Old Dogs and New Tricks

We've all heard it. It's an easy excuse... You can't teach an old dog a new trick. Well, as I gain a good percentage of my income by playing an old organ that is really no longer serviceable, it has become apparent that I must learn a new trick. "It won't sound as good, it's gonna cost too much, you can't do it! It'll change your sound too much."

These were all going through my head last summer as a cool young guy named Jason Dyba came over to my house with the intention of helping me put together a system using my laptop, new software and some really lightweight keyboards that could replace my five hundred pound, thirty-year-old Yamaha organ Amanda and I nicknamed "Yanni." You know the type, Jason's a tech genius... I'm not. I'm definitely the senior Saint Bernard to this fresh out of college Collie. He's running circles around me; and I am feeling every bit of my thirty-four years. Well, after months of banging my head against the keyboard, I finally had a much needed breakthrough yesterday.

The first thing we tried didn't work, neither did the second. But yesterday I walked back into "Guitar Center," Nashville's best stocked music store for keys, and I found the system that will do what I want it to do. The reasons why are many and a bit complicated, but suffice it to say that it is going to make my life exponentially easier. Here's the point. If you don't try, you have already failed. This old dog is learning all kinds of new tricks. That old saying is a lie. Don't believe it! You'll get to be an old dog before your time.

Special thanks to Molly for her excellent modeling work in the photo... and Molly, you are surely no "old dog.'