That Keaggy thing

After John Lennon and Paul McCartney, the person who influenced me the most as a guitar player and musician is Phil Keaggy (pictured at right, taken by my friend Sean Thomas Bickerton). And I say “after” only as a matter of chronology, because in truth Phil Keaggy has influenced me more than the two Beatles ever have.

I still remember the first time I heard his music: it was 1984, and I was at the Quezon City home of my then-new discipler Philip Tarroja (the director of Campus Crusade for Christ in UP Diliman). He put on an LP of Phil Keaggy’s “What A Day” album and went directly to the title track, and I was immediately captivated by the catchy intro, the Beatle-esque style of the song, and the McCartney-ish voice of Keaggy. Not to mention the incredible guitar playing! The lyrics were also smart and appealing, particularly the line “… and brother Tom, without a doubt” which played on the “Doubting Thomas” theme. After that song Kuya (older brother to you non-Filipinos out there) Philip played the rest of the album, and I was hooked for life.

Later on Kuya Philip lent me a tape of “What A Day” and another one of “The Master And The Musician,” Keaggy’s first instrumental album which is one of my favorites to this day. I was also able to buy a few other Keaggy albums, “Play Thru Me,” “Ph’lip Side,” and “Town To Town,” and over the next six years I played those tapes over and over and tried to copy Keaggy’s riffs and emulate his style. I finally gave up on the former and settled for the latter when I realized I wasn’t talented enough to play blazing leads and complicated fingerstyle and everything in between. All I could do was try to sound a little like him, and as many Keaggy fans say, I aspire just to be able to play his mistakes.

Because I played my five tapes practically daily for six years they literally died on me. They were in such bad shape that I wasn’t able to bring them with me when I moved to Davao City in 1990. The next decade was a drought to me Keaggy-wise, broken only when my sister in Canada sent me a couple of CDs (“Time 1” and “Time 2”). Unfortunately I didn’t have a CD player at the time and so I had to wait a little longer before I could fully enjoy them.

It wasn’t until last year that my Keaggy collection began to grow, courtesy of a friend in the US who has sent me quite a number of CDs over the past months. He also gave me the “Philly Live!” DVD and two other live DVDs, and so all in all I now have 16 albums.

I enjoy playing my Keaggy CDs and DVDs, but the greater enjoyment is in playing my guitar and realizing how much I have improved as a player as a result of listening to him. God has also used him mightily to change my life through his insightful lyrics and just by the fact that he pursues excellence as a good testimony for the Lord.

Fore more information on Phil Keaggy, the official Phil Keaggy website and the PK fans site are good places to start.