Interview By James Jensen
for Acoustic Music Resource (1999)
AMR: On “Rural Life” ...did
you use one guitar in particular?
PK: I used three Taylor Guitars, and this is the first album I have recorded entirely
using Taylor Guitars. I used a Martin mc-28 and J-40 on Kentucky Guitar and Irish Guitar.
It sometimes takes a while before you can record a certain guitar and make it sound like
you want it to sound , and find the right mic placement. My favorite guitar is my Taylor
514C, and I was able to record it well for this album and it is the primary instrument on
the album. It is a Mahogany back and sides with a Cedar top. The title cut as well as
“My Old Kentucky Home” were recorded on a dreadnought Taylor (710CE) which
doesn’t seem like my kind of guitar but it records like gang busters and with a very
present mid range, and for those two tunes that worked very well. That 710 is the guitar
which I wrote “Rural Life “ on as well.
AMR: Many listeners might be surprised to know that a guitar that sounds good in a
room may or more often may NOT be a good instrument for recording.
PK: Absolutely, the way the guitar sounds live has to do with projection. In other words,
how the tone emanates into a distance, say, ten feet away. The sound that you need to
record is much more “compact” than that, so the fact that a guitar projects
doesn’t help it record at all. I generally record with whatever instrument is working
on a particular tune. I don’t think you could just say “I’m going to use X
instrument on this album.” You wouldn’t get the optimum performance out of all
the tunes that way.
AMR: While we are talking technical stuff...any preferred strings?
PK: D’addario J-16’s are light gauge and J-17 are medium gauge , and those are
the two sets of strings I use. Taylor for instance sets up their dreadnought guitars with
medium strings and they come that way. The 710 came with mediums on it and I liked the
response but you have to struggle with them a bit more , fight against them. When I
changed strings the first time I changed them to light gauge and the guitar lost all its
response. The guitar is braced for medium strings and the light gauge strings just
don’t make the guitar “talk” at all. I put medium strings back on it and
the two cuts on the CD that I used it on are with medium strings.
AMR: I felt the recording was very present...what was your microphone setup?
PK: Half of the album was recorded at my home , and the other half in Germany in a bigger
studio, and while the mic technique was different at both locations we seemed to have come
up with a blend . My minimalistic technique which I use at home is two small good quality
capsule condenser microphones spaced at about 12-18” away from the guitar , and the
placement of the microphones is different every day. The placement varies every day ,
every time you play, and with every tune you fine the optimal situation. In Germany we
used a combination of the magnetic pickup in the guitar and two small condenser
microphones as well as a large diaphragm tube microphone placed about 4 feet away to
capture the distant sound of the guitar , and then we blended all those sources. I like to
experiment a lot.
AMR: People think that producing a “solo” guitar CD is simple...
PK: It is the hardest thing in the world!!!
AMR: With all the options from recording techniques to tune selection to
performances to post production EQ..is it hard for you to decide ..enough, it is done!
PK: Well, yeah it is hard ...because it must sound like a completed thing and be
commercially viable. That means that the initial recording has to be very good, and it has
to have a certain “punch” to it...or you have to go back and do it again. Once
you have something that feels right , and feels like it has a good presence and
“punch” then the mastering stage is just polishing it up a bit. I don’t see
adding tons of anything to it at that point to make it what it needs to be. At that point,
what I try to do is...add a little compression to add punch, and I don’t like
compression when you can hear it. The new digital compression techniques give you sizable
compression without evening hearing it. Some selective EQ , which takes more time than
anything..to get that right EQ which makes the guitar sparkle a little bit.
AMR: You include a cover of “Dance With Me” on this record...while a lot
of players today avoid covers...you come out of the Chet Atkins school where covering pop
tunes was an art form..
PK: Yes, exactly where it comes from. The thumbpicking tradition features grabbing tunes
from anywhere they can find them and fit them into the style. One of the challenges is to
take a tune...like in the ‘40’s they would take a big band or show tune and put
it onto the guitar complete with all the important parts there. That is exactly where I
would come to play a tune like “Dance With Me”..and I don’t have anything
against cover tunes, I never think of them that way...I think “here is a beautiful
piece of music , and I want to play it on guitar”.
AMR: Are you planning any folios for your albums?
PK: Yes, now I am not a transcriber, I would love to be one , but God didn’t give me
those talents...and it seems to have been difficult to turn these things into books. Mel
Bay is going to publish books for “Kentucky Guitar” and “Irish Guitar”
(ed. note..AMR will carry these folios when available!) the first book should be out soon.
AMR: Will you personally check them before publishing?
PK: Oh sure, I am a stickler that folios should EXACTLY match recordings. In other words ,
a folio shouldn’t match the average way I play a tune, because I change it and play
it different every time, the folio should match the recording note for note. Yes, I will
check them out. I actually did the raw tablature to show them all the actual positions and
fingerings.
We haven’t even started thinking about “Rural Life “ yet, and I know
guitarists are always looking for new tablature, but when you are making music it is not
the first thing you think about, I am thinking about the next album.
AMR: Tell us a little about your life as a professional
guitarist/musician/clinician..
PK: Well, it is different for each musician, but speaking for me...I spend a LOT of time
speaking to people on the telephone, and it is always pursuing something that will happen
in the future ..bookings, festivals, and all those kinds of things..video projects, book
projects, and it seems to take up a lot of time to negotiate all those day to day business
things. Typically I will spend about three weeks in and three weeks out on the road, which
is fine with me as I DON’T want to be on the road all the time. I don’t think
you accomplish a lot on the road except that you have to do it, and I really enjoy the
concerts, but your total career isn’t accomplished on the road. Most of mine is
accomplished when I am NOT on the road.
Every aspect of a career is important, but my thought right now is that I have so much
music that I have created that is still not recorded that it is a big deal for me to
realize that!
AMR: It seems like only yesterday that “Kentucky Guitar” came out and
caught everybody by surprise..
PK: 1994...
AMR: In what seems to be a short amount of time you have put out three solid
titles..had you been woodshedding for years before that?
PK: Yeah, I did, in fact “Kentucky Guitar” ...well before that...In 1989 I had a
burst of creative energy and the tunes for “Kentucky Guitar” came in a burst in
1992-93..and it seemed like a collection of tunes that belonged together and that is
important to me when I make an album. I just don’t want to throw the next batch of
stuff out and say it is an album, it has to have some sort of unifying factor. So I still
have a bunch of tunes that pre-date “Kentucky Guitar” and those tunes will be
the focus of my next album.
AMR: I keep accidentally calling this new CD “Rural Gu..
PK: Guitar...yeah I had to drop that Guitar word off of it...and the next album probably
won’t have any guitar word in it at all! When you are trying to establish yourself in
the world, and having people understand who you are, Kentucky Guitar was my statement
which said I was proud of Kentucky’s heritage with the guitar, as well as say very
plainly that this is a guitar record. Irish Guitar wasn’t given much thought and just
seemed like the right name to give it. Now Rural Life is named after that tune, and I had
a lot of emotional thought about that tune, it just seemed like the right thing to be the
thread to tie it all together.
AMR: Will the new recording be completed soon?
PK: I feel like I wanna record it soon. In 1975 another guitarist and I recorded a duet
album together which was never really released at all, and I think we can clean it up
digitally. That was the first place that “B Rods Rag” appeared!
AMR: Getting back to the creative bursts...how is your writing process?
PK: I am always thinking about and put attention to things which come along unexpected on
the guitar, but I would say the best tunes that I have come one of two ways. One way is
they just are literally magically placed in my hands...like the tune “Grandpas
Lullaby” was just there, I just started playing the guitar in standard tuning without
utilizing any standard chord formations and sounds like it is in a tuning...and it just
sounds a little bit different. That piece of music just happened one day ..and I was so
happy. Other pieces of music that I have done which I like ..begin with a little idea, 4,5
or 8 bars and I really have to work hard to make a whole piece of music. So some of them
are work that take months and months.
AMR: Any writing superstitions?
PK: I have never thought of anything as a superstition, but I definitely believe in
following an idea through all the way even if you don’t feel like it at the time and
are tired , and want to do something other than play the guitar ...if you stop working on
that idea it may dissipate into thin air..because it doesn’t exist on the fretboard
yet..it exists in your head as a melody and you might forget it. I have played the guitar
for ten hours straight to retain an idea , to get one of those things to be there so that
when I get up the next morning , the first thing I am going to do is play this piece
again, and hope that it is there. Once you can go to bed and get up the next day and still
play it..then you have got it. I also like to tape things because I have had good
experiences with taping little fragments of things and having them come back later...I
also agree with those who feel if you can’t remember it , it might not be a melody
worth remembering. I would much rather spend the time working on it to remember it ...and
the tape recorder will NOT do that for you...you have to play it to put it back in your
fingers..the tape recorder just jogs your memory.
AMR: Your instrumentals attract my ears because they seem like compact songs..with
a formal structure..
PK: I completely believe in song structure, and I am very aware of where the parts are
..”this part ended and now we have this other part”. When I was a kid I listened
to two types of music...my fathers family was into Classical music, and my dad would put
those on... my moms side of the family listened to Country music. So I had two very
different streams of influence in my house. I have always thought that you can’t
remember the structure of Classical music , you can remember the parts...and some of the
themes are beautiful , but do the musicians in the orchestra even remember where this
thing is going to go next or are they surprised when they turn the music page, it is like
a big Tom Clancy novel with subplots and things, and I never did like that. So short song
structure , which is very old, I really like and am very conscious of.
AMR: I am looking at your nails...and the obvious question is...
PK: I have always used a thumbpick ever since I was a little kid. The thumbpick sounds so
much different than your thumb, and with a thumbpick your hand lays flat on the strings
because the pick rotates your thumb 90degrees from say the classical position , and it
also allows the palm of your hand to be muting the strings at the bridge, which is part of
that “thumbstyle” kind of thing I do a lot. I always use the thumbpick, and I
like the sound , and for the fingers there are approaches like Tom Long and Duck Baker who
just use flesh against strings...I think most people agree that superior tone come from
flesh first touching the string and then the nail striking it after that. I started about
6 or 7 years ago applying acrylic nails for the reason that my real fingernails are too
thin and wear out in an hour..and the other thing about acrylic nails is you can make them
real thick..for a fatter tone like you get with a thicker pick. With the acrylic nails I
apply about 16th of an inch thick so it is not thin toned like my real nails , and I like
a “fat” tone. The most important part of the thumbpick is the length of the
picking part of it that extends past you thumb..the thickness effects the action but the
length is even more important. A lot of thumbpicks are just made too long. I use a Fred
Kelly “slick pick”..and I don’t need to alter it at all. I have seen
players file them down so that they only extend about an 8th of an inch...
“Thats what I used to do” (the
voice belongs to Tom Long...whose home this interview took place at...thanks Tom.
AMR: any problems with your hands?
PK: Yes, about 5 or 6 years ago I had tendinitis in my left hand from playing too much in
a day and stretching too far. I was real worried, so I stopped playing as many stretches
and cut back on the hours played for a month or more and it went away, but that is a real
danger for anybody who plays a musical instrument.
AMR: Alex deGrassi had problems because he wasn’t tuning down his tunings but
tuning UP and the tension then was heavier, creating more difficult fingering.
PK: I have been told by string manufacturers that each step you tune up or down equals one
string gauge. So if you tuned your guitar one step higher with lights it will play like it
has mediums on it. Like in DADGAD tuning with three strings tuned down one step you sort
of end up taking the whole tension of the guitar down a gauge. I have tried to talk the
string manufacturers into making a DADGAD set..with three medium gauge strings for the
three tuned down, and the other three light gauge.