When I took up the guitar at age 12 in 1963, nobody knew from the lute. Even classical guitar was (and still is), a sideshow - pleasant enough but a bit strange. Like me. It suited me well.

Early on I was exposed to the lute music of the Renaissance, which is always given to young players. It's very attractive, and sits well on the guitar - almost as though it was written for the guitar and that's no surprise, as the guitar and the lute are clearly related. Much of the music you play as a guitarist are transcriptions from other instruments - especially the lute. So when you learn classical guitar, you get John Dowland, Francis Cutting, others (Renaissance ) and S. L. Weiss (Baroque). I played Renaissance and Baroque lute music on the guitar for - well, since 1963.

As I grew up I realized, as much as I loved it on guitar, if I had a lute, then WOW I could REALLY do this music justice and play it not as a transcription but as written by the composer on the specific instrument. I like to go All The Way with the things I'm passionate about but as I said above, nobody knew from the lute. And I grew up in NYC. Classical guitars you could find, but a lute? Highly unusual.

But then came the Worldwide Web. As it became a marketplace for pretty much anything - including lutes - things that were heretofore unobtainable became obtainable.

This poem - ode perhaps, is to all the classical guitar players who play Dowland, ususally with the capo on the 3rd fret and the 3rd string (g), 1/2 step down to f#, in order to make the guitar as close as possible to a lute - but we all know a guitar as nice as it is, is not exactly a lute. Not by a longshot. So by and by, a classical guitarist is going to want to play the lute. Pretty much all of them.

This ode is for them.

I mean, us.

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Ode to Guitarists, Thinking About Getting a Lute

Come all you guitarists who dream of a lute
Listen real close, and I'll tell ya da trute:
I know it looks easy, dainty, and cute.
Don't let it fool ya - my god it's a brute.

It won't take a mind that's very astute,
To gather my drift. My point is not moot.
Study the flooglehorn, fiddle, or flute.
Pick up a bugle, on which you can toot.

Go plant a seed, and wait for the fruit.
Go scale a mountain, a cliff, or a butte.
Go fight a gorgon, a grizzly, or Groot.
Those would be easy, compared with the lute.

But if you persist, and stay resolute,
You've earned my respect, and you I salute.
It takes lots of work - there's no substitute.
But there's nothing like it - the sound of the lute.