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Added Tuesday, 14 June 2005
By TOM BRENNAN
RIVERVIEW - The meetings begin almost like a 12-step program -- with each guest introducing himself and adding short comments about his addiction.
But these men are hooked on a unique musical style. The group gathers to play and perpetuate the genre of guitar playing popularized by Merle Travis and immortalized by Chet Atkins.
The stories were remarkably similar at one recent gathering: They took up the instrument when they were younger, put it down as careers and families intervened, then picked it up again in an effort to learn and master the Atkins style.
The Tampa Bay FingerStyle Guitar Players meet monthly in the living room of Bob and Norma Stamper of Riverview. They come from all over West Central Florida.
"It is not very easy to find these people," said Rey Casas, who drove from Orlando with Ed Leonard. Casas said a friend learned about the club in an Internet chat room and passed on the information.
Richard Culbreath trekked from Cortez in Manatee County with his wife and grandson.
"We like to sit around picking music we like to play in the style we like to play it in," he said.
"You never know who will show up," Bob Stamper said. "That's what makes it great."
Although most players use their thumb or a flat pick to strum the strings, Atkins used his thumb to play the bass and his other fingers to pick the melody.
"The first time I heard it, it was like 'gotcha,' " Stamper said. "I heard Chet Atkins play 'San Antonio Rose' and I was hooked."
Stamper got the idea to form the club last year after attending the Chet Atkins Appreciation Society convention in Nashville.
"I noticed there were a lot of finger style clubs, and I thought it would be a good idea to try to start one here," he said.
Stamper figured that in an area as large as Tampa Bay, there had to be a few people who shared his love of the Atkins sound.
He placed a newspaper advertisement, and the group held its first jam session in August.
"This is so much better than spending an afternoon in a smoky bar," Culbreath said.
Stealing Licks
Norma Stamper said it doesn't take much to turn her living room into a picking parlor.
"We just take the coffee table and ottomans out and push the couches back," she said.
Her husband scavenges all the armless chairs and places them in a rough circle. He puts small footstools he made in his wood shop in front of them, in case someone wants to raise his leg to help support a guitar. Guitar stands are scattered next to the chairs.
As many as 17 pickers have shown up at a time, but there's a core group of about seven. The club lists 33 members.
Leonard said it is getting rarer to "share the fellowship of fellow guitar players." He said the monthly gatherings are an opportunity to learn from other pickers and pass on a few licks of their own.
"That is the way it has always been, one guy learning from another," Leonard said. "I've been playing for 40 years and am just getting the hang of it."
While the players swap chords, Norma Stamper, Jerrie Culbreath -- Richard's wife -- and her 10-year-old grandson, Dalton Jenkins, play cards and board games in the kitchen.
Culbreath said normally more wives attend.
"I've gotten to meet a lot of wonderful new people," she said of her life as a guitar widow. "We usually just hand out and swap recipes, stories and just about everything else."
It's All About Chet
They talk about chords, finger positions and renditions. But it always comes back to Chet Atkins.
"He always did it first, and no one could do it better," Bob Stamper said.
After playing a particular song, the group tries to remember which Atkins recording it's from or how their version varied from the master's.
"He went a lot faster and without the mistakes," said Richard Culbreath, comparing his rendition of "Muskrat Ramble" with Atkins'.
Some are eager to join in, others just watch or take a while to warm up to playing in front of others.
"It is different than playing by yourself," Casas said. "It is totally different joining in with other people."
Casas had never played the Ray Charles classic "Georgia On My Mind." But when Stamper broke into it, Casas said he wanted to learn it.
Stamper and Culbreath repeatedly played chord progressions and changes while Casas followed along.
"I started playing this style about 50 years ago because I wanted to see what it was all about and have been having a lot of fun ever since," Culbreath said. "As long as you play, there is no right way or wrong way, just as long as you do it."null
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