I began playing guitar when I was fourteen years old. That was in the early 1960s, just before the Beatles revolution changed the face of popular music forever.

My first guitar cost £4.00 and was probably made of recycled plywood!  By modern standards it must have been barely playable, but as I couldn't play anyway that  never occurred to me. Sheer stubbornness drove me on.

I first discovered Mississippi John Hurt’s music after I had been playing guitar for around ten years. I had strummed a lot and flat-picked a little, but finger-picking always seemed so complex and challenging that I never gave it much thought as a style I might adopt myself - until, that is, I heard a recording of Mississippi John Hurt playing 'Stack O’ Lee'.

Immediately I was entranced by his playing and gripped by a compulsion to learn to play that piece in the way that he did. So began a long affair with finger-picking and the country blues that continues more than thirty years on.

When I discovered YouTube, at last I could see as well as hear many of my guitar heroes, including Mississippi John Hurt and the Rev Gary Davis. I could also witness fellow guitarists presenting their own versions of the songs I had come to know and love. Before long, of course, I had to add my own attempts to the pile. 

Having spent most of my life teaching, but not in music, the opportunity to pass on now some of what I have learned about guitar-playing  proved irresistible.

It works for me. I just hope it works for you too!