Martin Simpson’s Inventive Guitar

In the last of the Masters of Guitar Series concerts this year, guitarist and guitar builder, Kevin Muiderman, will present one of the greatest fingerstylists, Martin Simpson, who is making a US tour that began last week.

Simpson is touring with fellow British artist, jazz great Martin Taylor, but will finish out the tour doing nine solo gigs. His appearance at the Empire Arts Center in Grand Forks next Tuesday, November 11, will be the first of those solo concerts.
The 2008 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards voted Simpson’s “Prodigal Son” best album. It’s a mixture of traditional songs and Simpson originals, the highlights of which possess a distinctly southern American flavor. Jackson Browne, Kate Rusby and Kellie While guest starred in “Prodigal Son.”

Simpson grew up in Lincolnshire, listening to traditional music. “I started playing the guitar because I loved songs,” he said. Since he wanted to sing, the guitar was the obvious instrument to start with, as many folks singers did and still do.

“I started playing when I was 12, and almost simultaneously my voice broke,” he added. “My voice went to rags, and my guitar overtook the voice.”

Almost at the same time, Simpson took up the 5-string banjo along with guitar. “They have continued, the one to influence the other over the years,” he explained. “Banjo is enormously important in my approach to music.”

He has a small collection of banjos in his home in Sheffield, England. “I love playing them, and I love what they bring to my guitar playing.” He even attributes his open tunings to the influence of the banjo. Humbly, he admitted, “Just when you think you’re being really clever and invented something new, you generally find that it’s a 5-string banjo tuning.”
Besides banjo and acoustic guitar, Simpson also plays resonator guitar, electric guitar, and lap slide guitar. He, however, will only be bringing one acoustic guitar with him next Tuesday.
Though Simpson’s skill and flash on guitar is well-known globally, he admits that his first love of singing has become his most constant love and one that he thinks he has finally mastered as well as his guitar. “I really feel like I am now in a position where they are a bit more neck and neck than they’ve ever been before,” he said.

Simpson will also present a free guitar workshop on Wednesday afternoon, November 12, from 6 to 9 pm, also at the Empire. “I really, really love the opportunity to talk about what I do,” Simpson said in a phone interview last week. “I have a great deal of love for what I do, and I also have a great deal of understanding of how much it means to other people to learn to play. I can remember so clearly as a kid asking the professional musicians I saw for little bits of information and being edified to such an extent just by these little things that they’d let you have. They were little tidbits, but they can change your life.”

Muiderman was also a student of Simpson’s and clearly sees the value of workshops such as these. “He is a consummate teacher,” Muiderman said, “and any interested player can come away with a broader understanding of the instrument.”

The workshop is offered to players of all levels of experience, free of charge, with the help of a grant from NOVAC.

If You Go

What: Martin Simpson
Where: Empire Arts Center, Grand Forks
When: Tuesday, November 11, 7:30 pm
How Much: Tickets: $15,
Who: All ages
Info: 701-777-4090