reid

                David Reid plays a tune for his granddaughter, Victoria. She is now eight years old and playing her own classical guitar.

I began guitar lessons as a teenager in 1964 with a teacher who played guitar, banjo, and lute. He was very much interested in the classics. I was very much interested in The Beatles. He was a controlling jerk. I was an upstart punk. We got along fabulously! Eventually, we settled on folk, specifically the music of Peter, Paul and Mary.

When I began college in 1967, I started playing music with friends and fellow "radicals." This time period saw the birth of "free form" guitar. To me, free form meant that even an amateur could fake it. In 1971, I was drafted and my guitar playing was confined to the occasional riffs on someone else's acoustic. I was discharged in 1976, and my playing continued to be sporadic at best.

As the years went by, my life and my career took off. I became a part of the "digital revolution" of the Silicon Gulch during the 1980s. I was making good money, had two pagers (cell phones were still the size of a shoe box) and was severely bloated with self-importance.

Then in 1992, I spent two days in the hospital for severe chest pain. It was not a cardiac "gotcha;" rather, it was a severe reaction to stress. As I lay in the hospital, I decided -- to this day I am not sure why -- to purchase a guitar and pursue lessons.

For six years I studied the guitar, and I became a fairly acceptable intermediate player, but life jumped into the mix once again. In 1998 I was given the opportunity to attend graduate school for a master's degree in marriage and family therapy. It was just what I was looking for to escape the Silicon Gulch mania. I was awarded a degree in 2000 and moved to Arizona to begin my practice. By 2001 I had become the clinical director of a substance abuse facility dealing primarily with the criminal justice population.

Throughout this period, I occasionally dabbled with my guitar. But I never made any concentrated effort.

In 2002, I was diagnosed with esophageal cancer. The tumor was surgically removed successfully, but I was cooked with radiation that damaged my larynx, especially the small capillaries. By February of 2004 I was unable to work due to chronic laryngeal infections. In September of 2004 my larynx was surgically removed, and I began a very long, painful, and depressing recovery.

My right arm was paralyzed by the "pectoral flap" procedure the surgeon used to rebuild my neck. It took most of 2005 to regain the use of it. When my physical therapist asked what my recovery goal was, I responded without hesitation -- I wanted to play the guitar again. It took several months for me to be able to drape my right arm over the lower bout of my classical guitar for more than ten minutes at a time.

When I finally regained most of my right arm mobility, I discovered that my muscle memory was totally shot, and the muscle memory of my left arm had also been affected. During the time that my right arm was dormant, my left arm took over and became much stronger. My fretting hand was "confused." There I was, totally disabled, unable to work in my field, with both arms screwed up. I spent most of 2006 depressed and even suicidal. I was eventually hospitalized for the safety of others and myself.

With therapy and medication I was able to deal with my depression. But I needed a new life goal. What was I going to do now?

Through the Guitar Foundation of American I found Charles Hullihan, a local guitar instructor. As it turned out, he also taught (and was the director of) the guitar program at Glendale Community College. Given the abundance of time I now found myself with, I decided to go back to school for music. I began in January, and though I certainly will never achieve concert capability, but I am confident that I will have fun in this new chapter of my life.

It seems that despite my trials and tribulations over the years, life has led me to a good place -- I now have the opportunity to go back to school and pursue music for the sheer joy of the experience. Wish me luck!