Fine tuning your life- talking with Tom Bills & Keith Struthers

Tune in to this audio discussion (above) with a world class luthier who's much more than just a guitar maker.

Tom Bills crafts guitars that look every bit as good as they sound. He's been doing this since 1988 for players and collectors worldwide, including the likes of Carlos Santana. Based in St Louis, Missouri, USA, he has written a book called the Art of Lutherie, sharing his valuable insights.

The theme implicit in this discussion, is a leitmotif common to all artists - what we create, creates us at the same time.

So what happens to us when producing a guitar, a painting, a ceramic sculpture or a building?

As the creative process challenges, stretches and frets us, we change. Over time, even decades, our thinking can become sharper, our feelings deepened and our capacities strengthen and fine tuned. These qualities percolate into all aspects of us. They gradually become the recomposed melody of our life.

By engaging and committing we become more of who we are.

The creative process reshapes and refines us from the inside out.

So we are always creating two distinct art works in tandem; one visible and the other invisible. The one is a finished item and the other, ongoing throughout our creative lives. It’s the process of re-creating ourselves, as we re-create the world around us.

As our individual growth metamorphosis it becomes the unseen long term art work, which is continually nourished by our many works of art. And the guage of its invisible growth is the originality of our creativity.

So some of us can be grateful that our early works are still around as milestones giving us a sense of the journey we have already travelled.