Keeping It Old School Here

The world of content creation underwent a seismic shift on November 30, 2022, with the launch of Chat GPT. This date marked a pivotal moment, with individuals being able to harness the potential of text-based artificial intelligence. This also means that a computer, rather than a human, can now generate blog posts and other content.

Is it convenient? Sure. However, AI-generated text lacks the personality, experience, humour and overall “human-ness” of a person writing the content. 

Maybe that’s also what makes Fretboard Stories (in my opinion) so cool. An actual human writes the content, researches the topics, and injects some personality. For most posts beginning on January 27, 2023, where we dissected the genius behind George Harrison’s slide playing, that human is me.

Hello everyone! Allow me to introduce myself!

My name is Kevin Daoust. I’m a Canadian guitarist based in Gatineau, Quebec, Canada. I’ve played guitar for a long time.

That all began at 9 when I started taking lessons with Jean-Marc Guenette in my hometown of Sturgeon Falls, Ontario. Everything began with the three-pack of Mel Bay guitar books and quickly progressed to learning songs, scales, more advanced chords and practically everything else he knew (to the point that lessons stopped; he couldn’t teach me anything else!)

After high school, I moved to Ottawa, Ontario, to study guitar at Carleton University. There, I spent four years learning about history, theory, composition, improvisation, performing in ensembles, and four years of lessons with Wayne Eagles. The entire experience broadened my knowledge and playing considerably, and I graduated with a Bachelor of Music degree with Honours in performance.

From there, life consisted of balancing a day job (at first with the Canadian Arts Presenting Association, then with the Government of Canada, whom I continue to work for, all while doing freelance communications and web design work), life at home and several musical pursuits, the majority of these being in the Franco-Ontarian music scene. I am lucky to have performed across Canada, as well as in the United States and France, with several different bands and artists (particularly my current projects: Hey, Wow, and Chanté et Kev), as well as recorded guitars on a few albums and singles (both as a member and as a hired gun). Beyond that, I’m also a guitar teacher, workshop facilitator and band coach, offering education and guidance to up-and-coming musicians.

I also try to sleep from time to time.

From Picks To Pens

When COVID-19 hit, I needed to find a way to replace the income I lost from many cancelled gigs, with nothing new in sight. I drove for Uber Eats for a hot minute to make some extra money, but that didn’t last long.

I saw a YouTube video by Cory Bergeron about making extra cash by offering music services via Fiverr.com. With nothing else to lose, I registered, offered a couple of guitar recording gigs, and saw what happened. Thankfully, the offers came in quickly.

After a while, I offered a writing service to prepare blog posts on anything guitar or music-related (reviews, lessons, etc.) Thankfully, that took off as well. I’ve written several pieces for several websites, ranging from lessons on improvising to more entertaining ones, such as “12 Songs About Steve” (not an actual title, but exemplifies the content I was writing).

Thankfully, my profile caught the attention of someone at Thalia Capos searching Fiverr for a writer. They wanted to revive the Fretboard Stories, and I was a guitar player who enjoyed stringing words together. Their first order came in for the George Harrison piece; the rest is history!

So, How Is The Sausage Made?

Topics for Fretboard Stories are chosen after an initial discussion with the team at Thalia Capos. Sometimes, they want something specific; sometimes, it's based on a broad list of potential topics; sometimes, it's based on what clients want to read; and sometimes, I’m free to write about what I want.

From there, I’ll research a topic (articles, videos, music, etc.) and prepare a post that’s generally between 750 and 1,000 words. If I need to include written and tabbed musical examples, I’ll create those using Musescore (though I’m now learning Guitar Pro for future examples). For audio examples, I record them using Reaper and several different guitar plugins for tones.

My only AI tool is Grammarly, which helps revise text once it is written. The rest is just my voice, style of writing, and personality. 

With more and more AI-generated content being produced and posted, we’re proud that someone is behind the posts you read here, responding to your comments and coming up with articles of interest for you! We hope you appreciate our content, find it helpful and entertaining, and enjoy knowing that there’s no AI in sight in the posts we produce.

We’re just keeping it old school here; it’s just better!

By Kevin Daoust - instagram.com/kevindaoust.gtr

Kevin Daoust is a guitarist, guitar educator and writer based in Gatineau, Quebec, Canada. When not tracking guitars for artists around the world, or writing music-related articles around the internet, he can be seen on stage with Accordion-Funk legends Hey, Wow, the acoustic duo Chanté et Kev, as well as a hired gun guitarist around Quebec and Ontario. He holds a Bachelor of Music in Guitar Performance from Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.