Observations: Music

The first time I ever played my guitar in public almost ended my musical career. I was teaching American history for a year at the University of Helsinki in Finland, and as I prepared a lecture about the civil rights movement, I decided to sing a few songs. I was hardly an accomplished guitar player. I had bought my first guitar in college in the 1960s, but had never gotten really comfortable with it.

In that class, back in 1978, I managed to get through “Blowin’ in the Wind” and “We Shall Overcome.” I thought my guitar playing was ragged, but acceptable.

When the class was over, one young woman came up to me and in her not-quite-fluent English said, “Sir that was wonderful.” I smiled expansively, then cringed as she went on: “Do you know why? Because you were so bad!” 

As my face fell, she realized what she had said and tried to repair the damage, going on to explain that she meant that I was not a professional, but was still willing to play my guitar publicly. But her comment, however much it may have been the result of her awkwardness with English, haunted me for years to come.

Over time, I realized that I really needed to take lessons, and so I started a process that continues to this day. Meeting weekly, with some terrific teachers in Oxford and Hamilton, I learned how to use a pick, found I could play new and different chords, and began to develop a smidgen of self-confidence.

My first public appearance, after that debacle in Helsinki, came at the Miami University Hamilton campus. A colleague and I played a concert of American folk songs as part of a lecture series, and it went reasonably well. I botched an occasional chord and lost the rhythm once or twice, but the large crowd was wonderfully receptive and I thoroughly enjoyed being on stage. It helped that I followed my teacher’s advice: when you make a mistake, just go on, don’t grimace, and the audience won’t know the difference. 

Performing was a fulfillment of my adolescent fantasies – I had wanted to play the guitar ever since I saw Elvis on television in the mid-1950s.

Some years later, I fulfilled another dream by writing a biography of Pete Seeger, the wonderful banjo player and father of the folk revival in the 1950s and 1960s. I went to Beacon, New York, about 30 times to talk with him, with my guitar accompanying me on my trips. My wife Sara came up with me several times; my sister Karen came once. After my book was published, I brought a Miami seminar that I was teaching to spend an afternoon with Pete.

And now, many years after that sad episode in Helsinki, I’ve been playing publicly more and more. I did a concert last summer at the Opera House in Boothbay Harbor, Maine, and have others coming up in San Diego and Boston.

And in addition to those solo performances, I play with a folk group called the Mudlick Five, named for a creek in Indiana where we sometimes rehearse. We have a concert coming up on Nov. 13 at the Oxford Community Arts Center. Come join us and sing along.

Allan M. Winkler is a University Distinguished Professor of History Emeritus at Miami University, where he taught for three decades. He serves on the Board of Directors for the Oxford Free Press.