This entry is inspirational for not just musicians but for anybody who has ever struggled with adversity and felt that they were the only one. Next time you start to feel sorry for yourself, just watch this video of Mark Goffeney, a guitar player from San Deigo, California who was born without arms. The video clips below were filmed in Balboa Park, famous in San Diego for street entertainers.

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Goffeney is no longer an amateur performer. He has appeared on television as an actor and a musician, and has spoken to audiences all over America advocating for the rights of people with disabilities. He played the principal role on FOX’s Emmy-nominated commercial Feet. The advertisement, aired during the 2000 and 2001 Super Bowls, was for the NFL website, and it told the story of a character named Roger who was so obsessed with the website that he did everything else with his feet, including changing his baby’s diaper.

Mark Goffeney has a band called “Big Toe” their website is located here : Big Toe Rocks

Article on Mark Goffeney in Ability Magazine
Big Toe’s MySpace Page

Pure Inspiration !!!

Here’s an amazing video of a trio of pint sized pickers with a whole lot of talent. These kids are amazing and the kid playing the mandolin is phenomenal and can pick the mandolin faster than Joe Maphis could rip through Foggy Mountain Breakdown on his Mosrite . Watch this video and be inspired by “The Tuttle Kids”. Michael (8) and Sullivan (10) play a bluegrass version of El Cumbanchero on mandolin and guitar with sister Molly. The video was filmed by their father Jack Tuttle who is a Bluegrass performer and instructor and author of Jack Tuttle’s Bluegrass Banjo Collection, volume 2.

I found this video as the featured “Video of the Day” on KillerChops which is an excellent website featuring videos of musicians for musicians. The site has some of the best videos I’ve seen and the webmaster does an excellent job of selecting and organizing the music videos that us musicians would be interested in. Drop by and check out some of the videos.