Chet Atkins and Mark Knopfler doing Ill See You In My Dreams and Walk of Life. My first morning in Nashville I was staying in a Upstairs studio apartment of a friend just a few houses off of music row. I was sitting on the front porch drinking a cup of coffee and this old car pulls up and parks on the street and out gets Mark Knopfler reaches in the back seat and grabs a guitar case and walks into a house (Emerald Studios) just a few doors down. I damn near did a spit take! Found out he was there to record with Chet Atkins. I knew I had made the right decision. A few years later I was producing one of the smallest shows I ever had - just 50 people (BellSouth Execs) and it was Chet Atkins and Steve Wariner. That show has to be one of the highlights of anything Ive done, including shows for 10s of thousands. Chet was such a humble man, and yet his influence still touches about every part of popular music (check out his little description at the beginning of this video and think about it for a second - it had never been done before and now is a standard way of playing for most lead guitarists). He was largely responsible for turning Nashville into Music City single handedly. From producing Elvis biggest hits, to being the President of RCA Nashville (and turning 16th and 17th Streets in Nashville into Music Row) to so many other things that changed music. And yet when he gave me his card it simply said Chet Atkins, CGP with a phone number. I asked him what the CGP stood for. He simply said Certified Guitar Player. This was shot in Studio A in the Grand Ole Opry/TNN building - where all the Hee Haws were shot. Probably originally broadcast on TNN. The room only held about 250 people but could be made to look like a large theater on TV. We would get a memo in the afternoon simply saying there was going to be a show filmed in Studio A if we wanted to come by (most of the people in this audience are probably Gaylord employees). Id walk down the hall of my office, make a few turns and into the studio to catch the taping, sometimes staying, sometimes not. This one I stayed for. There were more than a few times that I was asked to move because my height would screw with the camera sight lines. I cant think of anywhere else where you would have that opportunity. Enjoy some wonderful guitar playing. And if you think, like most do, that Chet was strictly country - check out an album of his called Sails - not country at all and some of the most beautiful music Ive ever heard in my life.
Posted on: Fri, 05 Dec 2014 16:12:33 +0000
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015