Tommy Emmanuel, CGP

In my post about our time at the Phila Folk Fest, I said there were a few performers I needed to talk about in detail. Tommy Emmanuel is first and foremost.

He's a fingerstyle guitarist who I've discovered over the past year via Pandora, and he was the performer who I was most excited about when the Folk Fest announced this year's lineup. His style reminded me a bit of Chet Atkins, who I loved as a boy from my Dad's record collection. I wasn't completely surprised to find that he grew up idolizing Chet Atkins and spent endless hours trying to figure out his fingerpicking style.

I also found out the source of the "CGP" initials that he uses as a title, and which is imprinted on the 12th fret of his guitars. Chet Atkins coined the term "Certified Guitar Player", and gave the honor to himself and four others (I'll save you the Googling: John Knowles, Tommy Emmanuel, Steve Wariner, and Jerry Reed.)

Tommy was the next-to-last performer on the Saturday night concert, but we had a surprise. Janis Ian was two slots before him. I didn't know that much about her, except that she was a 70's folkie who had a big hit with "At Seventeen", which I love - I think it's a gorgeous song. Well, at the end of her set, Janis said that she'd just met Tommy Emmanuel for the first time backstage, and that he said he was a big fan, and asked if he could play a couple of songs with her. She said her first instinct was to say "no", but she reconsidered and brought him out.

They played "At Seventeen", and it was absolutely magical - a moment you couldn't script and couldn't re-create. The kind of moment you just consider yourself privileged to witness. The highlight of the Fest by far for me.

Then an hour later he came out and played his own set, and it was killer. He's an unbelievable guitar player, a fantastic showman, and seems like a friendly down-to-earth guy. He did things that just left me shaking my head, asking myself if I'd actually seen what I thought I saw.

Since getting home, I've been gorging myself on Tommy Emmanuel links and articles and YouTube videos. Here are a few highlights:

• TED Talk: My Life As A One-Man Band (if you look at one link, look at this)
• Drivetime (written for his daughter)
• Beatles Medley
• Tommy explains his stage setup

I saw somewhere that he gives 300 concerts a year. I thought that must be a typo, but he repeats that fact in his TED talk. I can only shake my head - that's 6 shows a week, 50 weeks a year. That sounds to me like a *crushing* travel load. But he talks about it as if he enjoys it. Boggling. But if that means he'll be coming around here soon, I'm all in favor of it.