shivelyguitar.com
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Hello and welcome to my guitar pages. I've enjoyed learning, playing and performing for over 3 decades and felt it was time to share some of my experiences with you. It's been quite a journey and sometimes, a wild ride, but through it all my guitar has never let me down. It has been a friend who gives unconditionaly and asks nothing in return. Thanks for visiting my guitar pages and make time to get out of the box to support live music and the arts.
Bio
I have fond memories of impromptu get-togethers listening to my mom, dad, aunts and uncles performing hillbilly gospel at our house. My pop had a ®Les Paul jr. and a small ®Kay amp ... the sound was incredible. The jam sessions at our house became less frequent and pop gradually became less interested in playing the guitar. I quit taking piano lessons and coaxed the guitar from my pop. That's how it all began.
I spent countless hours alone with that ®Les Paul jr. listening to my moms' old gospel 78's, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton and the Beatles. There was little idle time between school functions and my beloved guitar ...something had to go. I started taking private lessons with Glenn (Rocky) Snider who favored a Merle Travis hammer-style thumbpicking technique. He had no knowledge of written music but taught me basic Boogie and many chord substitutions to stimulate my creativity. I think I was probably around 12 yrs. old by this time? Rocky would pick me up in his big convertible and take me to Frontier Ranch to listen to the great players on tour. He would arrange "openings" at small mom and pop music stores so we could perform as a duo. One day Rocky said I knew all he could teach me and I never saw him again until close to his passing. We managed to play some of our early stuff and I took him to a few of my gigs. He is dearly missed and always remembered.
The late 60's absolutely exploded with new sounds and each offered a new challenge. I spent most of the money from part-time jobs and allowance on new records and equipment. I lost interest in all but the necessary school functions and began to seriously study the guitar. I rode my bike to the local clubs and sat in the alley listening to the players and watching the GoGo girls. I started interacting by joining as many garage bands as possible. I was a few years younger than the local heavies but my playing made up for the age difference. My pop split the difference with me on a brand-new 1969 ®Les Paul Deluxe from Sommers and son in Columbus ...man, that was the stuff back then! Pop cam home from work with the big, silverface ®Fender Bandmaster Reverb setup. The ®Epiphone Devon Tremelo amp became pops' new amp, now that I had the big stuff. There was no big selection of guitar strings in those days so we used to take sets of banjo strings apart just to get the light gauge E string. Overdrive was in the form of fuzztones and amps didn't have master volume controls; you turned up to get the rich, smooth, harmonic tube overdrive. The pa usually consisted of plugging a cheap mic into one of the guitar amp inputs. We played loud ...very loud. My parents would put cotton balls in the poodles' ears when the weekend jam was at our house.
My family moved to Southern Indiana halfway through my sophomore year in high school to manage a large hotel with restaurant and lounge. My room was one of the suites directly above the lounge. I was able to hear every part from every musician in the band 6 days a week so I learned the guitar and drum parts while doing homework. I worked around the hotel helping my family and getting to know the musicians that worked there. Most of the guys had families and day jobs so they were more than willing to let me fill-in when they needed a night off. I had to leave the lounge during breaks since I wasn't of legal age. One night, Jerry Hargrove, the keyboard/bass player for a group called Smile told me he was coming to take me on the road when I graduated high school and do you know what? ...he did. Jerry ended up being my mentor and gave me a crash course in music theory and reading charts. We were constantly working on ideas when we weren't on stage. From these beginnings I ended up working as sideman with The Diamonds, Chubby Checker, Lou Rawls and various show bands touring the club/motel circuit until I married and moved back to central Ohio.
I worked at Coffman music, Coyle music and managed a Lang music store while continuing to perform on weekends. I was part owner of Magic Bean recording studio and was an engineer at Rome Recording studio in Columbus, OH under Jack Casey. I took professional truck driver training at Clark State Community College in Springfield, OH and have recently retired after 15+ years of driving the big rigs. My dream has been waiting on me all these years and I've decided, once again, to teach and perform music on the guitar.
