Goodnight, and Joy Be To You All

I recently watched a documentary by the BBC about the search for Paul McCartney’s original 1961 Hofner bass guitar – the original Beatle violin-style bass. It was stolen out of a locked van in 1972 and the resources used to follow up on all the leads generated through a media campaign to find it were quite fascinating. The investigators eventually re-questioned one of the strongest leads they had who turned out to be the son of the man who stole it. Through him, they traced it to a pub owner who had given it to his brother, and it had been left in the attic of his home for the past fifty years.

Words: Dave Charles

There is a definite bond between a beloved instrument and its owner, and sadly, musicians are often parted from instruments when they need extra cash to upgrade or, in some cases, just to get by. Sometimes they find their way back, but mostly they are lost forever. 

I had a guitar that I played for years. It was an Ovation Electric Legend that I bought from the late Eddie Boyle at TOMS in Joburg in 1977. I needed a professional instrument as I had been booked on the circuit by The Don Hughes Organisation, and I would be earning enough to pay it off. I can’t remember what it cost but it was way more than I had ever owed on anything, and, at the time, I wasn’t sure that I would be able to keep up the repayments. 

I adored that guitar. It was built with new technology bonding a lyrachord rounded back to a spruce top. It had a new acoustic pickup system that allowed you to plug it into a PA system or amplifier like an electric guitar, and the sound was brilliant. 

I took great care with this instrument, but somehow along the way it picked up battle scars, and each one told a story. From literally hundreds of pubs and clubs and venues in and around Johannesburg, exotic distant gigs at the coast and expensive private game lodges in the bush, we travelled the country playing the songs and telling the stories that kept us high on the agency booking charts. Then I moved to Cape Town for a bitter season of regret before returning to Joburg where I would find love and start a family. A few years later we moved to a home in the wild KZN bush, and I played less. 

I think it was here that the sound board started to bow and the guitar became difficult to play. 

After we relocated to Ballito about 23 years ago, I tried to have it repaired, but the Durban-based luthier I had been referred to told me that it was irreparable. Sadly, I believed him, and I sold it on commission at a long-gone music store in Umhlali. How I regret that decision. It could have been repaired – I know that now, but back then I bought a replacement, a Yamaha CPX 8. This was a fine guitar that I got at a discount at another long-gone music store in The Square in Umhlanga.

I have played this guitar for the past 23 years, and I think it may have improved with age. Then I went through a period of guitar acquisition. It was a kind of obsession, madness almost, where I had to buy every unusual guitar I could afford. Eventually, I ran out of space on the walls of my studio and my obsession lifted. 

And I stopped playing. I put it down to age and hands that had been damaged by excessive playing. I didn’t touch a guitar for a long time – long enough to lose it a bit. But recently I started playing that Yamaha again, quietly to myself, and it all came back. And they all came back. All the friends I had played with over the years came back to play the songs we shared, and I realised that I had stopped playing because I had missed them so much.

They say that people go when their names are spoken for the last time, but I think it’s when the last of their songs has been played by those who remember them. So I will keep on playing for a while. After all, I am in good company.