Legendary guitarist Tommy Emmanuel is headlining this year's Blues on Broadbeach festival in May.
The humble and hilarious Tommy Emmanuel has just finished a full day at his home studio in Nashville, shooting a bunch of teaching videos and working with an “incredible” young mandolin player by the name of Sierra Hull.
“Natalie!” he exclaims as our Zoom connects. “How are you? What’s happening? It’s nice to meet you!”
He seems more like a 20-year-old in the peak of his morning energy, after a good night’s sleep and a couple of coffees, than a 67-year-old man who’s been working his butt off all day. Surely he can’t be excited to be doing his ten thousandth interview? If he isn’t, he’s hiding it well.
“I can’t WAIT to come and play Blues on Broadbeach,” he exclaims, all smiles and good cheer. "I'm excited."
He’s off on a world tour before getting to Australia, and he immediately starts ticking off a list of all the countries and cities he’s playing on it, just off the top off his head, in order. I’m gobsmacked.
When he gets up to Iceland on the list, he starts telling me a story about running a guitar camp with Björn Thoroddsen (essentially Iceland’s Tommy Emmanuel), before launching into the tale of another time he had to drive to the airport in a snowstorm.
“It was pitch black and the snow was blowing sideways, and it was like a hurricane! We got in a convoy and we went to the airport really slowly and all these little vans are blown all over the road.
“I’m thinking ‘we’re gonna get on a plane?’
“We got on and no one mentions this weather or anything, everyone seemed like it was totally normal. They take it quickly up and out and it was totally clear.”
As charming and engaging as I’m finding our chat, I realise I’d better actually take control of the interview, lest our time runs out and all I’ve done is sit and be regaled with stories from 40 years on the road.
I ask him about playing the popular classics like ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ and ‘Classical Gas’ over and over again, and if he’s ever sick of them. From his recent videos he seems to still be into it on stage. Is he just a good performer?
“I’m a lousy actor,” he chuckles.
"I am out there having the Time. Of. My. Life. I always tell other artists, if you go out there and don’t give 100% then get the hell off my stage!
“Since Covid and since everything coming back I think we’ve all had a shot in the arm. We’ve all realised ‘holy shit this is really it, we’ve got to go out there and give the best we can.’
“And last year my whole tour was the biggest numbers I’ve ever played to, it was massive audiences everywhere. If you can’t get excited then what the hell are you doing?”
Tommy’s enthusiastic about Blues on Broadbeach for a few reasons. One, he gets to come home. With most of his family living on the Gold Coast now, he gets to have a bit of a reunion. Including with his lovely nephew, who also happens to be my mechanic. Small world. (“He’s the golden child of the family”, Tommy declares without the slightest hint of irony).
Two: He gets to play a world class festival that he’s never played before, and there aren't many firsts left in this man's career. And three: Blues on Broadbeach comes with a pretty strong recommendation.
“My brother Phil was the one who told me about it,” says Tommy. “He said ‘You should play that festival. It’d be good for you’.”
Phil Emmanuel was Tommy’s much-loved and talented older brother and guitarist who, unfortunately and suddenly, passed away in 2018. Both a great loss to the musical community and to the close-knit Emmanuel family, Phil, alongside Tommy, regularly made people’s “best” lists when it came to the world’s greatest guitarists.
Notably, Tommy has been named by Eric Clapton as “the greatest guitarist” he has ever seen. Tommy laughs when I bring that up, and quickly shrugs it off.
“It’s a wonderful thing that he said that but he probably says that about a lot of people,” he gives me a wry, cheeky look and shakes his head.
“Eric is such a sweetheart, he’s a great person and I think when people often say to me, what does it feel like to be the best? I think ‘there’s no best.’
“I never think about that stuff. I’m too busy trying to play this damn thing, I’m too busy trying to get good at this. I could care less about that other stuff.
"I’m interested in being a better guitar player than I was yesterday.”
Some days, like the busy video shooting day on which we’re chatting, Tommy plays all day long. He’ll also play all day long if he is trying to master a new piece or get better at something that requires practice.
“Then some days I don’t play the guitar at all,” he says. “I give my hands a break.”
During this down time, he enjoys simple pleasures like cooking healthy meals like fish with vegetables. With a history of inherited heart issues, he’s making sure that we get him for a good time AND a long time.
“I’ve changed my lifestyle a lot and I feel so much better than when I was younger,” he declares, alluding to his much wilder years on the scene.
Understandably, Tommy tends to become a bit of a homebody when he’s not touring the world. But considering the activity that goes on in his house and home studio, I’m not sure how much relaxation time he actually gets in.
“It’s a real community of Aussies [in Nashville],” he says. “Troy Cassar Daley used to come over and do songwriting and would stay here. Rick Price came and lived in my house, and got married in my house, and Anthony Snape and his wife moved over to America so they could work with me, and I had them and their two children in my house. It’s the house of love,” he chuckles again.
Ever the educator, Tommy runs regular masterclasses and workshops all around the world. He’s passionate about teaching the next generation of musicians, and not just guitarists either.
When he hits Broadbeach in May, Tommy will also be conducting a Masterclass exclusively for Twelve Bar Society members.
“I ask a lot of questions,” he says about his classes. “And I try to give people a dose of reality.
“Say if you’re in my masterclass and you’re a musician and you want to know something about a person who’s doing alright at it [I have to snort here at his description of his career].
“I’m an example to you of someone who makes a living making music. I don’t do anything else, so I talk about what do I do, to pay my mortgage, put my kids through school, employ people, and I can talk about the absolute realities of it.
“I talk about the importance of the quality of your music, choice of songs, and then we get down to stuff like, guitar playing and songwriting and arranging and this is how you get that particular sound, if you want to hear about a good arrangement, listen to this. It’s about everything.”
If you’re keen to get in on Tommy’s masterclass while he’s on the Gold Coast, check out all the info about the Twelve Bar Society here.
Tommy’s main stage show takes place during Blues on Broadbeach which runs from 18 to 21 May 2023, alongside a wealth of incredible talent including Don Walker, Melbourne Ska Orchestra, Emma Donovan & The Putbacks, Chris Cheney, The Kevin Borish Express and much more. Visit the website for details.
