Take a musical journey in Glenwood

Click to Enlarge Browse and Buy Post Independent Photos Carl Bernstein and his guitar are making a stop in Glenwood Saturday. Courtesy photo

By Stina Sieg
Post Independent Staff
Glenwood Springs, CO Colorado
April 18, 2008

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GLENWOOD SPRINGS, Colorado — Far out.

That’s about what you think after a conversation with Carl Bernstein. And it’s not just because the guitarist uses the words himself. Here’s a fellow who came of age in the hippie days, who spent years traveling in South America. Now, after half a century of playing, he still sounds excited about his music. At an age when most folks are thinking about security, the 65-year-old is mapping his own way musically.

Isn’t that out there?

“It all boils down to being really present,” he explained, of his work, “doing that piece with total involvement in the moment.”

Far out classical

WHO: Carl Bernstein, classical guitarist, performing live WHEN: 7 p.m. Saturday WHERE: The Glenwood Springs Center for the Arts, 601 E. 6th St. MORE INFORMATION & TICKETS: $20 for non-members or $16 members. Call 945-2414 to reserve in advance. To find out more about Bernstein, visit www.carlbernstein.net. WHY? Come and listen in on Bernstein’s musical journey.

It was Wednesday morning, and he was speaking by phone from his home in rural Ocatae, New Mexico. He was hearty and jovial, going into his past, his years of teaching, his career shifts, his upcoming Glenwood show. He didn’t give some full, extensive history, but more of a collection of short, important anecdotes that have shaped him. More than once he laughed, cutting a memory short, saying it was far too involved to detail. He was probably right — but it was still all fascinating.

At 7, he had an “awakening” to music, he said. Though he’d playing for a while before that, one day, while practicing alone, he broke through to something new.

“Suddenly, everything changed,” he recalled. “It was just the shear joy of playing and being in the moment. It was wasn’t work anymore.”

He was too young to know what had taken place, yet he spent his childhood trying to return to that instant of clarity. His musical journey had begun.

At 15, he heard Pete Seeger in concert and was turned onto guitar. Shortly after, he started playing classical, because it “struck a chord,” he said.

He talked about being 22, about “the most intense, sustained experience” he’s ever had, studying with guitar great Andrés Segovia in Spain. For three weeks, he practiced six hours a day and was surrounded by others just as dedicated as himself. Segovia, he explained, was the man who made classical guitar an accepted instrument. It was his life’s work.

“He just wanted to get his music out there,” he said.

Bernstein was right there with him. And here’s where his story gets thick and even more interesting — kind of hard to believe, almost. 1972, he took off from Santa Cruz, Calif. with the intent of traveling to the farthest tip of Chile. Ostensibly, this was to meet a woman who had moved there, one he’d seen profiled in National Geographic. Really, though, it sounds like he just wanted adventure. Like Segovia, he dreamt of playing for all who wanted to listen. He imagined himself as a troubadour. Other than that, there wasn’t a plan.

“I was going to play music as a means of livelihood,” he said. “I was going to play music for anyone at anytime anywhere.”

And he did, for seven years. From small venues to sidewalks, to the first live concert on a rural radio station, he really performed wherever he could. Though he had left with only $400 in his pocket, he created this new life for himself. Being spontaneous opened up so many doors, he explained, to jobs to meals to friends. He found himself doing shows for the U.S. State Dept. He even met his wife. Music has almost always been his meditation, he said, his way of sharing himself. After all, in his words, it is a “universal language.”

“Everybody’s open to music,” he explained, “It has a way of transcending all of people’s beliefs of who they are and who they should associate with.”

Of course he had so many more stories to share, about moving to the Southwest, the family he’d raised, the 20 years of teaching he’d done. Not surprisingly, however, the thing he sounded most jazzed about was what was going on with him right then.

“My whole life, I’ve been learning to live in the moment,” he laughed.

These days, that means being a retired instructor from New Mexico Highlands University and the United World College, both in Las Vegas, N.M. It means having time to share his music with people — again.

“The goal is to play from my heart and soul,” he said, “and help bring people into their heart and soul through my music.”

While he may not be the gypsy of his past, he’s starting to perform his mixture of classical, folk and Latin songs for people across this country. He’s in a new life phase, he went on. Who knows where it will take him?

“I guess I would say I’m feeling freer all the time,” he said.

Again, far out.