I’ve wanted to thank this man for the longest time. I’ve tried to look him up but just can’t locate him; so I’m very glad to pay tribute to him here. Lou was the first guitar instructor I ever had. I was 14 years old when I started taking guitar lessons at Sam D’amico’s music center in South Philadelphia. I was very much into Don Mclean’s music at the time and Lou knew this. He also knew I had the summers off with nothing else to do but practice. So he loaded me up with work every week. Writing each new week’s lessons in my music staff book while I played the previous week’s homework for him. Finger exercises and pages of rythmn chord exercises complimented lessons from the Mel Bay instruction booklets. I specifically remember: he always had me play the exercises from the first fret all the up to the 12 or 13th on my acoustic guitar – much further up than anyone could conceivably play, without a cutaway. I never understood this at the time, but I do now. Not that I became any kind of great guitar player. But my interest in playing persisted through the years most likely because the extra work he gave me not only stretched me at the time, but engrained the exercises and even some of the rythmn chords into my memory so that I could continue to use them long after I stopped taking lessons from him. So thank you Lou – whereever you are – I am now taking another pass at becoming a more serious player and the ability that I have at this point I owe to you!