One of my main interests as a young teenager in the 1960’s was to go, with my friends, and listen to the juke box which was in most coffee bars at the time.

It used to be the unspoken word that everybody drinking coffee in the shop would take their turn to feed the juke box, and by doing this you were announcing to the world (or at least those in the coffee shop) what type of music you enjoyed listening to.

I remember that I used to stay in the coffee bar until about 9 or 10pm each evening (in those days entertainment options were rather limited) and then I would go to my bedroom and tune in to Radio Luxemburg.

Do any of you remember Radio Luxemburg? It was quite a special radio station.

There were a lot of radio stations around in the 1960s, and many of them were stationed in offshore ships. I cant remember any of the names of those stations or ships now, but if any reader can remember then please let me know.

Although I loved listening to Radio Luxemburg I cannot remember whether this was a radio station which was based on land, or at sea. Can anyone help me here?

Well, it was while I was tuned in to these various stations that I first got a taste for the guitar. Somehow it seemed to resonate with my soul and I just loved listening to any record which had a guitar solo in it.

It was only after a rather curious event took place that I thought about the possibility of playing the guitar myself.

Those of you familiar with the road system in the U.K., will know that we have many roundabouts on our roads. These are designed to aid the flow of traffic, without stopping it as happens with traffic lights. They are literally a large circle placed at the junction of two roads, and they often have a small area of grass in the middle just to improve the appearance.

This unusual thing happened to me when I was out one day, passing one of these roundabouts, and there right in the middle was a friend of mine sitting down on the grass and happily strumming on his guitar.

All the cars that went past could not help but notice him, it was such an unusual sight right there in the middle of a roundabout. It was a bit like being on stage, in the middle of the road!

It was not long before I had joined him, and so there were now two people in the middle of the roundabout, one playing, and one listening.

But that started me on the path from which I have never turned back. I saved up furiously until I had enough money to go out and buy my own guitar, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Over the past number of years I have played in all types of venues, big and small, some ordinary, some very exciting, but I have never forgot my time spent on that roundabout.

And I am showing other people now how to kick start their guitar career by having a roundabout experience.