Diary Of A Busker Day 680

Diary Of A Busker Day 680 Tuesday January 6th 2015 Winchester (Opposite Bellis, Time: 2:10-3:30pm).

I only came out as I was a bit depressed in the house. I’m not sure why although it might partly be because tonight’s the last lesson I give to Tom and Owen, down the road. I’ve been seeing them for 2 1/2 years, but they don’t practise at all, or in Tom’s dad’s words ‘His commitment between lessons is minimal’, and what with their GCSEs and all that school stuff. But 2 1/2 years is a long time, I suppose, when you’re 11. Anyway, ‘The end of an era’, as Owen said. Indeed, and it also means I’m down 30 quid a week!

I saw that funny old lady (maybe funny’s not the word, not in the humorous sense, as she never smiles!) who gave me the fingerless gloves, last winter I think it was. She’d just come from some cafe where she had lemon cheesecake with drizzle. At first I thought she said ‘dribble’! Lemon cheesecake with dribble. She said ‘Oh…it was to die for’.

I debuted a new song – Purple Haze, which I’ve found quite easy to do – the main riff bit, anyway – as you can bring the open low E into play while doing the higher riff. In fact, I don’t know why it’s taken me so long to do that one. Actually, it’s been in my brain as, speaking of guitar lessons, Tenzin with the rich parents and huge house, got an electric guitar – a Stratocaster copy – for an early Christmas present, so I’ve started teaching him Purple Haze.

Now, this has made me remember something that has offended me. After the lesson a few days ago, when I was teaching him Purple Haze, his mother comes in the room and asks if I can start teaching him some theory stuff: note values, time signatures, etc., ‘because he seems to have forgotten lots of things’. Then she gets out a music book of the Disney film Frozen and shows me a piece that Tenzins’s sister is learning on the piano, and the mother wants Tenzin to accompany her on his guitar.

Well, of course, I had to go through the whole ‘I’m not very good with reading traditional notation…failed in music theory in high school, and anyway, guitarists don’t usually bother with all that…’. Well, Hendrix didn’t, as far as I know. Apparently, they used to live in France and the kid had some guy – a classical sort of tutor – teach him all that stuff. Obviously completely different than my way.

Anyway, when I left the house I was really angry. I mean, the kid’s got a really good electric guitar, and an amp with a ‘crunch’ sound. Does he want to learn Purple Haze by Jimi Hendrix or some bloody awful Disney rubbish? HE wants to learn Purple Haze, but his MOTHER wants him to learn the other one. I looked up the Disney one – Frozen – on youtube, and it really is bloody awful. I mean, it’s not a guitar song. And it’s got something like 300 million views. There’s no justice.

Earnings: £13.82p

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