WEBVTT
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you
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Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to The Harmonious Blacksmith.
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I am your host, Kevin Patrick Fleming, and today is really, really a very, very momentous occasion.
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Today is my very first interview in a series of interviews.
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But I thought I'd start with giving my listeners really what I should have given them a long time ago.
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I mean, I'm 22 episodes in.
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And you really don't know anything about who the blacksmith is.
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So today's episode is called Meet the Blacksmith.
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Thank you.
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Thank you.
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Thank you.
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And this is, of course, episode number 22 of season number two.
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I do appreciate you joining me, y'all.
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And I am just too excited not to tell you what is coming up on my podcast very soon.
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And that is multiple interviews with many musicians who are entrenched in music theory for one reason or another.
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So in other words, I'll be interviewing people locally and afar.
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I will be interviewing amateurs and I will also be interviewing professionals.
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What I'm really trying to get at is how does music theory affect your life?
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Why is it useful?
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Why should I learn it?
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Why should I spend time studying music theory at all when I can just pick up my instrument and learn things by ear?
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There are a lot of Thank you very much for checking that out.
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And so, without further ado, Adieu.
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Interview number one in my series is with The Harmonious Blacksmith.
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okay so i am going to be the interviewer as kevin patrick fleming or kevin or kpf and i will be interviewing the harmonious blacksmith who will be referred to by that name or by hb let's get started so mr harmonious blacksmith yes welcome to my podcast thank you and how are we doing today my friend oh i'm doing great thank you so so much for having me on of course kpf i am so excited to be here my friend thanks for the interview and i really hope that i can engage your audience with a lot of great information and content today oh that's awesome we're so glad to have you on the program hb thank you look we're gonna start you off with a few easy things great general things and then we'll narrow as we go more into music theory which as you know is what my podcast is all about yes sir let's Let's start with some basics.
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Nice.
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People out there, they want to know where you're from and how you grew up.
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Okay.
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So however you want to answer that, however specific and general, let's start with that.
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All right.
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As you know, my name is Kevin Patrick Fleming.
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Welcome.
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I was born in Galesburg, Illinois, USA.
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Okay.
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And on my mother's side, I'm first generation...
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Born right here in the United States.
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Oh, wow.
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My mother was born in Vienna, Austria.
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Oh, wow.
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And she came over in the mid 20th century as an immigrant.
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And then fast forward and I was born in Illinois in 1977.
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Oh, nice.
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The year of the original Star Wars.
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Yeah, that is correct.
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Okay.
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Yeah.
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My mom actually bought me a Star Wars 1977 Oh! Nice! Oh yeah, that's pretty epic, man.
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That's awesome.
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Yeah, it is cool.
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I've always sort of held Star Wars pretty personally because of that.
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So to continue, my father was out of the picture when I was really, really young.
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And that's really all I'm going to say about that.
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But my mother eventually moved to Texas where she got remarried to my stepfather and And we eventually moved to the East Coast in places like North Carolina and Georgia in the southeastern United States.
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Excellent.
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Excellent places to live.
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Thank you for that.
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Of course.
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Now, I'm really interested in what the harmonious blacksmith was doing as a child.
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When did you get into music?
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How did that happen?
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But really on top of that, what are the other things that you really grew up enjoying?
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Okay.
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Yeah.
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All right.
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So I'll go ahead and tell you this.
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Let's start with this.
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I started playing music when I was about 10 years old.
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Okay.
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Maybe 11.
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It's somewhere in there.
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And that's when I got my first guitar, which was a Harmony brand electric guitar.
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My mom knew that I had this huge desire to play because I had a best friend who was taking lessons and playing, and I heard him play stairway to The Great Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin or live the musician lifestyle weren't as into sports as I was and as I am.
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Now, I'm not pigeonholing musicians here.
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Okay.
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Keep in mind.
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That's all right.
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I'm just saying in general, that's the way it is.
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True.
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But I first learned sports in Houston, Texas, where if you were a boy and you could put the pads on, you learned how to play football.
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Oh, football.
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Yes, that's right.
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I was a football player growing up, and I actually played for seven years.
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It was all just as a kid.
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Football, you played soccer.
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That is a lot of sports for somebody who ended up doing mainly music.
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That's pretty impressive, actually.
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Thank you.
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You sound like a pretty well-rounded guy.
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I appreciate it.
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Excellent.
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I love that.
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Thank you.
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All right, so let's fast forward a little bit.
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Sure.
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And let's find out how you, you know, once you were mesmerized by Stairway to Heaven, your friend played it and you were mesmerized.
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Yes, sir.
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And you had to play music.
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Let's start from there.
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How does that elevate into into getting more serious about music and eventually taking it on as your lifelong love and profession in adulthood.
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Got the guitar.
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I eventually wanted to upgrade to an acoustic guitar, and here's a life lesson that not a lot of kids get these days.
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Uh-oh.
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I know.
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I'm going to sound like that old guy.
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Stay off my lawn.
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That's what I sound like right now.
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I get that.
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That's funny.
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But my parents made me do yard work every weekend for a month just to get about a$100 Alvarez Regent acoustic guitar, which was much, much better than the chintzy little Harmony that I had.
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I got for 30 bucks originally.
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Oh, nice.
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A working man.
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And despite all the stories of sports, I really was an introvert.
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We moved a lot.
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I moved in the middle of my ninth grade year in high school.
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And if you've never done that and you have no idea what that's like, it's really, really hard.
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Yeah, that had to be tough.
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You end up moving to a school where people have been growing up together.
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They all know each other.
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And you're just this outsider that came from somewhere.
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So needless to say, it was hard to make friends.
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I'd I became very introverted, and guess what?
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I used to go home, get off the bus, and I used to go up to my bedroom and close the door and play guitar until my mom called me for dinner.
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I did that for many, many, many, many days in high school before I got a little bit more popular and had some friends and some hangouts by the time I was a junior and senior.
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But really, my freshman and sophomore year were spent learning to play the guitar.
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Beautiful.
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And just to give you an idea of how obsessed I was.
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I used to play so much that I would wear my fingers raw and my fretting hand and yet I would just put band-aids on them so I could keep playing.
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That's how obsessed I was when I was a teenager.
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My God, that is a whole other level of obsessed.
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I don't know that I know anybody else that hurt themselves, put the band-aids on and then kept going and continuing to hurt themselves simply because they wanted to play so much.
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Okay, so now we've got young Kevin Fleming, born in the United States in Gettysburg, Illinois, in the year of Star Wars, grew up playing sports, moved around a bit here and there, but eventually got obsessed with music.
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So I think what the audience wants to know now is how did that progress to something more serious?
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And how and when did you decide to go into academia or become a professional musician?
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or how did all that come about?
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Ah, okay, I see.
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Well, let me start that part of the story by telling you a quick little anecdote.
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Ooh, everybody loves stories.
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After I had studied music for a while and my parents knew I was gonna go into the profession, even though they didn't want me to for economic reasons, if I ever complained anything money-wise, my mother used to say, well, that was the choice you made.
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And my immediate response What choice?
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So I just wanted to start with that so that you know where I'm coming from.
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Yeah.
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Let's fast forward a little bit.
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That was great.
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I had a bass player, and I played guitar.
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We were really instrumental in the beginning, and the very first epic song we played was called Are You Gonna Go My Way by Lenny Kravitz.
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Oh, I remember that one.
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Yes, for all you youngsters out there, you probably don't know what that is.
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Go ahead and cue it up in your streaming.
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I promise you won't regret it.
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It's a really cool track, but I will never forget that that was the first cover I played with my first rock band.
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Oh, wow, that's great.
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Thank you.
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Thank you for sharing that anecdote.
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My pleasure.
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Yeah, that's great.
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Everything that led you from Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin all the way to Are You Gonna Go My Way by Lenny Kravitz.
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But I thought somewhere in there that you ended up being a classical guitarist.
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This doesn't necessarily sound like you're ending up in the classical guitar chair with a footstool on the ground.
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How did that happen?
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I think the audience wants to know.
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Okay, I'm good with that.
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How you arrived as a classical guitarist.
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Okay, actually, my story with that is not as uncommon as you might think.
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A lot of my classical guitar friends in music school, as I'm going to tell you how I got there, really did come from a similar background that I did.
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Learning to play electric guitar, getting obsessed with music, building your chops, playing hard rock and heavy metal and things like that.
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Oh, wow.
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And then eventually, a friend of mine took me to a concert in downtown Marietta, Georgia, where for the first time I got to see the great Christopher Parkinney, the prodigal student of the great Andre Segovia, who is, of course, the father of the modern classical guitar.
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Oh, wow.
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So you were introduced to classical guitar by hearing one of the greats in modern time, Christopher Parkinney.
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Yes.
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Like a direct student from the great Andre Segovia.
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The student.
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Who, of course, brought the entire school of guitar over to the United States.
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Yes, he did.
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Okay, so now we're getting to the nitty gritty.
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A friend drags you to a Christopher Parkening concert.
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You're obviously going to be moved by it.
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Oh, yeah.
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And then your trajectory changes at that point.
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Correct?
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For your life?
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Well, not immediately.
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But, yeah, ultimately it did.
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I think I was considering music really not as a profession.
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Oh, really?
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I should go ahead and tell you this.
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When I was about to start college, I actually had a rock band that was doing quite well and possibly about to go on tour.
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Oh, wow.
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That's cool.
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But I really wanted to go to college, and I knew I was going to go to college instead of drifting off with a rock band.
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So I got into Georgia Tech in Atlanta.
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Oh, my freshman year was like a no brainer.
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You got to go to Georgia Tech.
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That's a great school.
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That's an incredible school.
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So I was a civil engineering major for a year of all things.
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Wow.
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But I would have never guessed that was at Georgia Tech.
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All I did was spend a lot of time dreaming about playing music and guitar.
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And I realized that that would become my life.
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Wow.
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If I did not make a decision to go back into music after my freshman year, which is what I did then I probably would be sitting in an office staring out a window dreaming of playing music dreaming of teaching music and being entrenched in it and ultimately that's the decision I make and I never looked back and I have never ever regretted it so you took the plunge wow so you were an engineering major at a prestigious school like Georgia Tech yes sir I mean the That is huge.
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That is such a good school.
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And you were able to walk away from that and go to music.
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So, all right.
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So what's the next chapter then after you attended Georgia Tech?
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Well, I'm so glad that you asked.
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Well, first of all, after both of my parents almost losing their minds that I was going to leave a school like Tech to go to a smaller school and become a music major of all things was definitely an event in my life.
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I can imagine.
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I met some friends, some future friends, one of which was my first teacher of classical guitar one summer.
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And he introduced me to one Mary Ackerman, who was really the classical guitar teacher that I had the longest in life.
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I studied with her for like almost five years.
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Wow.
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Nice.
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And thank goodness I did.
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She was a fantastic teacher, an incredible player, an amazing human being.
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I will always have love for Mary Ackerman and I will always have humble and gracious thanks for everything she gave to me.
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That's beautiful.
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Honestly, once I was under her wing, that was it.
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I mean, I knew this is what I was going to do.
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I knew that classical guitar was going to be the path that I was going to pursue.
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And ultimately I did.
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And I earned my bachelor's degree in classical guitar performance at Kennesaw State University.
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Little old Kennesaw.
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And I eventually followed the path of my teacher, Mary A.
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Kerbin.
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I went on to learn from her former teacher, the late, great Bruce Holzman.
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Oh, isn't that cool?
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Anybody in classical guitar circles knows that name.
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I mean, Bruce Holzman, thankfully, is just a world-renowned pedagogical master when it comes to guitar.
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I mean, just really, really a Jedi.
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Night, if you will.
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It used to blow my mind how much he could problem solve in any situation of any piece, no matter what.
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And once I came out of there, you really feel like you can play anything after you are under his tutelage for a while.
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And I really felt like that.
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And so I earned my master's from the Florida State University under the late, great awesome all right now we're getting somewhere so now you have you're entrenched in academia definitely you've got a bachelor's degree you've got a master's degree this is obviously going somewhere in your profession and of course um apropos to this program uh we're getting to how you became a music theory uh jedi knight so to speak i'll go ahead and give you that title and um i'll be interested to know what's So what is the next part of the story?
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Okay, well, I should go ahead and tell you that I was really intense in classical guitar for an entire decade and really the rest of my life.
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But the reason I mentioned a decade is because I did enter the competition circuit.
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Oh, wow.
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And I just didn't want to forget to mention that I was a part of that.
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I ended up winning a lower level college competition in the state of Georgia.
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Nice.
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I also ended up winning a first prize in a statewide competition in Mississippi.
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Excellent.
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And I also ended up winning a fourth prize in an international guitar competition in North Carolina.
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Wow.
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Congratulations.
00:21:11.692 --> 00:21:18.760
So I just wanted to mention that so you know how serious I was and how entrenched I was in classical guitar.
00:21:19.000 --> 00:21:20.041
That's pretty serious.
00:21:20.442 --> 00:21:25.567
But after I got my master's, I ended up at the ripe old age of 20.
00:21:25.647 --> 00:21:33.316
I became an assistant professor of guitar at a college in the middle of Georgia.
00:21:33.355 --> 00:21:49.192
And it really was incredible because my second year there at the ripe old age of 25, Elliot Fisk, the great Elliot Fisk, came and played a concert at my school and I got to meet him and talk to him.
00:21:49.713 --> 00:21:50.894
It was a real pleasure.
00:21:50.914 --> 00:21:54.538
If you don't know who Elliot Fisk is, go ahead and check him out.
00:21:54.578 --> 00:21:59.084
He's kind of an old school One of those old school original guitar players.
00:22:00.384 --> 00:22:04.589
You know, if we're going with all the Star Wars analogies that we've been going with.
00:22:04.910 --> 00:22:05.490
Why not?
00:22:05.550 --> 00:22:08.534
He's kind of an Obi-Wan type, you know?
00:22:08.834 --> 00:22:09.174
Nice.
00:22:09.815 --> 00:22:16.442
And here we are like 22 minutes into this interview and I haven't even talked about music theory, I realize.
00:22:17.163 --> 00:22:19.806
Obviously, a lot of background was needed to get here.
00:22:19.846 --> 00:22:20.286
Of course.
00:22:20.527 --> 00:22:20.906
Of course.
00:22:20.946 --> 00:22:26.952
The truth is, I eventually ended up as a doctoral assistant, a graduate Oh, my.
00:22:30.616 --> 00:22:35.803
Excellent.
00:22:39.747 --> 00:22:55.503
It was really more about just my level of curiosity.
00:22:55.503 --> 00:22:57.546
about music theory.
00:22:57.586 --> 00:23:20.210
And just to circle back and give a little full context, let me remind you, because of the stigma that comes with classical musicians, and there is one, and I've experienced it constantly after becoming a classical musician, I always remind people that I was a self-learned musician in my teenage years.
00:23:20.230 --> 00:23:21.251
Ah, self-learned.
00:23:22.272 --> 00:23:28.578
Yes, I was self-learned as a musician before I ever had a really good teacher in Mary Ackerman.
00:23:29.400 --> 00:23:37.548
And I want to remind people of that because my beginnings weren't in that kind of intense classical environment.
00:23:37.608 --> 00:23:41.413
They were just a kid just messing around with a guitar.
00:23:41.452 --> 00:23:53.465
And because of that, I'm telling you that story because once I started studying music theory in college, a lot of times when I was in a class, and by the way, I was like a kid in a candy store.
00:23:53.486 --> 00:23:55.167
I loved it.
00:23:55.188 --> 00:23:55.407
I ate it up.
00:23:55.407 --> 00:24:04.478
But when I was in class, I had a lot of moments where I was being taught something where light bulbs went on and I was like, so that's what you call that?
00:24:06.118 --> 00:24:07.560
Oh, I know what that is.
00:24:07.780 --> 00:24:10.463
I just didn't know it had a name like that.
00:24:10.503 --> 00:24:10.865
I see.
00:24:11.464 --> 00:24:13.227
Things like that happen so much.
00:24:13.267 --> 00:24:19.574
And I think that would happen for a lot of you out there if you're, you know, not a formally trained musician.
00:24:19.614 --> 00:24:20.555
You don't have to be.
00:24:20.615 --> 00:24:21.836
It's not necessary.
00:24:22.176 --> 00:24:22.896
That's right.
00:24:22.957 --> 00:24:25.359
Like I said, I don't come from that originally.
00:24:25.359 --> 00:24:26.681
We love to hear that.
00:24:26.701 --> 00:24:28.864
So I can tell you, you don't have to come from that.
00:24:28.963 --> 00:24:34.329
But the point is, you'll find out that you actually know a lot of the concepts already.
00:24:34.369 --> 00:24:37.853
You just don't know what we call them and how we organize them.
00:24:37.873 --> 00:24:38.173
He's right.
00:24:38.213 --> 00:24:41.616
And then once you give them names, you learn how to organize them.
00:24:41.676 --> 00:24:45.480
You learn some different angles about how to think about music theory.
00:24:45.521 --> 00:25:36.636
It really helps you build your knowledge for music and how it's constructed, how to play it and perform it just heightens everything about music for you it makes it more enjoyable it makes you understand it and read it more it makes you perform it better and more confidently there's just so many reasons that music theory is absolutely 100% necessary if you're serious about doing music wow that's a nice sales pitch for music theory in general I just hope that all of our listeners out there really made note of your journey especially the fact that you came from humble beginnings and in the beginning you weren't even You weren't even thinking about being a musician professionally.
00:25:36.656 --> 00:25:36.916
That's true.
00:25:36.936 --> 00:25:38.038
You were at Georgia Tech.
00:25:38.057 --> 00:25:39.459
You were an engineering major.
00:25:39.499 --> 00:25:42.521
Your sane, rational mind was there.
00:25:42.602 --> 00:25:45.825
But really, your deep-seated passion took over.
00:25:45.845 --> 00:25:46.184
Oh, yes.
00:25:46.345 --> 00:25:47.747
And you ended up in music.
00:25:47.807 --> 00:25:52.471
And now you're this music theory kind of guru for
00:25:52.490 --> 00:25:52.770
people.
00:25:53.371 --> 00:25:54.873
And you have a lot of students.
00:25:54.913 --> 00:25:59.457
So talk about the rest of your path and how you got to where you are today.
00:25:59.497 --> 00:26:00.857
Okay, absolutely.
00:26:01.038 --> 00:26:06.982
So I did continue down the academia I was at this small school in Georgia.
00:26:33.442 --> 00:26:37.325
And I think, I guess I never told you what all I do.
00:26:37.365 --> 00:26:40.788
So, instrument-wise, I play several things.
00:26:40.907 --> 00:26:55.861
Not only guitar, but also bass guitar, banjo, mandolin, ukulele, lap steel, a little bit of pedal steel, a tiny bit of keyboard, and, of course, a whole lot of music theory.
00:26:55.901 --> 00:26:56.821
Wow, that's a lot of stuff.
00:26:56.862 --> 00:26:58.864
Just wanted to let everybody know that that's what I do.
00:26:58.983 --> 00:27:03.407
So, at the university that I teach at, I am the main folk music teacher.
00:27:03.407 --> 00:27:33.440
teacher I teach lessons on folk music instruments and I teach classes on folk music but excellent I must be pretty satisfied obviously being a part of this podcast is a huge part of my life I make music theory courses thank you and I do have many students that just take music theory and have for years for example I have a good friend who works in Hollywood works on movie trailers and Wow.
00:27:33.460 --> 00:27:38.325
And he was taking music theory lessons from me all the way across the country.
00:27:38.365 --> 00:27:41.409
He was in California and I was in Georgia.
00:27:41.429 --> 00:27:46.334
And we would meet up on Saturday mornings despite the time difference.
00:27:47.275 --> 00:27:50.397
And we just did music theory for several years.
00:27:50.577 --> 00:27:50.657
Nice.
00:27:50.679 --> 00:27:56.243
And he ended up being able to use that kind of thing for his Hollywood projects.
00:27:56.284 --> 00:27:56.744
There you go.
00:27:56.765 --> 00:27:57.986
For his trailers for major movies.
00:27:58.026 --> 00:27:59.548
You affected movies in Hollywood.
00:27:59.768 --> 00:28:00.429
You affected movies.
00:28:00.449 --> 00:28:02.451
It's kind of cool when you affect people that way.
00:28:02.611 --> 00:28:02.790
Yep.
00:28:03.031 --> 00:28:03.311
One other.
00:28:03.311 --> 00:28:44.997
little braggart you know one of my current guitar students all I'll say is he is a prominent quarterback on a major college football team and it's funny that I hear his name called on national sports radio all the time and I'm like hey that's my student they're just talking about my student so it's really connected me a lot to a lot of really cool people and how you get to affect them now I did have a lengthy conversation And I didn't talk about that too much because really, honestly, the older I get, the more I love the education, the more I love passing the buck to my students and what it does for them.
00:28:45.037 --> 00:28:48.400
The idea that you can do so many different things.
00:28:48.480 --> 00:28:48.800
Yes.
00:28:49.080 --> 00:28:54.467
Because my students have ended up doing all kinds of things with music theory.
00:28:54.547 --> 00:28:57.670
They use it to learn to improvise at jam sessions.
00:28:58.250 --> 00:29:03.215
They use it to learn to compose and write music and make their songs.
00:29:03.215 --> 00:29:12.226
They use it to do transcription work where you're taking a piece from one medium and transcribing it over to another.
00:29:33.167 --> 00:29:41.477
what it is that the harmonious blacksmith completely gets out of music theory in his life.
00:29:41.616 --> 00:29:43.239
Okay, okay, I got you.
00:29:43.459 --> 00:29:44.079
Absolutely.
00:29:44.180 --> 00:29:57.693
So look, like I was saying earlier, as somebody who was a self-learned musician, somebody who learned by ear, somebody who just listened to CDs and cassettes, yes, that dates me.
00:29:57.874 --> 00:29:58.234
Oh, yeah.
00:29:58.255 --> 00:29:58.955
That's fine.
00:29:59.036 --> 00:30:00.277
That's okay.
00:30:00.396 --> 00:30:35.054
And rewound them over and over and over again to try to figure out what that one note was in that one part you know things like that I went all the way from that to just using my ear to connecting what I had experienced with my ear to intellect and that really what is the heart of music theory the heart of music theory is connecting your passion for music to your ear which is your number one asset and ultimately also to your intellect so that Nice.
00:31:03.023 --> 00:31:03.845
Excellent.
00:31:32.976 --> 00:31:38.981
I hope you connect everything and organize it and really elevate your game to the next level.
00:31:39.563 --> 00:31:47.491
But I do want to finish by saying thanks again for having me on your first interview on the Harmonious Blacksmith KPF.
00:31:47.592 --> 00:31:48.893
I do appreciate it.
00:31:48.913 --> 00:31:52.135
I just want to let you know I think you're an extremely talented guy.
00:31:52.196 --> 00:31:52.916
And you know what?
00:31:52.957 --> 00:31:56.820
Now that we're in person, I think that you're also a really handsome guy.
00:31:57.501 --> 00:31:58.844
You're just really well-rounded.
00:31:58.864 --> 00:31:59.044
Thank you.
00:31:59.203 --> 00:32:01.666
And I just want to thank you again for the interview.
00:32:01.747 --> 00:32:02.928
It was really wonderful.
00:32:02.928 --> 00:32:03.489
Wow.
00:32:04.088 --> 00:32:07.051
Well, look, man, it was so good for you to come on.
00:32:07.132 --> 00:32:08.374
I really, really do appreciate it.
00:32:08.394 --> 00:32:08.913
And you know what?
00:32:08.953 --> 00:32:10.675
You're a really handsome guy, too.
00:32:11.076 --> 00:32:11.696
Oh, that's so nice of you.
00:32:11.717 --> 00:32:19.665
I mean, I can't believe how well-rounded and talented and smart and funny and just handsome you are.
00:32:20.507 --> 00:32:21.347
Thanks, man.
00:32:21.807 --> 00:32:23.109
You are a really good guy.
00:32:23.150 --> 00:32:24.830
Look, this has been great.
00:32:25.392 --> 00:32:30.017
I couldn't have asked for a better first interview in my series of interviews coming up.
00:32:30.057 --> 00:32:32.559
So thank you, ladies and gentlemen.
00:32:32.880 --> 00:32:39.991
Let's give it up for the Harmonious Blacksmith.
00:32:41.355 --> 00:32:42.817
Oh, thank you so much.
00:32:42.936 --> 00:32:45.842
Thank you, everybody, for listening out there.
00:32:46.282 --> 00:32:46.884
We love you.
00:32:47.023 --> 00:32:48.026
We appreciate you.
00:32:48.086 --> 00:32:49.367
Thank you so much, everybody.
00:32:50.817 --> 00:32:51.858
All right.
00:32:51.898 --> 00:32:54.862
Thanks again to the harmonious blacksmith for the interview.
00:32:54.902 --> 00:32:57.784
Thanks again for all my listeners out there.
00:32:57.804 --> 00:33:00.405
I appreciate you tuning in and supporting me.
00:33:00.445 --> 00:33:16.901
We will get back to it next week and I will be looking forward to continuing this music theory exploration with all of you.
00:33:16.941 --> 00:33:26.965
Have a beautiful music filled week everybody We love you and we can't wait to spend some time again with you in the future.
00:33:27.006 --> 00:33:28.230
Take care, everybody.
00:00:03.970 --> 00:00:04.317
you
00:00:46.402 --> 00:00:53.357
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to The Harmonious Blacksmith.
00:00:55.362 --> 00:01:06.117
I am your host, Kevin Patrick Fleming, and today is really, really a very, very momentous occasion.
00:01:08.161 --> 00:01:14.430
Today is my very first interview in a series of interviews.
00:01:15.673 --> 00:01:21.762
But I thought I'd start with giving my listeners really what I should have given them a long time ago.
00:01:21.781 --> 00:01:23.844
I mean, I'm 22 episodes in.
00:01:24.737 --> 00:01:28.362
And you really don't know anything about who the blacksmith is.
00:01:28.403 --> 00:01:35.191
So today's episode is called Meet the Blacksmith.
00:01:35.231 --> 00:01:42.040
Thank you.
00:01:42.061 --> 00:01:44.584
Thank you.
00:01:44.605 --> 00:01:45.725
Thank you.
00:01:46.370 --> 00:01:52.796
And this is, of course, episode number 22 of season number two.
00:01:52.835 --> 00:01:55.858
I do appreciate you joining me, y'all.
00:01:56.438 --> 00:02:03.765
And I am just too excited not to tell you what is coming up on my podcast very soon.
00:02:03.864 --> 00:02:14.835
And that is multiple interviews with many musicians who are entrenched in music theory for one reason or another.
00:02:15.314 --> 00:02:20.580
So in other words, I'll be interviewing people locally and afar.
00:02:20.600 --> 00:02:26.145
I will be interviewing amateurs and I will also be interviewing professionals.
00:02:26.766 --> 00:02:32.092
What I'm really trying to get at is how does music theory affect your life?
00:02:33.054 --> 00:02:34.474
Why is it useful?
00:02:35.455 --> 00:02:36.897
Why should I learn it?
00:02:37.739 --> 00:02:45.247
Why should I spend time studying music theory at all when I can just pick up my instrument and learn things by ear?
00:02:45.287 --> 00:03:11.615
There are a lot of Thank you very much for checking that out.
00:03:11.634 --> 00:03:16.801
And so, without further ado, Adieu.
00:03:16.861 --> 00:03:25.008
Interview number one in my series is with The Harmonious Blacksmith.
00:03:33.665 --> 00:04:36.047
okay so i am going to be the interviewer as kevin patrick fleming or kevin or kpf and i will be interviewing the harmonious blacksmith who will be referred to by that name or by hb let's get started so mr harmonious blacksmith yes welcome to my podcast thank you and how are we doing today my friend oh i'm doing great thank you so so much for having me on of course kpf i am so excited to be here my friend thanks for the interview and i really hope that i can engage your audience with a lot of great information and content today oh that's awesome we're so glad to have you on the program hb thank you look we're gonna start you off with a few easy things great general things and then we'll narrow as we go more into music theory which as you know is what my podcast is all about yes sir let's Let's start with some basics.
00:04:36.387 --> 00:04:36.646
Nice.
00:04:36.867 --> 00:04:43.213
People out there, they want to know where you're from and how you grew up.
00:04:43.555 --> 00:04:43.634
Okay.
00:04:43.654 --> 00:04:49.440
So however you want to answer that, however specific and general, let's start with that.
00:04:49.940 --> 00:04:50.841
All right.
00:04:51.382 --> 00:04:53.564
As you know, my name is Kevin Patrick Fleming.
00:04:54.225 --> 00:04:54.747
Welcome.
00:04:55.047 --> 00:04:59.372
I was born in Galesburg, Illinois, USA.
00:04:59.411 --> 00:05:00.151
Okay.
00:05:00.172 --> 00:05:03.415
And on my mother's side, I'm first generation...
00:05:03.536 --> 00:05:05.737
Born right here in the United States.
00:05:05.918 --> 00:05:06.338
Oh, wow.
00:05:06.499 --> 00:05:09.281
My mother was born in Vienna, Austria.
00:05:09.322 --> 00:05:10.362
Oh, wow.
00:05:10.543 --> 00:05:14.867
And she came over in the mid 20th century as an immigrant.
00:05:15.848 --> 00:05:21.435
And then fast forward and I was born in Illinois in 1977.
00:05:21.454 --> 00:05:23.858
Oh, nice.
00:05:23.877 --> 00:05:26.680
The year of the original Star Wars.
00:05:26.761 --> 00:05:28.221
Yeah, that is correct.
00:05:28.442 --> 00:05:28.942
Okay.
00:05:28.963 --> 00:05:29.504
Yeah.
00:05:29.584 --> 00:05:43.098
My mom actually bought me a Star Wars 1977 Oh! Nice! Oh yeah, that's pretty epic, man.
00:05:43.137 --> 00:05:43.718
That's awesome.
00:05:43.738 --> 00:05:44.860
Yeah, it is cool.
00:05:45.000 --> 00:05:49.225
I've always sort of held Star Wars pretty personally because of that.
00:05:49.264 --> 00:05:55.451
So to continue, my father was out of the picture when I was really, really young.
00:05:55.531 --> 00:05:57.514
And that's really all I'm going to say about that.
00:05:57.713 --> 00:06:11.168
But my mother eventually moved to Texas where she got remarried to my stepfather and And we eventually moved to the East Coast in places like North Carolina and Georgia in the southeastern United States.
00:06:11.449 --> 00:06:12.069
Excellent.
00:06:12.249 --> 00:06:13.511
Excellent places to live.
00:06:13.550 --> 00:06:14.531
Thank you for that.
00:06:14.632 --> 00:06:15.273
Of course.
00:06:15.293 --> 00:06:21.499
Now, I'm really interested in what the harmonious blacksmith was doing as a child.
00:06:21.939 --> 00:06:23.742
When did you get into music?
00:06:24.442 --> 00:06:25.322
How did that happen?
00:06:25.382 --> 00:06:29.548
But really on top of that, what are the other things that you really grew up enjoying?
00:06:29.687 --> 00:06:30.149
Okay.
00:06:31.110 --> 00:06:31.449
Yeah.
00:06:31.589 --> 00:06:31.930
All right.
00:06:32.071 --> 00:06:33.391
So I'll go ahead and tell you this.
00:06:33.391 --> 00:06:34.853
Let's start with this.
00:06:36.175 --> 00:06:41.360
I started playing music when I was about 10 years old.
00:06:41.620 --> 00:06:41.821
Okay.
00:06:41.841 --> 00:06:42.961
Maybe 11.
00:06:43.002 --> 00:06:44.923
It's somewhere in there.
00:06:44.963 --> 00:06:52.653
And that's when I got my first guitar, which was a Harmony brand electric guitar.
00:06:53.913 --> 00:07:40.262
My mom knew that I had this huge desire to play because I had a best friend who was taking lessons and playing, and I heard him play stairway to The Great Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin or live the musician lifestyle weren't as into sports as I was and as I am.
00:07:40.302 --> 00:07:42.466
Now, I'm not pigeonholing musicians here.
00:07:42.545 --> 00:07:42.745
Okay.
00:07:42.846 --> 00:07:43.387
Keep in mind.
00:07:43.826 --> 00:07:44.267
That's all right.
00:07:44.288 --> 00:07:46.149
I'm just saying in general, that's the way it is.
00:07:46.509 --> 00:07:46.730
True.
00:07:46.951 --> 00:07:58.362
But I first learned sports in Houston, Texas, where if you were a boy and you could put the pads on, you learned how to play football.
00:07:58.963 --> 00:07:59.403
Oh, football.
00:07:59.423 --> 00:08:00.024
Yes, that's right.
00:08:00.045 --> 00:08:03.247
I was a football player growing up, and I actually played for seven years.
00:08:03.247 --> 00:08:12.036
It was all just as a kid.
00:08:33.200 --> 00:08:34.902
Football, you played soccer.
00:08:34.922 --> 00:08:38.686
That is a lot of sports for somebody who ended up doing mainly music.
00:08:38.745 --> 00:08:40.126
That's pretty impressive, actually.
00:08:40.147 --> 00:08:40.327
Thank you.
00:08:40.707 --> 00:08:42.909
You sound like a pretty well-rounded guy.
00:08:42.929 --> 00:08:44.192
I appreciate it.
00:08:44.211 --> 00:08:44.672
Excellent.
00:08:44.792 --> 00:08:45.332
I love that.
00:08:45.452 --> 00:08:45.753
Thank you.
00:08:45.793 --> 00:08:48.196
All right, so let's fast forward a little bit.
00:08:48.456 --> 00:08:48.657
Sure.
00:08:48.716 --> 00:08:57.905
And let's find out how you, you know, once you were mesmerized by Stairway to Heaven, your friend played it and you were mesmerized.
00:08:57.946 --> 00:08:58.506
Yes, sir.
00:08:58.746 --> 00:09:00.269
And you had to play music.
00:09:00.328 --> 00:09:01.690
Let's start from there.
00:09:01.730 --> 00:09:14.004
How does that elevate into into getting more serious about music and eventually taking it on as your lifelong love and profession in adulthood.
00:09:33.104 --> 00:09:34.065
Got the guitar.
00:09:34.184 --> 00:09:42.693
I eventually wanted to upgrade to an acoustic guitar, and here's a life lesson that not a lot of kids get these days.
00:09:43.315 --> 00:09:43.414
Uh-oh.
00:09:43.434 --> 00:09:43.735
I know.
00:09:43.754 --> 00:09:44.956
I'm going to sound like that old guy.
00:09:44.996 --> 00:09:46.298
Stay off my lawn.
00:09:47.178 --> 00:09:48.000
That's what I sound like right now.
00:09:48.019 --> 00:09:48.660
I get that.
00:09:48.681 --> 00:09:49.020
That's funny.
00:09:49.562 --> 00:10:03.056
But my parents made me do yard work every weekend for a month just to get about a$100 Alvarez Regent acoustic guitar, which was much, much better than the chintzy little Harmony that I had.
00:10:03.056 --> 00:10:04.597
I got for 30 bucks originally.
00:10:04.618 --> 00:10:05.138
Oh, nice.
00:10:05.217 --> 00:10:05.999
A working man.
00:10:06.019 --> 00:10:10.683
And despite all the stories of sports, I really was an introvert.
00:10:11.085 --> 00:10:11.945
We moved a lot.
00:10:12.485 --> 00:10:15.589
I moved in the middle of my ninth grade year in high school.
00:10:15.710 --> 00:10:20.695
And if you've never done that and you have no idea what that's like, it's really, really hard.
00:10:20.715 --> 00:10:21.696
Yeah, that had to be tough.
00:10:21.716 --> 00:10:25.299
You end up moving to a school where people have been growing up together.
00:10:25.340 --> 00:10:26.581
They all know each other.
00:10:26.721 --> 00:10:29.563
And you're just this outsider that came from somewhere.
00:10:30.325 --> 00:10:32.427
So needless to say, it was hard to make friends.
00:10:32.927 --> 00:10:34.789
I'd I became very introverted, and guess what?
00:10:34.950 --> 00:10:43.779
I used to go home, get off the bus, and I used to go up to my bedroom and close the door and play guitar until my mom called me for dinner.
00:10:44.721 --> 00:10:57.094
I did that for many, many, many, many days in high school before I got a little bit more popular and had some friends and some hangouts by the time I was a junior and senior.
00:10:57.134 --> 00:11:01.197
But really, my freshman and sophomore year were spent learning to play the guitar.
00:11:01.278 --> 00:11:01.639
Beautiful.
00:11:01.678 --> 00:11:04.360
And just to give you an idea of how obsessed I was.
00:11:04.402 --> 00:11:13.731
I used to play so much that I would wear my fingers raw and my fretting hand and yet I would just put band-aids on them so I could keep playing.
00:11:14.231 --> 00:11:16.674
That's how obsessed I was when I was a teenager.
00:11:16.835 --> 00:11:20.778
My God, that is a whole other level of obsessed.
00:11:21.440 --> 00:11:32.912
I don't know that I know anybody else that hurt themselves, put the band-aids on and then kept going and continuing to hurt themselves simply because they wanted to play so much.
00:11:32.912 --> 00:11:49.188
Okay, so now we've got young Kevin Fleming, born in the United States in Gettysburg, Illinois, in the year of Star Wars, grew up playing sports, moved around a bit here and there, but eventually got obsessed with music.
00:11:49.590 --> 00:11:54.995
So I think what the audience wants to know now is how did that progress to something more serious?
00:11:55.615 --> 00:12:02.864
And how and when did you decide to go into academia or become a professional musician?
00:12:02.864 --> 00:12:05.866
or how did all that come about?
00:12:06.707 --> 00:12:07.668
Ah, okay, I see.
00:12:07.688 --> 00:12:12.293
Well, let me start that part of the story by telling you a quick little anecdote.
00:12:12.394 --> 00:12:13.936
Ooh, everybody loves stories.
00:12:13.956 --> 00:12:30.293
After I had studied music for a while and my parents knew I was gonna go into the profession, even though they didn't want me to for economic reasons, if I ever complained anything money-wise, my mother used to say, well, that was the choice you made.
00:12:30.332 --> 00:12:38.461
And my immediate response What choice?
00:13:02.977 --> 00:13:09.506
So I just wanted to start with that so that you know where I'm coming from.
00:13:09.547 --> 00:13:12.451
Yeah.
00:13:13.010 --> 00:13:22.423
Let's fast forward a little bit.
00:13:26.489 --> 00:13:29.874
That was great.
00:13:32.994 --> 00:13:35.395
I had a bass player, and I played guitar.
00:13:35.937 --> 00:13:45.004
We were really instrumental in the beginning, and the very first epic song we played was called Are You Gonna Go My Way by Lenny Kravitz.
00:13:45.024 --> 00:13:46.446
Oh, I remember that one.
00:13:46.505 --> 00:13:50.609
Yes, for all you youngsters out there, you probably don't know what that is.
00:13:50.769 --> 00:13:53.392
Go ahead and cue it up in your streaming.
00:13:53.412 --> 00:13:55.373
I promise you won't regret it.
00:13:56.674 --> 00:14:01.719
It's a really cool track, but I will never forget that that was the first cover I played with my first rock band.
00:14:01.999 --> 00:14:02.759
Oh, wow, that's great.
00:14:02.779 --> 00:14:02.960
Thank you.
00:14:02.960 --> 00:14:04.942
Thank you for sharing that anecdote.
00:14:05.001 --> 00:14:05.702
My pleasure.
00:14:05.863 --> 00:14:07.284
Yeah, that's great.
00:14:07.325 --> 00:14:16.634
Everything that led you from Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin all the way to Are You Gonna Go My Way by Lenny Kravitz.
00:14:16.715 --> 00:14:21.700
But I thought somewhere in there that you ended up being a classical guitarist.
00:14:21.740 --> 00:14:29.028
This doesn't necessarily sound like you're ending up in the classical guitar chair with a footstool on the ground.
00:14:29.067 --> 00:14:30.909
How did that happen?
00:14:30.970 --> 00:14:32.851
I think the audience wants to know.
00:14:32.912 --> 00:14:33.952
Okay, I'm good with that.
00:14:33.972 --> 00:14:37.157
How you arrived as a classical guitarist.
00:14:37.636 --> 00:14:43.003
Okay, actually, my story with that is not as uncommon as you might think.
00:14:43.482 --> 00:14:50.910
A lot of my classical guitar friends in music school, as I'm going to tell you how I got there, really did come from a similar background that I did.
00:14:50.971 --> 00:14:59.480
Learning to play electric guitar, getting obsessed with music, building your chops, playing hard rock and heavy metal and things like that.
00:14:59.500 --> 00:14:59.660
Oh, wow.
00:15:00.041 --> 00:15:23.105
And then eventually, a friend of mine took me to a concert in downtown Marietta, Georgia, where for the first time I got to see the great Christopher Parkinney, the prodigal student of the great Andre Segovia, who is, of course, the father of the modern classical guitar.
00:15:23.346 --> 00:15:24.226
Oh, wow.
00:15:24.706 --> 00:15:32.515
So you were introduced to classical guitar by hearing one of the greats in modern time, Christopher Parkinney.
00:15:32.755 --> 00:15:32.816
Yes.
00:15:32.816 --> 00:15:37.321
Like a direct student from the great Andre Segovia.
00:15:37.341 --> 00:15:37.760
The student.
00:15:37.780 --> 00:15:41.705
Who, of course, brought the entire school of guitar over to the United States.
00:15:41.725 --> 00:15:42.306
Yes, he did.
00:15:43.067 --> 00:15:46.350
Okay, so now we're getting to the nitty gritty.
00:15:46.370 --> 00:15:50.455
A friend drags you to a Christopher Parkening concert.
00:15:50.495 --> 00:15:52.897
You're obviously going to be moved by it.
00:15:53.238 --> 00:15:53.378
Oh, yeah.
00:15:53.398 --> 00:15:57.542
And then your trajectory changes at that point.
00:15:57.643 --> 00:15:58.123
Correct?
00:15:58.182 --> 00:15:58.783
For your life?
00:15:59.004 --> 00:16:01.025
Well, not immediately.
00:16:01.066 --> 00:16:02.768
But, yeah, ultimately it did.
00:16:02.768 --> 00:16:09.534
I think I was considering music really not as a profession.
00:16:09.674 --> 00:16:10.296
Oh, really?
00:16:10.817 --> 00:16:12.118
I should go ahead and tell you this.
00:16:12.217 --> 00:16:21.248
When I was about to start college, I actually had a rock band that was doing quite well and possibly about to go on tour.
00:16:21.268 --> 00:16:22.168
Oh, wow.
00:16:22.408 --> 00:16:22.849
That's cool.
00:16:23.831 --> 00:16:29.296
But I really wanted to go to college, and I knew I was going to go to college instead of drifting off with a rock band.
00:16:29.876 --> 00:16:32.720
So I got into Georgia Tech in Atlanta.
00:16:32.720 --> 00:16:36.124
Oh, my freshman year was like a no brainer.
00:16:36.244 --> 00:16:37.365
You got to go to Georgia Tech.
00:16:37.404 --> 00:16:38.346
That's a great school.
00:16:38.505 --> 00:16:40.148
That's an incredible school.
00:16:40.207 --> 00:16:43.451
So I was a civil engineering major for a year of all things.
00:16:43.471 --> 00:16:44.272
Wow.
00:16:44.351 --> 00:16:46.955
But I would have never guessed that was at Georgia Tech.
00:16:47.275 --> 00:16:51.399
All I did was spend a lot of time dreaming about playing music and guitar.
00:16:51.440 --> 00:16:53.721
And I realized that that would become my life.
00:16:53.863 --> 00:16:54.462
Wow.
00:16:54.543 --> 00:17:29.671
If I did not make a decision to go back into music after my freshman year, which is what I did then I probably would be sitting in an office staring out a window dreaming of playing music dreaming of teaching music and being entrenched in it and ultimately that's the decision I make and I never looked back and I have never ever regretted it so you took the plunge wow so you were an engineering major at a prestigious school like Georgia Tech yes sir I mean the That is huge.
00:17:29.770 --> 00:17:30.991
That is such a good school.
00:17:31.031 --> 00:17:35.115
And you were able to walk away from that and go to music.
00:17:35.175 --> 00:17:36.056
So, all right.
00:17:36.076 --> 00:17:40.019
So what's the next chapter then after you attended Georgia Tech?
00:17:40.279 --> 00:17:42.761
Well, I'm so glad that you asked.
00:17:42.922 --> 00:17:58.576
Well, first of all, after both of my parents almost losing their minds that I was going to leave a school like Tech to go to a smaller school and become a music major of all things was definitely an event in my life.
00:17:58.576 --> 00:17:59.856
I can imagine.
00:17:59.957 --> 00:18:06.443
I met some friends, some future friends, one of which was my first teacher of classical guitar one summer.
00:18:06.805 --> 00:18:16.515
And he introduced me to one Mary Ackerman, who was really the classical guitar teacher that I had the longest in life.
00:18:16.535 --> 00:18:20.179
I studied with her for like almost five years.
00:18:20.519 --> 00:18:20.700
Wow.
00:18:21.019 --> 00:18:21.299
Nice.
00:18:21.319 --> 00:18:22.541
And thank goodness I did.
00:18:22.602 --> 00:18:28.528
She was a fantastic teacher, an incredible player, an amazing human being.
00:18:28.528 --> 00:18:36.817
I will always have love for Mary Ackerman and I will always have humble and gracious thanks for everything she gave to me.
00:18:36.836 --> 00:18:37.538
That's beautiful.
00:18:37.738 --> 00:18:41.060
Honestly, once I was under her wing, that was it.
00:18:41.080 --> 00:18:43.784
I mean, I knew this is what I was going to do.
00:18:43.804 --> 00:18:48.368
I knew that classical guitar was going to be the path that I was going to pursue.
00:18:48.388 --> 00:18:50.811
And ultimately I did.
00:18:50.852 --> 00:18:58.440
And I earned my bachelor's degree in classical guitar performance at Kennesaw State University.
00:18:58.480 --> 00:18:59.881
Little old Kennesaw.
00:18:59.902 --> 00:19:04.567
And I eventually followed the path of my teacher, Mary A.
00:19:04.586 --> 00:19:04.926
Kerbin.
00:19:05.207 --> 00:19:11.113
I went on to learn from her former teacher, the late, great Bruce Holzman.
00:19:11.233 --> 00:19:12.115
Oh, isn't that cool?
00:19:12.275 --> 00:19:15.878
Anybody in classical guitar circles knows that name.
00:19:15.898 --> 00:19:24.887
I mean, Bruce Holzman, thankfully, is just a world-renowned pedagogical master when it comes to guitar.
00:19:25.107 --> 00:19:28.432
I mean, just really, really a Jedi.
00:19:28.432 --> 00:19:30.193
Night, if you will.
00:19:30.213 --> 00:19:39.106
It used to blow my mind how much he could problem solve in any situation of any piece, no matter what.
00:19:39.647 --> 00:19:47.419
And once I came out of there, you really feel like you can play anything after you are under his tutelage for a while.
00:19:47.439 --> 00:19:49.280
And I really felt like that.
00:19:49.421 --> 00:20:29.948
And so I earned my master's from the Florida State University under the late, great awesome all right now we're getting somewhere so now you have you're entrenched in academia definitely you've got a bachelor's degree you've got a master's degree this is obviously going somewhere in your profession and of course um apropos to this program uh we're getting to how you became a music theory uh jedi knight so to speak i'll go ahead and give you that title and um i'll be interested to know what's So what is the next part of the story?
00:20:29.989 --> 00:20:39.598
Okay, well, I should go ahead and tell you that I was really intense in classical guitar for an entire decade and really the rest of my life.
00:20:39.739 --> 00:20:44.564
But the reason I mentioned a decade is because I did enter the competition circuit.
00:20:44.804 --> 00:20:45.325
Oh, wow.
00:20:45.345 --> 00:20:48.969
And I just didn't want to forget to mention that I was a part of that.
00:20:49.449 --> 00:20:55.134
I ended up winning a lower level college competition in the state of Georgia.
00:20:55.214 --> 00:20:55.695
Nice.
00:20:55.695 --> 00:21:01.622
I also ended up winning a first prize in a statewide competition in Mississippi.
00:21:01.903 --> 00:21:02.282
Excellent.
00:21:02.482 --> 00:21:09.510
And I also ended up winning a fourth prize in an international guitar competition in North Carolina.
00:21:09.530 --> 00:21:09.711
Wow.
00:21:09.971 --> 00:21:10.872
Congratulations.
00:21:11.692 --> 00:21:18.760
So I just wanted to mention that so you know how serious I was and how entrenched I was in classical guitar.
00:21:19.000 --> 00:21:20.041
That's pretty serious.
00:21:20.442 --> 00:21:25.567
But after I got my master's, I ended up at the ripe old age of 20.
00:21:25.647 --> 00:21:33.316
I became an assistant professor of guitar at a college in the middle of Georgia.
00:21:33.355 --> 00:21:49.192
And it really was incredible because my second year there at the ripe old age of 25, Elliot Fisk, the great Elliot Fisk, came and played a concert at my school and I got to meet him and talk to him.
00:21:49.713 --> 00:21:50.894
It was a real pleasure.
00:21:50.914 --> 00:21:54.538
If you don't know who Elliot Fisk is, go ahead and check him out.
00:21:54.578 --> 00:21:59.084
He's kind of an old school One of those old school original guitar players.
00:22:00.384 --> 00:22:04.589
You know, if we're going with all the Star Wars analogies that we've been going with.
00:22:04.910 --> 00:22:05.490
Why not?
00:22:05.550 --> 00:22:08.534
He's kind of an Obi-Wan type, you know?
00:22:08.834 --> 00:22:09.174
Nice.
00:22:09.815 --> 00:22:16.442
And here we are like 22 minutes into this interview and I haven't even talked about music theory, I realize.
00:22:17.163 --> 00:22:19.806
Obviously, a lot of background was needed to get here.
00:22:19.846 --> 00:22:20.286
Of course.
00:22:20.527 --> 00:22:20.906
Of course.
00:22:20.946 --> 00:22:26.952
The truth is, I eventually ended up as a doctoral assistant, a graduate Oh, my.
00:22:30.616 --> 00:22:35.803
Excellent.
00:22:39.747 --> 00:22:55.503
It was really more about just my level of curiosity.
00:22:55.503 --> 00:22:57.546
about music theory.
00:22:57.586 --> 00:23:20.210
And just to circle back and give a little full context, let me remind you, because of the stigma that comes with classical musicians, and there is one, and I've experienced it constantly after becoming a classical musician, I always remind people that I was a self-learned musician in my teenage years.
00:23:20.230 --> 00:23:21.251
Ah, self-learned.
00:23:22.272 --> 00:23:28.578
Yes, I was self-learned as a musician before I ever had a really good teacher in Mary Ackerman.
00:23:29.400 --> 00:23:37.548
And I want to remind people of that because my beginnings weren't in that kind of intense classical environment.
00:23:37.608 --> 00:23:41.413
They were just a kid just messing around with a guitar.
00:23:41.452 --> 00:23:53.465
And because of that, I'm telling you that story because once I started studying music theory in college, a lot of times when I was in a class, and by the way, I was like a kid in a candy store.
00:23:53.486 --> 00:23:55.167
I loved it.
00:23:55.188 --> 00:23:55.407
I ate it up.
00:23:55.407 --> 00:24:04.478
But when I was in class, I had a lot of moments where I was being taught something where light bulbs went on and I was like, so that's what you call that?
00:24:06.118 --> 00:24:07.560
Oh, I know what that is.
00:24:07.780 --> 00:24:10.463
I just didn't know it had a name like that.
00:24:10.503 --> 00:24:10.865
I see.
00:24:11.464 --> 00:24:13.227
Things like that happen so much.
00:24:13.267 --> 00:24:19.574
And I think that would happen for a lot of you out there if you're, you know, not a formally trained musician.
00:24:19.614 --> 00:24:20.555
You don't have to be.
00:24:20.615 --> 00:24:21.836
It's not necessary.
00:24:22.176 --> 00:24:22.896
That's right.
00:24:22.957 --> 00:24:25.359
Like I said, I don't come from that originally.
00:24:25.359 --> 00:24:26.681
We love to hear that.
00:24:26.701 --> 00:24:28.864
So I can tell you, you don't have to come from that.
00:24:28.963 --> 00:24:34.329
But the point is, you'll find out that you actually know a lot of the concepts already.
00:24:34.369 --> 00:24:37.853
You just don't know what we call them and how we organize them.
00:24:37.873 --> 00:24:38.173
He's right.
00:24:38.213 --> 00:24:41.616
And then once you give them names, you learn how to organize them.
00:24:41.676 --> 00:24:45.480
You learn some different angles about how to think about music theory.
00:24:45.521 --> 00:25:36.636
It really helps you build your knowledge for music and how it's constructed, how to play it and perform it just heightens everything about music for you it makes it more enjoyable it makes you understand it and read it more it makes you perform it better and more confidently there's just so many reasons that music theory is absolutely 100% necessary if you're serious about doing music wow that's a nice sales pitch for music theory in general I just hope that all of our listeners out there really made note of your journey especially the fact that you came from humble beginnings and in the beginning you weren't even You weren't even thinking about being a musician professionally.
00:25:36.656 --> 00:25:36.916
That's true.
00:25:36.936 --> 00:25:38.038
You were at Georgia Tech.
00:25:38.057 --> 00:25:39.459
You were an engineering major.
00:25:39.499 --> 00:25:42.521
Your sane, rational mind was there.
00:25:42.602 --> 00:25:45.825
But really, your deep-seated passion took over.
00:25:45.845 --> 00:25:46.184
Oh, yes.
00:25:46.345 --> 00:25:47.747
And you ended up in music.
00:25:47.807 --> 00:25:52.471
And now you're this music theory kind of guru for
00:25:52.490 --> 00:25:52.770
people.
00:25:53.371 --> 00:25:54.873
And you have a lot of students.
00:25:54.913 --> 00:25:59.457
So talk about the rest of your path and how you got to where you are today.
00:25:59.497 --> 00:26:00.857
Okay, absolutely.
00:26:01.038 --> 00:26:06.982
So I did continue down the academia I was at this small school in Georgia.
00:26:33.442 --> 00:26:37.325
And I think, I guess I never told you what all I do.
00:26:37.365 --> 00:26:40.788
So, instrument-wise, I play several things.
00:26:40.907 --> 00:26:55.861
Not only guitar, but also bass guitar, banjo, mandolin, ukulele, lap steel, a little bit of pedal steel, a tiny bit of keyboard, and, of course, a whole lot of music theory.
00:26:55.901 --> 00:26:56.821
Wow, that's a lot of stuff.
00:26:56.862 --> 00:26:58.864
Just wanted to let everybody know that that's what I do.
00:26:58.983 --> 00:27:03.407
So, at the university that I teach at, I am the main folk music teacher.
00:27:03.407 --> 00:27:33.440
teacher I teach lessons on folk music instruments and I teach classes on folk music but excellent I must be pretty satisfied obviously being a part of this podcast is a huge part of my life I make music theory courses thank you and I do have many students that just take music theory and have for years for example I have a good friend who works in Hollywood works on movie trailers and Wow.
00:27:33.460 --> 00:27:38.325
And he was taking music theory lessons from me all the way across the country.
00:27:38.365 --> 00:27:41.409
He was in California and I was in Georgia.
00:27:41.429 --> 00:27:46.334
And we would meet up on Saturday mornings despite the time difference.
00:27:47.275 --> 00:27:50.397
And we just did music theory for several years.
00:27:50.577 --> 00:27:50.657
Nice.
00:27:50.679 --> 00:27:56.243
And he ended up being able to use that kind of thing for his Hollywood projects.
00:27:56.284 --> 00:27:56.744
There you go.
00:27:56.765 --> 00:27:57.986
For his trailers for major movies.
00:27:58.026 --> 00:27:59.548
You affected movies in Hollywood.
00:27:59.768 --> 00:28:00.429
You affected movies.
00:28:00.449 --> 00:28:02.451
It's kind of cool when you affect people that way.
00:28:02.611 --> 00:28:02.790
Yep.
00:28:03.031 --> 00:28:03.311
One other.
00:28:03.311 --> 00:28:44.997
little braggart you know one of my current guitar students all I'll say is he is a prominent quarterback on a major college football team and it's funny that I hear his name called on national sports radio all the time and I'm like hey that's my student they're just talking about my student so it's really connected me a lot to a lot of really cool people and how you get to affect them now I did have a lengthy conversation And I didn't talk about that too much because really, honestly, the older I get, the more I love the education, the more I love passing the buck to my students and what it does for them.
00:28:45.037 --> 00:28:48.400
The idea that you can do so many different things.
00:28:48.480 --> 00:28:48.800
Yes.
00:28:49.080 --> 00:28:54.467
Because my students have ended up doing all kinds of things with music theory.
00:28:54.547 --> 00:28:57.670
They use it to learn to improvise at jam sessions.
00:28:58.250 --> 00:29:03.215
They use it to learn to compose and write music and make their songs.
00:29:03.215 --> 00:29:12.226
They use it to do transcription work where you're taking a piece from one medium and transcribing it over to another.
00:29:33.167 --> 00:29:41.477
what it is that the harmonious blacksmith completely gets out of music theory in his life.
00:29:41.616 --> 00:29:43.239
Okay, okay, I got you.
00:29:43.459 --> 00:29:44.079
Absolutely.
00:29:44.180 --> 00:29:57.693
So look, like I was saying earlier, as somebody who was a self-learned musician, somebody who learned by ear, somebody who just listened to CDs and cassettes, yes, that dates me.
00:29:57.874 --> 00:29:58.234
Oh, yeah.
00:29:58.255 --> 00:29:58.955
That's fine.
00:29:59.036 --> 00:30:00.277
That's okay.
00:30:00.396 --> 00:30:35.054
And rewound them over and over and over again to try to figure out what that one note was in that one part you know things like that I went all the way from that to just using my ear to connecting what I had experienced with my ear to intellect and that really what is the heart of music theory the heart of music theory is connecting your passion for music to your ear which is your number one asset and ultimately also to your intellect so that Nice.
00:31:03.023 --> 00:31:03.845
Excellent.
00:31:32.976 --> 00:31:38.981
I hope you connect everything and organize it and really elevate your game to the next level.
00:31:39.563 --> 00:31:47.491
But I do want to finish by saying thanks again for having me on your first interview on the Harmonious Blacksmith KPF.
00:31:47.592 --> 00:31:48.893
I do appreciate it.
00:31:48.913 --> 00:31:52.135
I just want to let you know I think you're an extremely talented guy.
00:31:52.196 --> 00:31:52.916
And you know what?
00:31:52.957 --> 00:31:56.820
Now that we're in person, I think that you're also a really handsome guy.
00:31:57.501 --> 00:31:58.844
You're just really well-rounded.
00:31:58.864 --> 00:31:59.044
Thank you.
00:31:59.203 --> 00:32:01.666
And I just want to thank you again for the interview.
00:32:01.747 --> 00:32:02.928
It was really wonderful.
00:32:02.928 --> 00:32:03.489
Wow.
00:32:04.088 --> 00:32:07.051
Well, look, man, it was so good for you to come on.
00:32:07.132 --> 00:32:08.374
I really, really do appreciate it.
00:32:08.394 --> 00:32:08.913
And you know what?
00:32:08.953 --> 00:32:10.675
You're a really handsome guy, too.
00:32:11.076 --> 00:32:11.696
Oh, that's so nice of you.
00:32:11.717 --> 00:32:19.665
I mean, I can't believe how well-rounded and talented and smart and funny and just handsome you are.
00:32:20.507 --> 00:32:21.347
Thanks, man.
00:32:21.807 --> 00:32:23.109
You are a really good guy.
00:32:23.150 --> 00:32:24.830
Look, this has been great.
00:32:25.392 --> 00:32:30.017
I couldn't have asked for a better first interview in my series of interviews coming up.
00:32:30.057 --> 00:32:32.559
So thank you, ladies and gentlemen.
00:32:32.880 --> 00:32:39.991
Let's give it up for the Harmonious Blacksmith.
00:32:41.355 --> 00:32:42.817
Oh, thank you so much.
00:32:42.936 --> 00:32:45.842
Thank you, everybody, for listening out there.
00:32:46.282 --> 00:32:46.884
We love you.
00:32:47.023 --> 00:32:48.026
We appreciate you.
00:32:48.086 --> 00:32:49.367
Thank you so much, everybody.
00:32:50.817 --> 00:32:51.858
All right.
00:32:51.898 --> 00:32:54.862
Thanks again to the harmonious blacksmith for the interview.
00:32:54.902 --> 00:32:57.784
Thanks again for all my listeners out there.
00:32:57.804 --> 00:33:00.405
I appreciate you tuning in and supporting me.
00:33:00.445 --> 00:33:16.901
We will get back to it next week and I will be looking forward to continuing this music theory exploration with all of you.
00:33:16.941 --> 00:33:26.965
Have a beautiful music filled week everybody We love you and we can't wait to spend some time again with you in the future.
00:33:27.006 --> 00:33:28.230
Take care, everybody.
