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Life With The GuitarVisiting Werner and Elisabeth Bauhofer [ Reprinted in translation from "Dolomiten Magazin" Bozen (Bolzano) Italy, with kind permission of the Editors. Story and Photos by Journalist Michael Muhlberger. ] It would be ideal if the house was shaped in the form of a guitar and the windows and doors were strung with strings. But this is not possible in the downtown area where Werner Bauhofer lives, so he concentrates on having the furnishings oriented toward the guitar. The guests' coffee is served in cups with the logo of a guitar company. Bauhofer lives with Elisabeth (he calls her "Lies") and daughter Magdalena (4-1/2 years old) at the corner of Weggensteiner and Andreas Hofer streets, straight across from the Maximilian office and next to the Batzen House. The whole life of the 37-year-old has been devoted to the guitar. When he was ten years old, he started to play the instrument; he left high school early to devote himself to music. Performances took him around half of the world, and it is not exaggerating to say that Bauhofer belongs to the best guitar players of the world. In Bauhofer's living room string instruments hang on the wall as if they were paintings. Rally they are pieces of value. Two Hawaiian steel guitars were built in 1938 and 1948, and the other instruments have an approximate value of a midprice automobile. The small guitar from the South Seas has a funny name: "ukulele" (jumping flea). Bauhofer acquired most of his instruments in Nashville (USA) in shops where the big stars of Rock music also buy. But the valuable instruments are not there for decoration. A corner of the living room is a recording studio, and 140 songs have been recorded there. Not only Werner Bauhofer plays guitar, his wife does too. Together they perform as "Country Palace Duo" and the name reveals the kind of music they play -- mostly Hawaiian and Country music. In addition to their job as parents, Werner and Elisabeth have two other careers each. He's a salesman, she's a teacher, and both teach guitar. The busy couple enjoy their house mostly on the weekends. Through a long hallway (race track for Magdalena's tricycle) one gets to an area which contains family, bedrooms and kitchen. On the walls are mementos from their many travels, and drawings from their daughter. A special story is how the Bauhofers found each other. After they were together for a year in High School, they lost contact until in 1990 there was a show in Neumarkt and one of the guitar players couldn't make it. Werner filled in for him. A friend of Elisabeth had bought a ticket for that performance but couldn't go, and gave the ticket to Elisabeth. Soon after seeing each other again, they became a couple. [ Ed. Note: Werner has been an HSGA member for three years, and gave us the wonderful drawing of the Hawaiian band. Betty Bahret won HSGA's "Name This Band" contest with the name "The Five Sharps", and won a Jerry Byrd CD and drawing of the band, signed by Werner. ( See Winter '96-'97 HSGA Quarterly.) The "Dolomiten" is a daily newspaper published in Bozen/Bolzano, (South Tyrol/ Italy) in German language for the German speaking minority in this very northern Dolomite mountain area of Italy. HSGA member, Michelle Di Vella lives there, too. ] 
HSGA * HAWAIIAN
STEEL GUITAR ASSOCIATION Homepage URL: www.hsga.org (hsga@lava.net) Last updated: 07/23/02 by Gerald Ross (gbross@umich.edu) |