Episode 19: The Greatest Gig: Rob Hampton on Joy and Success

What happens when a seriously stressed-out high school English teacher burns out and ends up building an extraordinary life teaching guitar?

In this episode, Heather talks with Rob Hampton — teacher, entrepreneur, and all-around delight — about how he went from burnout to building something truly special in music education. Rob has taught everyone from four-year-olds to Fortune 500 CEOs, helped over 29 million guitarists, and built a career rooted in joy, grit, and real intention. 

They talk about building something amazing, helping everyday people have extraordinary experiences making music, student breakthroughs, AI, chronic pain, creativity, and one very specific grammatical hill Rob is fully prepared to die on. 

It’s smart, funny, thoughtful, and full of heart.

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:08

This is the Heather Patero Show where conversation meets calling. Well, welcome to the Heather Patero Show. I am so glad you're here, and I am so happy to have this conversation today. My guest is the founder of Heartwood Guitar in Redmond, Washington. And since 2003, he has taught hundreds of private students from beginners to retirees to Fortune 500 CEOs. He's also built Heartwoodguitar.com, which has now helped more than 29 million guitarists worldwide. He's the author of Rob's Totally Awesome Guitar Teaching Handbook, which is an excellent title, by the way. And he also runs the greatest gig, where he helps music teachers build sustainable, joyful careers that don't make them want to run screaming into the woods. And twice a year he hosts something called The Jam, part recital, part open mic, part rock concert, which already tells you that he and I are probably aligned on the whole make student performances less painfully stiff front. He is smart, funny, thoughtful, and deeply serious about helping people make music. Welcome to the show, Rob Hampton.

SPEAKER_02 1:29

Oh, thank you, Heather. Thank you for that wonderful introduction.

SPEAKER_03 1:32

Oh, you're so welcome. Well, listen, I want to start before the websites and the waiting list and the millions of guitarists back when you were on track to be a high school English teacher. Tell us about that.

SPEAKER_02 1:45

So I wanted to be uh a high school teacher ever since I was a high schooler myself. I remember studying my high school teachers and thinking, you know, I wouldn't have handled that that way, or I would have been nicer to that student. Or I also had a few teachers who I really admired and wanted to emulate. I wanted to have the kind of impact on other students that they had on me. Um, so I studied education and I taught high school English for three years, but I totally burned out. It was not a good match for me.

SPEAKER_03 2:20

So what was going on in that season for you?

SPEAKER_02 2:23

Yeah, so um it wasn't for lack of effort, um, but I was miserable. I was staying up too late, I was drinking too much. Um I woke every up every morning with a pit in my stomach. I remember going to the faculty restroom in between classes and just staring at myself in the mirror, going, okay, you can get through another period. And um, that was true both in the inner city uh public high school I first taught in, but also you know, in a private Catholic school that I worked at for two years up here in the Puget Sound area. Um and and the so it wasn't really the student population, and I enjoyed the students one-on-one, but I just realized I had a lot of difficulty teaching 30 kids who all have their own stuff going on at the same time. I'm I've come to realize I'm a highly sensitive person, as I think a lot of musicians are. And um it is it has turned out to be my superpower in one-on-one lessons. And I also do well with adults in groups, but having having a big class of young people, you know, like one kid I know like his uncle got shot the day before. Another girl just found out she was pregnant. Kid in the back doesn't know how to read, and he's super embarrassed whenever his turn comes to read aloud in class. There's all this stuff going on, and I just found it totally overwhelming and and had a hard time just stringing a complete sentence together when I was up in front of them. And it was just emotionally exhausting the whole time. So I totally burned out, quit after three years, and and was so distraught that this career that I thought would be my vocation was not working out. So that's kind of where I was when I found guitar teaching.

SPEAKER_03 4:34

Well, it feels more like you you knew you were built for teaching. It was just the wrong room.

SPEAKER_02 4:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 4:39

You know, was that how it kind of felt?

SPEAKER_02 4:41

Yes. But you know, the my my only real model was classroom teaching. I I never considered doing it uh running my own business. It never occurred to me until finally it did.

SPEAKER_03 4:56

Well, did that shake your confidence, though, about teaching?

SPEAKER_02 5:00

Yes. Um, yes. I I was sure that I would find something. And thank goodness my parents kind of subsidized my year of searching after then. They kind of helped support me while I I spent a year as Seattle's worst handyman, um, which didn't really pay the bills. I think I spent all the money I earned on how-to books and and power tools. Um uh I I think probably as part of my privileged upbringing, I grew up in like a suburb of San Francisco and you know, was a white male growing up in this culture. You know, you're kind of you're kind of part part of that experience is kind of believing that you can do anything. And uh, and so I think I I did think that things would work out, but it was still pretty uncomfortable burning out from that job and not knowing where I would head.

SPEAKER_03 6:05

I imagine it was pretty scary thinking you had worked that hard to get all that education to teach, and then it didn't pan out the way you thought it was gonna pan out.

SPEAKER_02 6:15

It was awful, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 6:17

So you wrote something that really stayed with me when I asked you about this. You said my evolution as a teacher has involved learning what my unique gifts and struggles are and creating a career that fits. That is such a wise sentence. I think so many can benefit from that, knowing what your gifts are, knowing what your struggles are. And then sometimes you do have to create yourself. So, what were those gifts that you started to recognize more clearly?

SPEAKER_02 6:46

Okay, so I think of gifts as being some kind of mix of like being good at stuff, but also loving stuff. And you don't necessarily need to be really good at something. If you really love it, you know, ideally you'd be good at it too, but you still need to listen to those things that you love, even if you kind of suck at them. And drama was definitely one of those things for me. I love drama. Like, drama is what took me from being a complete dweeb in middle school to being like not necessarily cool, but maybe like one or two levels under cool. Cool enough to like know girls and they knew me. Um so so that was my salvation in middle school. And then in high school, I really found my tribe through the drama drama department. And I was not very good at it. I'm still not very good at it. But um, but I loved being on stage. And um what's nice is I I found that with music, um uh my difficulties with theater um don't matter as much, but I can really get into a song and and I think perform a song well in in ways that I couldn't necessarily, you know, be the lead role of All About Eve and portray a 40-year-old man very well, which is what I did my senior year in high school. So, anyway, that's an example of a gift I have that's less about skill, but more about passion that has translated into, you know, me kind of specializing now in helping shy students get on stage and give it their all and have a blast, give a good performance. Um, so I feel like I'm channeling my high school drama director a little bit when I when I teach now, which is just this wonderful feeling of continuity. Um so yeah, that was one of my skills. And then as I mentioned before, like my high sensitivity personality, while it it made me overwhelmed in a in a classroom setting, I really get to focus on my individual students, give them a hundred percent of my attention, and tailor every lesson to their dreams, their skill level, their background, and and also, you know, the little nuances like how their day is going. Like, you know, you can kind of pay attention to how much energy they have and whether they're feeling frustrated with their lessons or inspired, and really tailor what you're teaching them based on on their emotional state. And I I wouldn't say I'm amazing at that, the way that maybe like a therapist would be really good at picking up on that stuff, but I have enough of that skill, I think, to to really make lessons rewarding for people. Most of my students have been with me for more than a decade, and I think some of that has to do with just my ability to really hone in on um in the the uniqueness of my individual students.

SPEAKER_03 10:10

That's awesome. Sounds like you designed around reality. You found a solution. And, you know, I think a lot of people waste years trying to become compatible with a life that is not compatible with them. And there's no shame around not thriving in traditional structure, which I think is what you you realize that that was not going to work for you. And um that's good. I mean, that that speaks to your resilience and it speaks to your passion because passion is powerful and passion drives us in so many ways. Yeah. So you've taught everybody from four-year-olds to Fortune 500 CEOs, which is a pretty fabulous range, if you ask me. What is one unglamorous truth about building a full-time life in music that people do not talk about enough?

SPEAKER_02 11:00

An unglamorous truth. So, so this is me like smoking a cigarette, telling telling a young person as they're considering a job in guitar, like why maybe they should think twice.

SPEAKER_00 11:16

Pretty much.

SPEAKER_02 11:18

All right.

SPEAKER_00 11:19

Take a drag here.

SPEAKER_02 11:26

Um well, kid, this is totally not like me because I tend to try to get people really stoked about it. Uh, but there's plenty of glamorous stuff. Um boy. Well, this is kind of random, but I'll say that you know, if if you work out of your own home, this is true probably of any job where you're working out of your own home, but often guitar teachers will will run things this way, that it takes a lot of trust and cooperation and nuance in um working things out with your partner so that um uh to kind of set boundaries around your work life um so that you can have the proper focus so that they don't feel like um you know you should be in the house helping with the kids, which is a a constant kind of negotiation, especially when the kids were young, and and uh my wife and I really struggled as parents. Um and uh so that's a tough a delicate balance, I would say.

SPEAKER_03 12:47

Oh, it is. My husband and I had to work that out too, because I would be working in the afternoons and evenings, and he was a corporate job person, so he was working in the daytime. And so we fortunately we were very blessed to have a wonderful lady who helped us, and I would drop our son off at about 11, 10:30, 11 in the morning, and then my husband would pick him up at 2230. But by that time I was already teaching lessons, and you know that you know it I think people think what we do is glamorous working in full-time music, but they don't see the hustle. And I just had a conversation with uh some artists. The hustle is hard, but it's so worth it because we're making a difference. We truly are. It's like when the world shut down for COVID. You know, people how many people couldn't have gotten through if they didn't, you know, they had music and books and art and movies, and we but yet we were we were told we were non-essential workers. And so we are extremely essential. And and I think that is an unglamorous truth, is that we don't get appreciated enough for what we the beauty that we bring into this world. So let me ask you this what surprised you most about the business side once it became your actual life and not just a dream?

SPEAKER_02 14:05

Oh, well, it was really a thrill early on to get a lot of interest in my teaching, um, which to some degree was a result of it being kind of the wild west of the internet. And um another one of my gifts, I suppose, which was again more of a passion than really a skill, was loving uh computers and technology. My dad bought one of the first like Apple, was it an Apple II Plus? It was a very early PC personal computer. Um, and so so like I was on 300 baud modems back like pre-internet, calling up BBSs for better or worse, you know, visiting some places I shouldn't have been. But um, but I was like this little like wannabe hacker kid um growing up near Silicon Valley. And so anyway, in in graduate school, I learned a little bit of HTML and ended up building my own website and search engine optimizing it back then, back before like most guitar teachers really knew anything about that. And so I got ranking um high up in Google for things like Seattle guitar lessons and just got this fire hose of um of interest in lessons. And so had a huge waiting list and was able to raise my rates a lot higher than I thought I expected I could. And um also realized that there was a big need for teachers to visit students' homes. And uh that's actually how I taught right when I was starting out because um I lived with an ex-con and his perpetually molting, enormous, unfriendly German shepherd. And so I wasn't going to invite students there. And he actually told me, he pulled me aside once and he's like, dude, man, you shouldn't, you shouldn't bring students here, man. You you know, he's talking about lawsuits and everything, and I kind of got the sense that his criminal history probably was in the back of his mind too. Not that he was gonna do anything, but um just that uh I don't know that it was it was not it was not the right place to teach. And so I would just go to students' houses and um that's how I got started, but I charged like five bucks extra for coming to to their houses.

SPEAKER_03 16:44

Wow. So you were like doing the on doing the in-home lesson thing before it even really became a thing. I mean, yeah, that's amazing. And you you made a website before it was really a thing. I mean, yeah, it sounds like you just were on the cutting edge of so much stuff.

SPEAKER_02 17:00

I was flailing though. I mean, the the website, I guess, I I didn't know how valuable it would be, but it just seemed obvious that I should have something. Um, this was back in like 2003. Um I just thought it would serve as my business card. But um, but the the in-home visits were just a necessity. And but I quickly realized that it was not worth it. The five the I needed to get my own place and start teaching in person because five bucks did not compensate me remotely for the amount of hassle it was to pack up everything and drive to students' houses. And so once I got established with my own apartment and uh all that, I realized that there were still students, or rather, students' parents who did not want to um be their kids' taxi driver all day. And um so I should probably offer something to these families. These are like wealthy families who have uh plenty of money, but not enough, not not not really the willing to put in the time to drive their kids around to lessons. And so I just decided to charge what I thought was worth it, which was an astronomical amount when I thought about like the time it took and the traffic and the extra time for traffic and everything. So I basically was charging about double my teaching rate to visit in-home lessons. And at the time it was at about 130 bucks an hour or something. So already kind of the top end at the time for music lessons. And, you know, most students didn't want to pay that amount, but there's there's a lot of money in Seattle, and so occasionally I'd find, you know, business people who want to lessons for their kids. And so um the those three or so home visits per week that I taught were that that really helped me pay my mortgage for a long time. So that was another surprising thing that that that could be kind of the backbone financially of my business was visiting people's homes. And as long as I was paid well for it, then the then the traffic wasn't as big a deal. And you know, I got I got to know the families, which is really cool. I go to their, you know, birthdays and bar mitzvahs and graduations and everything. They'd have me over for dinner sometimes. I felt like kind of like a uh a country uh doctor, you know, making home visits. It was kind of cool.

SPEAKER_03 19:42

That's awesome. Well, and the fact that you were willing to do it, and I think in business, that's something that we have to be willing to consider is to do something that somebody else won't. And that's that's a great, great thing to do. I mean, let's talk about the money because this is where some folks might might perk up. You said you went from $40 an hour in 2003 to $165 an hour now, and that did not happen by accident. I mean, you had to think that through. I know in Atlanta, I don't know any guitar teacher that is charging that amount of money. And and, you know, we we're not uh probably as rich as Seattle, but you know, we got ball players here, you know, and it's interesting that you thought that that that was okay. And I I think the thing is that's the thing. If you you have to know your worth and you have to know your value, and and and I think that's part of what you try to teach music teachers in in the business model of where you're helping teachers in the greatest gig is you've written very thoughtfully about that scarcity mentality, the idea that other teachers are somehow a threat, that helping somehow uh someone else will hurt you, or there's not enough to go around, and that can mean either students or money. And for music teachers or for anybody that is is a contract worker, where do you think that comes from? Well, I'll tell you what I think it comes from. It's it's tied to self-worth and what you believe that you're worth and what you believe that you have to offer. And because someone charges, let's say $40 an hour, you think, well, I couldn't charge more than that. You know, you we've got to know our business. And I think that somehow we get we forget who we are because we're so busy looking at everybody else when sometimes our business needs to be more like with blinders, you know, like this is what I'm worth, this is what I'm charging, this is what we're gonna do. This is my business, this is not somebody else. I'm not saying outprice yourself in the market, but obviously you didn't have that mindset. You were like, I'm gonna charge what I'm worth to deal with this crazy traffic, you know.

SPEAKER_02 21:54

So yeah, right. Yes. And it wasn't it wasn't comparing myself to other Guitar teachers. I want to be clear that like I I know lots of music teachers who are from what I can see are worth at least as much as I am in terms of their time and what they give to their students. So it's not just that. It's also simply, you know, supply and demand that if you have a lot of people knocking at your door, um one way to address that is to raise your prices to uh make the supply and demand even out more. And there are there are a lot of benefits to that. You will make more money. There are also drawbacks to that. You will uh only be serving wealthy people. And um uh you will no longer be able to like go to a party and talk to a random person and they say, like, oh my gosh, I have a guitar, you know, collecting dust at home. Uh maybe I could take lessons from you. You know, I used to be like, oh, awesome, let's do it. Let's let's start tomorrow. And and then uh for a long time now, it's been before we get that set up, I need to let you know. And my rates have gone up significantly since the 165 an hour, too. Um it's uh it's higher than that now. So um so yeah, so there are benefits and drawbacks. But yeah, that it I was thinking more about like where the scarcity mentality comes from. And I gotta say, some of it is also um that assumption that I grew up with, growing up white and male in a wealthy part of the country, which is you know, everything's gonna work out. And um I do think that as an entrepreneur, you need that confidence and hope to take risks. Um, but it was just, I think, a little easier for me to have that confidence coming from the background I had. But it was also some very wise people, I think, early on in my life who were coaching me. There was like Mr. Lorenz, who I went to a Jesuit high school. And so I had a sexuality and spirituality teacher in high school, which a lot of people find really funny. Anyway, good old Mr. Lorenz, who told me not to be afraid of the penis word. Um, he also was at the career fair and uh was like sitting alone at the teaching booth while like all my peers were crowding around the like finance and law booth at the career fair. And so I just kind of sidled over to him and I told him I thought I was thinking about being an English teacher, and he was so happy, his whole face lit up. You know, I might have been the only guy, the only student he talked to the whole night. And uh, and and I told him that I was worried about making a decent living for my kids. I wanted them to have a good life, and I didn't want to be selfish and just like, you know, pursue my dream at their expense. And he said, Rob, do what you love and the money will come. And that always stuck with me. And then my dad also, when I talked to him about work, my dad was a very gentle and kind man, never pressured me into chasing some high-power career. And uh and he he encouraged me to, he said, do something you like. And I think he was coming from a lot of jobs, he had like 14 jobs over his course of his life, from being a pig farmer to uh an investor. And uh a lot of the jobs he didn't like, he called one of them a fur-lined rut. And so I think he wanted me to have a happier life in my work. And so Mr. Lorenz and my dad really encouraged me to pursue my dreams, and thankfully I was supported enough financially and emotionally to kind of blunder around for a while to find what I wanted. And um, I like to think I still would have done that had I, you know, been working a full-time at McDonald's while I was trying to figure that out. And I I did work throughout my life, but I I uh rarely had the stress of like wondering how I was gonna pay rent the next month. And I realized that that is a great gift and makes it a lot easier to have a uh an abundance mentality, right? I know you're trying to pass on, you know, advice to your listeners that applies to everyone, but I'm I'm also I think very clear-eyed about uh or not very, but I'm trying to be more clear-eyed about you know the advantages that I've been given that have helped me get to where I am. It's not to say that people can't also uh you know build their own business, but um but I think it was a little easier for me than a lot of people.

SPEAKER_03 27:21

Well, and I think again, going back to passion, passion is a powerful thing. We I did not grow up wealthy at all. I did not grow up in um, but I had support. And my mother was a school teacher, and my daddy died when I was nine years old, and he didn't live her leave her with any life insurance or any kind of money or anything like that. And I remember when generic brands were they weren't a store brand. It literally said on the on it, it was a black and white label. It said black-eyed peas or green beans, and we never could afford the Barbies. You know, we always had the dollar store knockoffs, and I feel like that I'm very successful and I feel like I am living my dream. And of course, I married a wonderful man, and and he didn't grow up wealthy at all either. And it we're we're just two ragamuffin kids who just had a dream and passion. And to be honest, our faith plays a lot of a part in that, you know, that that we believe that God has good and perfect plans for us. It may not go the way that we think they should, but we do believe that God um has good and perfect plans for us. And so when you lean into that, when you lean into the support and the opportunity, whether you work at McDonald's or you come from a rich home or you come from uh foster care or whatever your story is, that passion and having a dream to even begin with is a great place to start. And I and I think you you did that. You you took the advantages that you had and you used it to your benefit to create something magical and wonderful that has helped so many people. Now, listen, I I want to talk about the jam because I love this concept so much. I am totally a teacher that does not believe in the stuffy recital model. So you describe it as part recital, part open mic, part rock concert, which already sounds way more alive than the polite clapping and knees together recital model. So tell us about the jam. What does it feel like? What what what goes into creating something like that?

SPEAKER_02 29:36

Yeah, well, you know, I came from an education background. And when you're a high school English teacher, you're you're always looking for opportunities for your students to celebrate their work, you know, their their florid poetry about the sky, you know, raining tears and rivers of blood and all that, all that wonderful purple uh uh uh poetry that um high schoolers write. So you, you know, you're trying to figure out well, where can we publish this, you know, and can we stick it on the wall? And so when I started teaching guitar, that's where my mind immediately went, you know, and thankfully there's an obvious venue for musicians to share uh what they've done. And um, in my mind, there was a better opportunity for their work to actually be enjoyed and and um spread around, because uh I think music is is in general a little more accessible than than poetry and three-paragraph essays. So uh so the like the I knew I didn't want a stressful, stuffy, like piano recital, traditional piano recital type uh experience. And so I was thinking more of like the open mic, which I was familiar with. You know, I'll I'll have like an open mic for my students. And so it evolved from there to where now we have a whole day of music, um, three shows about an hour and a half long each. And I collaborate with three other music teachers, another guitar teacher and a drum teacher and a bass teacher, and we bring all our students together and form bands. Some of the students perform solo if they're like singer, songwriter, guitarists. But a lot of the students get together in these bands and either collaborate with other students, usually with some teachers filling in the gaps on instruments that uh where they they're needed. Sometimes uh the students just pay for the like rock star experience of having the teachers back them up. Um and it's it's a blast. It's like it's the coolest thing I do as a teacher, and we have just transcendent moments uh all the time. And we take really high-quality video of the performances, so the students have this um their memories captured. And I think the the the kind of guiding principle that that helped those the the jam evolve into what it is, was was this thing I realized after a while, which was that the focus should not be on that the focus should be on entertaining the audience at the jams, not on um giving the student kind of a valuable educational experience or a chance to demonstrate their skill. Once the focus shifted to the audience, which I know seems a little weird if you're a teacher, right? Like you're there to serve your student, and and we we have our students pay money for the jam. And so, you know, definitely their educational experience is paramount. But when you organize the show around entertaining the audience, everything falls into place because that's what the students want. They don't want to be like up there tested. They want to touch people, and so that guiding principle plays out in like maybe nudging the students away from choosing their very hardest song to perform at the jam, you know, which is often their impulse, you know, like I've been working on stairway for a year, and like I can I can almost play it to tempo now. I should really show it off, you know. And I tell my students now this is not a pole vaulting competition, right? This is not a thesis defense. And and we talk about how professional musicians perform. Like when you and I perform, Heather, we're not like, we're not on the ragged edge of our abilities every song, right? That would suck. We we take risks, but um, but a lot of the stuff we perform, we've got pretty well down, right? Because then you can play with it and and and connect with the audience, you know. When you're like trying to remember what your next note is, you're not connecting with the audience. And so um, so yeah, like that that guiding principle has really made the jam a magical experience. And the audience, uh more often than not, really does love it. Uh, we we put on a great show and we we try to make each song, no matter the student's skill level, we try to make each song work. And so that often means like, you know, the student just play is one cog in the machine. Uh the student plays this rhythm part, but you know, if they falter, the rest of the band, there's enough skilled musicians in the band to where their momentum carries the song through and there's no train wreck, no embarrassment, you know, they just stop for a second and then jump back in, and then they get that applause at the end and they're hooked.

SPEAKER_03 35:14

Oh yeah. Well, and it becomes a team experience and a community-driven experience. It's about relationship, which is what, in my opinion, music should be about anyway. And then once that student experiences real energy, real audience connection, real payoff, and then they understand why the work matters to begin with, right? You know, I mean, that's that that's why we do it. That's why we practice, that's why we put our best foot forward, that's why we work on dynamics and contrast and all the things that we work on to make it musical. You know, there's there's something that I do, and I I won't charge you for this, but one thing that I do with my students is they have to do something called an accountability video. And once a week, they have to check in with me and say, hey, Miss Heather, this is what I'm working on. Even my adult students, hey Heather, this is what I'm working on. And then I give them feedback. This is outside of the lesson time that I do that. So, and I don't charge extra for that per se. It's part of their experience. And I keep up with it. Who turns in the accountability video and who doesn't? And at the end of the year, when we do our spring awards, they they get credit for that and they they get a trophy or some kind of you know, a feedback back. You know, they get something, a reward back for putting in that time, that effort. And it shows. I have found consistently the students that turn in accountability videos once a week are usually a better student. They usually pay on time, they usually hardly ever miss their lesson. They are more invested in their training and it builds that relationship. We build that relationship all throughout the year, every week. I see Ms. Heather in person, and then once a week I'm I'm sending her something to show her that I care about what we have done. And accountability, I think, is a key component in our world that is missing, even for adults right now, holding them accountable for their actions, for what they're doing, for the investments that they're making. And I think if people would just be accountable, I think the whole world just needs to send us accountability videos. It would be a better world, you know. But but I think that system. Yeah, and and and it it invests them more into what we're doing, that it's not just about them, which is what your jam is essentially doing. It's not just about them, it's about me too. It's about me as their teacher. That when you send your accountability video, you're showing me that you care about our time together. You care about what I'm investing in you, not just what you're investing in me. And that is what the jam is also, I think, doing in essence too. It the focus is now off me. It's about, I want this to sound good, not for me, but for my audience, because people will actually be listening and I want to make my teacher proud and I want to make my teammate proud. And knowing that you've got a backup, oh, isn't that interesting? It goes back to that support that we were talking about earlier, knowing that if a kid who maybe is a beginner or in the beginning stages, they've got the support of the people in the band, when you know that you've got the support and opportunity, that is what makes you successful. Not that you came from a good background or a good home or any of that. Support and opportunity and passion. I would say passion. You know, I mean, you and I just preached a whole sermon on that. I mean, seriously, I mean, that right there could change somebody's life, really, to be reminded that we do this together. We're better together, right? And I just think it's amazing. And I'm sure your parents get a lot out of that. What has been some of your parent feedback after the jam? I mean, are they seeing their kids be more confident? Are they seeing something in their kid that all of a sudden wasn't there and then now it is because they had that opportunity and that support?

SPEAKER_02 39:13

Oh my gosh, yes. I mean, I don't teach a lot of kids anymore. I have like two or three. Most of my students are adults. Um and some of that is that I moved out to Redmond, and so I teach mostly on Zoom now. Um and and Zoom, you know, parents are looking for in-person lessons, often for their kids. Um let me think about specific feedback. I mean, usually so at the end of the jam, parents of students, I mean, they they come up with their arm around their child usually and they're just beaming. And when they get uh when they get the video back, um they tend to send it around on Facebook or or uh you know wherever. Um and they have their kids keep coming back for lessons through high school. Um it's it's and and and I'm often I often find myself like looking at a slideshow at a you know, a graduation party or something, a quincineta that I went to recently. And there are sometimes like parts of this presentation honoring a child's transition into you know going to college and stuff where they're thanking teachers, and there's a whole section dedicated to jam videos and this gratitude for the kids' experiences. And um, I know I'm not the only, you know, teacher in their life, and and uh it's it's just it's really striking to kind of you know, often they'll show video footage of of the child when they're little all the way up through, you know, being a 17 or 18 year old, and just seeing the scope of my work with this child through the years as they grew up and as their musical skills developed. And and um it's just an amazing honor um to be a part of someone's life for that long and um to feel like you played a role in and the incredible young adult that they've become, you know. Um yeah, I think that's probably the best feedback I've gotten is those slideshows.

SPEAKER_03 42:08

That's awesome. That's awesome. All right, listen, tell everybody about Emma and her original song, Snow Day. Let's change gears here a little bit. Let's hear about that song.

SPEAKER_02 42:19

Great. Oh, I love this memory. So um, so I had been teaching, I taught Emma from when she was about five years old until she went off to college. And um, she was this delightful little spunky kid, and we're still in touch. I just had lunch with her a couple months ago. Um uh and she's she's like in her mid-twenties now. And I just have this great memory of helping her write the song. So we wrote probably, I don't know, eight songs together or so over the course of me teaching her. And a lot of them were when around she was like seven, eight, nine, ten years old. And so they're you know, they're just about these great kids topics, like, I wonder what the penguins are doing at the icy park, you know. Um and and uh so she came to my studio one day and she's like, I want to write a song. And I'm like, cool, let's do it. What do you want to write it about? And she was like, I don't know. She she was all inspiration, but you know, none no ideas. And so um I just asked her, like, is there something you seem in a happy mood? You want to write a happy song? Like, what's something you've been feeling happy about lately? And it had just dumped snow like the week before, and and they'd been off school for like a week and gone sledding and everything. And she's like, Snow day, let's write a song about the snow day. So I'm like, all right, snow day. And I think I've been listening to a lot of Weezer uh around that time and kind of pop punk stuff. So I started playing this. Something like this. So I start playing this chord progression, and she just starts kind of freestyling. And uh, and she she came up with this great chorus, and then we organized three verses about like three fun things about Snow Day. So it was snow making a snowman and drinking hot chocolate and going sledding. And so, you know, it's like the three-paragraph essay from English. And um and uh and she really got the chorus melody down first. Um, and it was super catchy, and that kind of fired her up. And then we wrote the verses, and then we went out on the lawn outside my studio, and she memorized the verses by running around on the lawn while I stood in the middle and uh and played on my acoustic, and she just like repeat them over and over while she ran. Um, and so uh, you know, kind of like just making it work for a squirmy nine-year-old. And and when she finally performed it at the jam, it was this kind of it was this great confluence of things where we we had our our jam venue had fallen through and we just kind of scrambled. And we were able to get booked at the Columbia City Theater, which I don't I think is no more now. Um, and it this was like right before everything went digital. This was like 2009, and they still had these um TV broadcast cameras there. So they had three cameras and a professional audio studio in the back because they were they had been like they were all set up to like record live albums there at the theater. And uh so great audio, three different angles for the cameras, and we just got incredible video footage and and a packed crowd. Her her middle school teachers were elementary school teachers were there in the audience, like clapping along, and it was just so fun playing this song, and she just freaking belted it out. She was like, she's singing real strong and confident, and uh uh oh my god, it's such a great song.

SPEAKER_00 46:40

Snow day, the best day ever, snow day, the best day ever, snow day, the best day ever, you know, really simple, and and it was just such a blast.

SPEAKER_02 46:59

And after the song ended, she gave me a big high five, and um, she's like, that was awesome. And she gets just got to be a star for a day. It was so neat. And and still, her, I believe, still, her elementary school, you know, she's in her mid-20s now, but I think still when they have a snow day and they send out the email announcement, they link to that video. How cool is that?

SPEAKER_01 47:28

That is amazing.

SPEAKER_03 47:30

That is fabulous. Now tell us about Wesley, because uh apparently one legendary jam story is not enough. Let's hear about that one.

SPEAKER_02 47:39

Well, this was the same, this was actually the same show. So um, yeah, this is this perfect storm of all these kids who I taught who um, you know, were just like at the right age and right skill level, you know, to be adorable but still amazing. Um, and so Wesley was five at the time and um uh and and performed at that same show. So great audio, great video, and he performed Folsom Prison Blues, which was kind of typical of his repertoire. He loved like these, the like outlaw country artists, um and uh which is funny because his I don't think his parents were that into that kind of music, but he just really glommed onto it. His parents were very hip. Uh they liked a lot of different kinds of music. But um Wesley loved that country music, and so uh, but he was he was not old enough to fret chords. He had this tiny little half-size guitar, um, didn't really play in tune. Um so I taught him Folsom Prison Blues uh on just on the sixth string. Um, so it was like, what did he do? Uh something like that, and then he just start picking on the sixth string, kind of ragged rhythm, and and he'd start singing, I hear that twain a comin'. It's woolin' wound the bend, and I ain't seen the sunshine. The video's much better. I don't know when I'm stuck in Folsom Pisons. So he just played root notes, and with his Elmer Fudd pronunciation and the dimples and the He-Man haircut, um, it was just adorable and and also kind of startling to hear a kid that young uh, you know, sing about I shot a man in We know, but he turned out okay. Don't worry. He's he's uh in Nashville studying music, probably gonna be a session musician. So that's awesome. He's he's amazing. He ended up all right, despite the bad influence at five years old. No, um, but yeah, he the video went viral. Um and Jimmy Kimmel's person called wanting him to get on a show, and Ellen, and all these late night talk shows. And thankfully everyone kept a cool head, even though I was secretly a little like praying that we could do it just so I could promote my business. I I also know probably wasn't that good for him to have that kind of experience at that age. Yeah. So, and and as it was, he was kind of freaked out the next time the jam rolled around because he suddenly felt like, oh my gosh, there's there's like three million eyes on me now.

SPEAKER_01 50:55

Oh, goodness.

SPEAKER_02 50:56

Um, so he actually bowed out of the next performance. Yeah, which was just kind of confirmed to me that it was the right decision to not do the whole, you know, world tour of Folsom Prison Blues. With the five years, but yeah, that was a wild experience. Yeah, no kidding.

SPEAKER_03 51:12

Well, I love that you're giving students a real stage instead of just a formal little performance slot. That it that that's just amazing. So you said you also work with shy performers and adults who are told somewhere alo along the line you're tone-deaf or you're not musical, or some other nonsense somebody handed them at a vulnerable age. And let me tell you, those stories do stick. I have had, I've been teaching 27 years now, and I've had several adults come to me and out of bravery and courage, say, I've been told all my life I can't sing or that I shouldn't sing. And I said, you know, that's an act of violence. And because everybody gets a voice, that's the one instrument we all get, and we should all be able to use it. What and I I say to them, it's not that you can't sing, it's just you don't know how to use your instrument yet. Let's work on that, you know.

SPEAKER_04 52:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 52:06

So how do you start rebuilding somebody's musical identity after it's been damaged?

SPEAKER_02 52:12

Wow, the way you characterize it is so powerful. And um it it really drives home, you know, how how fundamental music is to our existence or how fundamental it should be. Um and what I do I kind of come at it from I guess a maybe a somewhat different angle, even though deep down it like tears me apart when I hear that from a student. Um I my approach is to kind of like uh uh kind of tease tease the idea and just kind of like throw it out there like, hey, you know, you're probably not tone deaf. In fact, I've never met anyone who's tone deaf. And they're like, well, you haven't met me yet. And I'm like, you probably just need a little help. So, you know, let me know if you if you if you you want to try it. And then I just keep teasing it like every few lessons, you know, and as they as we, you know, assuming that this is a new relationship, I just started teaching them, you know, as they we gain a little trust and everything, I just kind of keep keep letting them know. And and usually, eventually, they're like, okay, I want to try it. You know, if they don't jump into it already. And um, and then I just do this simple exercise. You probably do something similar. I'd be it'd be interesting to hear what you do, but I just do this simple thing where um uh uh uh by then they know how the guitar works. And if you go up the fretboard, the pitch goes up, and if you go down the fretboard, the pitch goes down. And so it's this kind of visual reference for them. I can do it on the piano too if I'm nearby. And I just have them sing a note. Just I'm like, sing any note. And they sing a note, and I find that note on the guitar, kind of in the middle of one of the guitar strings. And um, and I'm like, you're singing this note. Uh why don't you try singing this note? And I'll play a note a little higher and I'll sing it, and I'll see if they can sing it. If they can't, I'm like, you're down here, and you need to bring your voice up here. So just give it a little more oomph and see if you can slide that your voice up. And um, you know, everyone knows how to change their inflection when they speak. They may not really know, be aware of what they're doing, but um, no one speaks with a complete monotone. And so they have the tools necessary to raise in pitch or lower in pitch. And so, anyway, with a little bit of help, they end up being able to match the new pitch. And then we just go from there. And I'm like, no, you're not tone deaf. You just you just need more experience using your voice. And so I just try to be really gentle with it and kind of laid back and uh because I know it's it's the voice is a window to the soul. And if you don't feel like you can use your voice, then it's just very threatening to to you know have stuff come out of your mouth and not have control over it and to feel like it's ugly. And uh so yeah, it's you're walking on sacred ground when you help someone sing on pitch, right?

SPEAKER_03 55:49

Oh yeah, the voice is extremely vulnerable. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:52

Yeah. Yeah. So it's I've been able to help everyone who's come to me who said that they were told they were tone deaf. Um I I have heard that there is a a clinical condition where people have a very, very hard time hearing pitch, processing pitch, but um apparently it's quite rare, and I've never met someone like that.

SPEAKER_03 56:17

Well, my uncle, who just passed away, he had throat cancer and the radiation made one of his vocal folds paralyzed. So he got where he could not bring them together to and and he loved to sing. You know, he was not a trained singer, but he loved to sing. And you know, it's it's a gift to be able to use our voice, and we should use our voice in powerful ways. And singing is one of those. So well, I'm glad you're helping those people. That's wonderful. Well, listen, I want to go somewhere a little more personal because you said you were open to it. Uh, you've dealt with chronic pain through your entire adult life, and I think most people looking at your work from the outside and just what we've talked about today would have no idea. How has that shaped the way you live and work?

SPEAKER_02 57:06

Well, thankfully, I've been able to really, it it is not much of a factor in my life now, thankfully. But it has been a theme up until a couple of years ago. Throughout my adult life, I've had periods where I was severely debilitated by chronic pain. Um, so I was uh an avid rock climber in college. My mom introduced me to it, taking us kids to Yosemite when when we were kids, and she was involved in the Sierra Club and did a little bit of rock climbing. So it was a known thing to her. And so I just fell in love with that. And that was my whole identity in college, more so than music. Music was just kind of a hobby, but I just loved climbing and had to stop my junior year or senior year um uh because of my elbow. And throughout my adult life, it would just kind of travel around my body, my arms, my back, my knees. Um, I thought I had some kind of weird disease. And um so there were have been periods uh as a guitar teacher where I wasn't really able to play at all. Um there was a period in 2008, I think, where I started a separate business in search engine optimization. Um, not really a business that I was suited for, but it was another skill I had just from working on my own website. And this was kind of a backup for me because I was I wasn't sure that I was going to be able to continue to teach long term. And um I never really was able to return to climbing the way I wanted to, because I would kind of get in shape for it, but then it would flare up again, and I could just couldn't get any consistency in in staying fit for it. Um and I I never really uh I'm not like one of these uh technical whizzes on guitar. I'm no virtuoso in any style. I'm just kind of a jack of all trades. And part of this is my my just my tastes too. I'm much more into like the singer-songwriters than Ingve Malmstein. Um and so uh, you know, I think a a lot of serious guitarists would kind of consider me a lightweight, but you know, going back to like finding what you're good at, you know, I I uh I have found my skills in guitar and they're not in shredding. And that's okay. I'm still, you know, a really valuable teacher for those students who need my help. Um but uh yeah, thankfully with the chronic pain, I I came to eventually understand that it was mostly caused by stress. I do have a congenital defect in my in my lower back, and I had spinal fusion surgery for it. So, I mean, there were physical problems that were that that were a factor too. But uh the pain in my arms that I suffered through throughout my adult life turns out were stress-based. And so I eventually found a um uh a book and a podcast um that uh uses science-based studies and techniques to help people to basically chill out when they feel pain. Because the the problem is the the you you get this feedback loop where you you feel the pain and then you freak out because it's gonna ruin your life. And then that just keeps that pain signal going and it can go for years. And so I it through mindfulness and other kind of mental health things, I've learned to quell it to where it's really not much of a factor now. And when it is, I know why it's coming. So um I I I gave a little bit of detail just, you know, because I know how much how debilitating it is, and it's fairly common. So um uh, and because we need our bodies so much as musicians, um, you know, occasionally I'll find other musicians who deal with chronic pain, and I want to make sure they're aware of this because it has really transformed my life. Uh, I feel like I've gotten my life back since I'm great news.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:44

Well, listen, Rob, we've been deep, wise, emotionally mature, and extremely respectable long enough. Let's ruin this whole vibe with a quick fire. It's something that we do on the show every episode. And I've been looking forward to this one with you, okay? All right, so I'm gonna start. So here, what is the most aggressively Seattle thing about you?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:09

Aggressively Seattle. Oh, I I am so hey here. Let me show you what I took off uh before we started our Zoom.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:20

Okay. So for the listeners, Rob is about to show me something. So here we go. Oh my goodness. Okay, so he's got on a and he's got on a parka.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:30

Mind you, mind you, it's April and it was 70 degrees yesterday, but I wore this out to the studio from my house. Yeah. So yeah, definitely my outdoor clothes. I'm wearing approach shoes right now. These are like technical rock climbing shoes that you would use to like scramble up to the base of a climb. And I wear those casually. So yeah, totally obnoxious uh outdoor gear, even though uh 99% of the time I'm sitting in front of a computer.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:01

Oh, there you go. All right. What is a tiny hill you will absolutely die on that has nothing to do with music?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:09

Yes, you you asked me this with like the prep questions. And it is that um uh the rest of the world, including I've I've heard this come out of the mouths of NPR reporters, that they like something better than something else. And I was an English major in college, and I'm sensitive to language, and that has always sounded wrong. It's you like something more. If you like it better, it sounds like liking it is a skill that you're fearful at. But it's a question of degree, not skill.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:44

Well, I hope you're not judging me because you know I've got a little bit of a southern accent and everything.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:50

So oh no, you have been so eloquent, and I love how you that you introduced this part of the show. It was just hilarious. Oh my gosh. I I judge you and find you amazing, I guess.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:05

So if your life had walk-up music every time you entered a room, what would it be?

SPEAKER_01 1:04:10

My life had walk-up music.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:12

Um, it might be Bohemian Rhapsody.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:15

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:16

Um I didn't kill a man, I swear. But the the passion, the epic, epic emotion and um both, you know, torturous and ecstatic. Oh, that guitar solo. That guitar solo is so redeeming at the end. I just I I find it heavenly. So yeah, the agony and the ecstasy. I would say Bohemian Rhapsody.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:44

Okay. What is your most old man opinion?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:48

I really believe that the more time we spend in nature, the better off we are.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:51

Oh, that's a good thing. Refreshing for sure. Well, Rob, as uh we start to close out, I want to come back to one of the central ideas in this conversation. You said that as a music teacher, your job is to spread joy, not just to assign practice, not just teach notes, not just turn out polished performances, but to spread joy. And I would say that we talked about support and opportunity today as well in community. And I think those are central ideas to this conversation as well. I want to give you the floor for the last word here. When people walk away from this conversation, what do you most hope they carry with them?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:28

You know, this moment in our lives, we are surrounded by so much conflict and I see a lot of despair. And I hope that if people don't have a Mr. Lorenz or like my dad in their lives encouraging them to cultivate those things that they love. I hope that my story can help inspire them to do what they love. And I found that things really really started to fall into place for me when I when I started pursuing those passions. And I'm just so grateful that I had other people encouraging me to do that. Um it is this has been such not only a rewarding career for me, but the best part is I've been able to help all these other people have these amazing musical experiences and help kids grow. And um that uh has brought so much joy to my life.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:33

Well Rob, you really are proof that when someone stops trying to squeeze themselves into the wrong mold and starts building a life that fits who they actually are extraordinary things can happen. And not just public facing success, the deeper stuff too sustainability, courage, impact, joy, students who believe in themselves, teachers who stop apologizing for the value of what they do with your greatest gig curriculum. I mean it's just amazing. You are amazing testimony to to to joy. So tell everybody where they can find you.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:06

Uh yeah heartwoodguitar.com that's where I teach mostly beginning and intermediate guitarists. I have like 850 handmade chord charts on the site and um I also have a wonderful membership program with like 250 people who uh subscribe to the website to get courses and in-depth song lesson videos. So you can get in touch with me through that. If you want to say hi you can use the little contact thing in the bottom right corner or um just shoot me a message in my contact form. I'd love to hear from you.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:44

And don't forget greatestgig.com if you're a music teacher and you want support strategy and encouragement Rob would love to help you. Rob Hampton, thank you so much. This was such a gift to spend time with you today.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:58

Oh great to soak up the good vibes Heather I'm such a fan and so grateful that we've been connected over all these years.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:05

So thank you for asking thanks everybody I'll see you next time you've been listening to the Heather Patero Show produced by Heather Patero Studios connect with us on Facebook or Instagram or visit Heatherpatero.com until next time stay creative and live on purpose