Visiting Denmark street.

Many moons ago, when I first started playing guitar in my mid to late teens, my best friend and I used to travel to London on a regular basis and browse the guitar and music shops in Denmark street.

If you don’t know, Denmark street (aka Tin Pan Alley) is a side street off Charing Cross road that is famous for it’s guitar and musical instrument shops and it is a mecca for anyone wishing to check out the latest instruments and gadgets.

I remember the anticipation and excitement I would feel as we travelled up on the train and then coming out of the main station in London and walking up the road as people and cars bustled around us.  The whole way up we’d talk about a variety of topics, but the main topic was music and the latest bands and songs that had moved us.  It set the theme for the day perfectly.  We’d often stop off on the way up Charing Cross road at a little CD shop we knew of (that is sadly no more) and buy some CD’s at a great price, then bag in hand we’d continue on up.

Upon reaching Denmark street we’d step into each shop and browse the guitars hanging on the walls and drool over expensive items of craftsmanship we could only aspire to.  The shop assistants were usually condescending and dismissive and I’m sure they thought we were just another couple of window shoppers who came in to gawp at and paw their products.

Occasionally when we were feeling braver and the sales assistants weren’t too antagonistic we would ask to try a guitar and we’d carefully cradle the instrument in our arms as we’d strum our rudimentary riffs and licks and try not to embarrass ourselves in public.

Every visit we’d come away with a new music notation book of some kind, or a capo, or some plectrums or some other gadget.  But once in a while, after we had saved up our money, we would actually buy a guitar.  This was a wonderful day and it felt great knowing we could try numerous guitars, safe in the knowledge we were going to buy one at the end of the process.  We usually knew roughly what we were looking for (acoustic or electric etc), but the final choice was often what grabbed and impressed us on the day.  And what fell into our price range!

I still have fond memories of striking a bargain (probably not as great as I thought at the time) and walking back to the station with our new purchase in it’s guitar case, eager to get home to tune it up and start to play it.   Even if it was my friend buying the guitar that day, the excitement was nearly as great and we both vicariously enjoyed the others purchase and growing guitar collection.  Hell, we shared nearly everything anyway, so a new guitar for one was really a new guitar for us both.  We’d cradle the guitar case in our hands on the train home and talk excitedly and then we’d walk to one of our houses from the station at the other end sharing carrying duties and often not even feeling the weight in our excitement and anticipation.  You can’t beat plugging a new guitar into an amp for the first time, or that first full strum of an acoustic guitar.

We may have been belittled by the arrogant shop assistants who I’m sure only worked in the shops until their own bands ‘took off’, but overall I have happy memories of visiting Denmark street.  It was a day out in London with my best friend, it was exploring new music and it was savouring that glow that comes from creating music yourself.  I no longer buy new guitars, or even play much anymore, but the experience of buying them and learning is one I still savour and those years were formative in my musical education and I’d not give them up for anything.