Six String by Nature

I sat. Slightly confused. Slightly broken. But growing. Healing. The guitar in hand as my fingers conversed with the strings, flirting in a new yet old pattern which emerged from years of infatuation and love. The right hand plucked and tapped a beat as the left moved gently across the fretboard, finding the proper chords to thread a web of sound that flutters into the mountains like a butterfly gently flapping her wings to stay afloat midair. ‘Like a Wave’ was being birthed.

I let go of music as my livelihood just a month before this moment. Instead of focusing on the destination of playing concert filled venues with people dancing, drinking, and all other shenanigans that come along with concerts, I found myself present. I found myself writing a new song as I leaned back on the padded bench of the small living room entrance of a farm which sat on a mountain ridge high in the Sierra Nevada’s of Colombia. A slight breeze touched my cheek as I pondered the idea of never selling out a venue. What do I want to do then? My inner voice wondered in curiosity of the possible ways to live. The first line came through in a surge of passions being realized. ‘I’d like to learn how to live like a wave, I’d like to learn how to live in only today’. That’s what I want to do. Live in presence. Future and past thoughts crippled my essence to this point in my life, thinking if I could have done better or looking ahead to what is better to come. Always better. Now, coming to presence, the guitar began to speak true through my channeled heart. This was 2019. Nine years prior, I began the long journey of fretboard plucks and song writing deluges.

The six string ballet flooded me with all of life’s emotions for nine years. I poured my energies into this wooden creature brought to life by a flurry of strums and plucks carried through my heartbeat. My passion journeyed through sadness and frustration, so much so that anguish, anger, and even hatred built into a black quartz within my heart as I ventured into the heart waves of life and poured them through the fingertips along the fretted neck board. My six string danced with society's tango in heavy competition that wants to portray ‘I am the best’ or at least ‘better than you’. It came with love and hope which has the potential to carry dreams of transformation beyond the sound waves of eternity, saying, ‘we can do this’.

But how to monetize this charming six string passion that tormented my mind and moved me through suicidal thoughts and deep depression? Well, I already have. I have played music at bars, breweries, and cafés. I played on the streets, at hostels, around fires, in restaurants, and on a boat. I have recorded two albums and sold a few copies. However, it hasn’t been sustainable enough to live off this passion of the six string strum where lyrics pour through my heart beat but stem from the guitar itself. Unfortunately, the reach hasn’t extended past my eyes and into the waves of musical living.

Between January 2017 and March 2021, I spent two years in total, about six months at a time, finding my way through the fog of the mind and the daze of society in Colombia South America. I recorded with a Grammy Award winning producer and three other producers in 2018 to fulfill a dream album called Finding Sound. In 2020, I stumbled upon a music school/hostel/coffee farm that resides in the same small town as the Grammy Award winning producer. I want to buy into this three in one business to obtain a business visa and gain residency in Colombia.

Music will become more than a passion filled hobby in Colombia. It will become a way of life. In Colombia, I have the ability to dive into the ocean of golden music symbols by furthering my study of music theory, guitar, piano, vocals, and a variety of drums and flutes while I continue to express myself through the sound waves of the six string. I will learn from the Grammy Award winning producer how to use different applications of production and study the intricacies of music with the music teacher. I will teach basic guitar to local children and travelers alike while I play live shows in the evenings at hostels, cafés, restaurants, and on a boat tour to share music with those who are around me. Through these efforts and the mentorships from the Grammy Award winning producer and owner of the music school, I will develop a well-rounded understanding of music creation and the music industry as I simultaneously extend the music that flows through me across unseen seams of society.

The town I am moving to is a tourist town that sees national and international travelers weekly. Rooting my life here allows our music to reach travelers from around the world and weave a musical thread into the quilt of society currently untouched by our music. The thread will start with Run Wild 1.3, as seen in the video linked above. It will be our first hit, according to the Grammy Award winning producer. Our music will connect with people in person and maneuver through the inter webs of our internet based world where recorded albums, live streams, and music videos will touch the hearts of whoever chooses to listen.

Those who choose to listen follow me for different reasons. Maybe it is because of the way I amble in the Amazon of Colombia as I move through the mysteries of mind and jungle – more likely it is the way I amble through the jungle of the mind. Maybe it is because of the adventure photography of mountain lakes and river bottoms. Maybe it is the sound of music that flows through my heart. Maybe to live vicariously. Maybe none of those reasons. My first follower on Patreon told me they wanted to support my journey; they believed in my journey. An old coworker told me they listened to all of the songs I put on Instagram. Another wonders where I am and what intriguing new adventure I will lead. One fan of my music said the lyrics weave a thread of understanding into the mind as the guitar hits the heart strings of life. People seem to follow me for who I am.

The next section is a broad brushstroke touching the canvass of my life. A tidbit of information that will entice the reader to know more. It touches core aspects of my musical passion but leaves out many tales of how my passion of song writing and playing music brought me to the footsteps of a dream coming true. A dream, only inches away. One that will be realized. One, that with this essay, can be realized this year.

Broken. Lost. Confused. The six string saved me. Acoustic guitar I mean. I walked into my friend’s house in March 2010. I left all my college friends behind. We merely drank and got high every day for a year straight. I tried cocaine too. That was when I knew I needed to change. So I went back to my best friend growing up. He sat there in his apartment, a six string classical guitar in hand, learning a song. He was recovering from a broken arm that rendered him unable to work. He had a lot of time. The idea of learning guitar slipped into a cavern in my mind like a sliver sticks a finger that moves along a forgotten wooden surface. I began my journey with guitar from that moment forward.

I studied climate change and environmental studies at the University of Montana. I was twenty years old. Falling in the mind and losing myself. I couldn’t remember who I had been. I barely recognized myself in the mirror; my eyes too foggy to recognize my own face as I studied the failures of our society. I wasn’t ready for all of the problems of society to be bestowed upon my young mind. It forced me to see and awaken my spirit fire. Again, I wasn’t ready. The spiritual awakening felt in moments like a legion of archers attacking from all directions through doubt, fear, pain, and suffering as I slid down mudslide slopes where no hope goes into the darkest hollows of the lost minds mountains surrounded by the mist of eternal night. Suicidal, depressed, and carrying symptoms of schizophrenia forced a change of who I am. I swan dove into the infinite ocean of the heart’s emotion as I fumbled my fingers along the six string like a drunk trying to open a door, seeing two knobs. Who am I?

The guitar drove me forward in this confusing time of muddled information streams, injustices, and complex systems entangled upon themselves like a web of fishing nets knotted together on the beach. Frustration poured through my being as my fingers bled and callused in the process of metal strings and fingertips building a rapport. My mind shaken; only the guitar carried the capacity to bring me to presence. I was propelled to speak about the issues of the world. The only way I saw fit was through music. Through song and story. Through bringing people together around the soundwaves of love, pain, hope, and change so maybe they would be happy for a while. Music can touch the soul to the depths of existence, bring the mind to presence, and inundate the heart with all the emotions of being human which at times carries heavy storms of fierce wind, torrential rain, and piercing lightning or whispers a light drizzle that holds a break in the clouds for the god light moment to shine through, illuminating a rainbow.

I started to write my own songs within two years of picking up the six string. ‘Orchard Dreams’, one of the first songs I wrote, sings of staring to the clouds beyond the stars as I swing on my dusty old chair. A song through the heart that believes in dreams. A dream that persists today and sits at the edge of my fingertips to live on the coffee farm in Colombia. A dream held for ten years, now just about to be realized in the material world. Another called ‘One Being’ came through early on. ‘One Being’ recognizes that we are all interconnected at unfathomable levels with the earth, sun, and moon. In fact, we are one with them.

I played ‘One Being’ at an open mic in a bar in my hometown for my first open mic ever. The once loud crowd silenced themselves as they all swiveled their chairs or cocked their ears to listen. I remember two men specifically. I looked up; both the men turned their heads to see who was playing as they held their beer halfway from bar to mouth as if caught in the act of something unspeakable, unable to finish what they started. The sound waves of music seemed to paralyze them. At that moment I knew music was my heart path. The strum of the six string, my only tether to this world. My mind too far off in dream land of a different existence as I began to come through alcoholism, suicidal thoughts, and depression.

If the six string strum didn’t come along, maybe I would already be dead. Maybe, I would be in a dark void in the mind, lost in judgement towards how our society treats humans and non-humans alike. Cacao slaves in West Africa. Destruction of rainforests in Brazil just so we can have a little more cow on the dinner table. Guitar brought me through anguish, sadness, despair, and existential dread of a future on fire looming ahead of us. I was 23 at the time. The Amazon wasn’t burning as much as it is now. Or maybe it was and I was more ignorant then.

I ventured to Colombia, South America. Within the first few weeks in Colombia I received a vision in a dream. I found myself in a tall building and narrow hallway with a wooden rail on my left side being the only barrier between me and an infinite void above and below. To the right of me, a wall of portraits. I was pulled quickly through the hall; speeding passed the pictures that blurred together like a quick camera pan where streaks of color show the movement but shapes and patterns fall into the form of color and line. I arrived at an open door. I slowed almost to a stop and floated into the room. A white drape covered something unknown but it’s form silhouetted a treasure chest towards the back wall. The drape fell off, seemingly unprovoked. It was a treasure chest. The treasure chest opened. Glistening golden beams of light leaked out of the now open chest like sun rays pouring through small breaks in a mostly cloudy day. My heart beckoned me forward. I looked down; a golden guitar nestled cozily in the treasure chest. This is a gift for your Bryan a gentle voice within my subconscious told me. Then I woke up.

I kept going. I began to come to my heart with the sound of music as the songs I wrote frolicked through different genres like young children cavorting in a flower filled meadow in the Rocky Mountains of the United States. I had a few rap songs intermixed with my mostly folky mountain feel. A slight influence from Spanish guitar began to develop as I listened to the trills and smooth melodies of Andean tunes. I soon found myself in a small town called Ollantaytambo, Peru. It was located on the route to Machu Picchu. I played in the parks and on the streets. Everywhere I went, six strings kept on my back.

One day, I ate a pizza in a pizzeria when a couple from the United States sat next to me. My confidence in my music grew as I asked if I could play them a song. I played a song I wrote called Para Ver. The song balances the struggles in our world with the heart path that moves through the blockades of the mind to transform the ensnared network of societal existence. The woman listening teared up as her eyes spoke of pain and understanding of our world’s dilemmas. ‘Keep going’, they told me. Then again, in the main square of Cuzco, I played a few songs. The same song Para Ver appeared through the mystical six string instrument strapped to my shoulder. A bandana wrapped around my forehead with eyes glistening in hope, I fingered the song and sang to the people meandering through the main square. A lady from an unknown land looked at me with teary eyes. Seemingly, she knew the pains I spoke of first hand and also that people were fighting for a healthier existence.

I was on track; but I was still shattered. Then, a seed from a fellow musician to put my music online sprouted and began to blossom, engulfing my mind like a knapweed covered hillside. People like my music, I need to get it to them. I noticed musicians playing on the buses and streets for a living. I considered following that path. My heart wanted to. My mind tired and yearned for a break. I went home without the slightest awareness of what was to come.

I stopped listening to my intuition and began to fall into the trap of what I ‘needed’ to do to survive instead of filling my heart with love. I played daily but my mind and heart began to cloud in a misty fog that sits in the valley on a cool winter’s day. I couldn’t see it though. This was my only choice in life, I told myself. I need to be heard. But I need to get better. I am not good enough. These cyclical thoughts of not being good enough at singing and strumming may have stopped me from continuing onward to Bolivia. But the thought of living with music persisted. I can’t exist in this society without becoming a known musician I said to myself. The thought waves cycled through my mind like an escalator at an airport that never stops as I again struggled with alcoholism. I went to a few live shows and said ‘one day I will be there’; so heavily focused on the destination I couldn’t embrace the journey of presence.

I started to date a woman a few years older than me. One night I sat down with the guitar, mind racing, wondering if I needed to be with my girlfriend instead of the guitar. I couldn’t sit with six string anymore. The agony of what love was collided in my mind, almost snapping the heart strings of who I am. I put the guitar in its case and picked it up without zipping the bag shut, the mind too distracted to pay attention to that small detail. The guitar fell. I thought it broke. It didn’t. A few days later I found my other guitar. Broken. It was snapped at the neck. I knew my way with music was faltering. We broke up a couple months later. My passion for music was stronger than my love for this human. At least I told myself I loved her. The truth is, I didn’t want to be alone. I left her and I came back to the guitar as my lover.

I took the leap to create my destiny with the plan to travel the world and record music with different producers in January 2017. My plans always change. I found myself in the Amazon. The Putumayo region of Colombia. That is when I met them. Spiritual and tribal elders I continue to return to four years later. One is now 107 years old, when we met, 103. Our first meeting he reached out and as our hands touched to greet he said “gracias” before I could catch my breath to speak. That was when I met the protector of his Tribe. One word that touched my soul and rejuvenated my direction in this world. One word that still floats across my mind like a cotton seed in the breeze gently weaving with the winds of being. A new seed planted.

My obsession with getting my voice heard through music clouded my mind in a mist of a dark night riddle that could never be solved. Only let go. The guitar that once saved my life from depression and suicidal thoughts became a tunnel visioned curse. A dark spell that shadowed the mind, saying, ‘this is the only way for me’. Two years of learning from these spiritual elders changed that. In 2019 I began to break free of the spell I bestowed upon myself as new songs started to pour in. One called ‘Like A Wave’ became an instant favorite to those around me as they danced around the fire and asked for me to play ‘Like a Wave’ every time it was my turn to fiddle with the six string. Another called ‘Never Give Up’ became an instant favorite of mine as I sang from my heart space saying, ‘I will never give up’. The music flowed freely through my heart as I surrendered to love the six string acoustic guitar, potentially for the first time in my life. The only other time where six string love sauntered into my heart was when it pulled me through depression and suicidal thoughts. But I was too broken at the time; too frail in mind to hold a hearts love for something so delicate.

Today, I play the six string for myself again. I feel the turbulence of minor chords and uplifting waves of major chords. I hear the sounds through my heart as it swells in the ocean of emotions. The chord that bends in blues melts away my sorrows of today as I continue to create my own sound. I sing to the mountains and the streams. I sing to the birds and the trees. I sing to those around me. I play live shows and busk on the streets. I return to the six string extension of myself as my mind clears. I see the guitar as a beautiful expression of my being that helps me maneuver our age of befuddlement. After a long day’s work in 2021, I sit at a trailhead in the back of my van, dancing along the six string like a spider as she maneuvers along her web; my heart beat thumps to the rhythms of my soul. Strumming the six string by nature heals my heart’s holes and calms the turbulence in my mind as I find myself loving the pluck of a string and the bird as she sings.