Guitar Lessons Chapter 4: 'I Make Certain Demands'
The fourth installment of a novel in progress
My first conversation with Teacher (I never found out his real name) was brief and business-like. Yes, he said, he’d be willing to consider me as a student. But he insisted that we meet in person first, without guitars, to talk everything over.
The location: Mr. Godfrey’s, a slimy, smoky rock club renowned for slam dancing, binge drinking, and ritual vomiting. I started my career in clubs like this one. I pictured the place in my mind and seriously considered cancelling the meeting.
When the scheduled date arrived, however, I went anyway. Teacher told to arrive at 9 p.m., shortly before the band for the night was scheduled to begin. I was to look for someone seated close to the stage wearing a suit and tie. That would be him.
Few people are more maladjusted than a rock guitar player heading toward 40, I said to myself as I entered the club, snaked through the crowd, and slinked toward the stage. I’m too old for this. At age 70, Woody Herman still looked good on stage. At that age — if I live that long — what will I look like?
Then I spotted Teacher. He was sitting at a table next to an ancient Altec Voice of the Theater speaker, part of the band’s sound system. The speaker was stained with spilled food and beer.
I shuddered. Trying to talk over the noise of the assembling crowd, huddling like rats in a moldy basement, would be nearly impossible. And when the music started, it would be hopeless. At best we had 20 minutes — more or less, depending on how much time the band members decided to drink before they declared themselves unhinged enough to walk on stage.
Inhaling stale air and navigating through clouds of cigarette smoke, I eventually stumbled on Teacher’s table. He stood up and bowed. We shook hands.
“Welcome,” he said. Thank you for agreeing to meet me here. What do you think of this place? It’s not bad, really. Tonight there are fewer whores than usual.”
The person speaking these words looked like the CEO of a Fortune 500 company. He wore a dark suit, starched white shirt, and red satin tie. I remember how clean his fingernails were. In the midst of this hovel, he looked like he’d just stepped out of the shower and been dressed by a butler.
Teacher was my height but older and heavier. He was bald, too, with a thick mustache. And he spoke with a heavy accent — Russian or East European, perhaps. Sitting in front of him was a crystal clear martini garnished with a lemon slice.
This man was at once alien and familiar, like a distant relative I’d not seen for decades. The moment we made eye contact I had the vivid impression that he’d taken me in the palms of his hands and weighed me, assessing me according to some unspoken criteria.
“Sit, sit, sit,” Teacher said, spreading his hands and pointing to an empty chair. “There’s plenty of time. And we can cover everything essential in just a few minutes. Would you like anything to eat, by the way?”
I said no.
“Excellent choice,” Teacher replied. “The food here is revolting.”
I chuckled nervously and turned my head to survey the room. Then I made eye contact with him again. He smiled through an unflinching gaze, silent and staring straight into my eyes.
Finally I spoke. “Why did you want to meet here?”
“Because it is absurd,” he replied. “Because it is ugly and loud and dirty. Because having a conversation in a place like this requires real effort. And because anything worth learning requires voluntary suffering.”
It was my introduction to Teacher’s style.
“How did you hear about me?” he asked.
“A friend of mine gave me your card. To be honest, he said that you’re kind of strange.”
He chuckled, closed his eyes for a second. “I make certain demands,” he said. “As a result, some of my students simply drift away, and many of them have nothing good to say about me. People come to me filled with the illusions of youth and delusions of grandeur. They want me to confirm how wonderful they are, what marvelous guitar players they are, what brilliant careers they have ahead of them. My job is to deflate their ego at depth. I want to find out whether there is anything more fundamental hidden underneath their facade. And for that, they call me strange.”
“Okay,” I said, clearing my throat.
“Many of these fools don’t know loss or pain,” Teacher said. “And you can’t really play music until you’ve stared death in the face. My job is to reduce people to nothingness and see how they respond. If they can handle that, then I might permit them to become my students.”
I cocked my head. “I don’t get it.”
“In order to truly create something, you have to start from nothing,” Teacher said. “Otherwise you are merely rearranging material that you already know. A true musician goes from the known to the unknown, from the certain past to the uncertain future, to something that is utterly new. If people are not willing to go there, then I have no interest in teaching them.”
I smiled and sighed. “Nothingness is what brought me to you,” I said. “For years I played in rock bands. I was on the road most of the time. Then I woke up one day scared as shit. My whole life was stale coffee, booze, and bus rides. I saw that if I continued my lifestyle, I’d just grow old and die like a dog.”
Teacher stared straight into my eyes without expression and said nothing. I held his gaze with growing discomfort.
Finally he spoke. “Come see me next Tuesday afternoon at 1 pm.” He reached into a suit pocket, pulled out an elegant fountain pen, and wrote on a stained napkin that languished on our table. “Come to this address,” handing the napkin to me.
“Thanks,” I said.
Teacher stood and reached into his pocket to pull out his wallet. He left some bills on the table and then bowed to me again. “Until then,” he said.
He turned with dignity and walked away, disappearing into the crowd.
His martini remained, untouched.