We've got talent in our back yard, and sometimes we don't even realize it. Take Troy Stetina, for example.

For nearly 20 years, Stetina, an astonishingly skilled hard rock/metal guitarist, has been working in Milwaukee: teaching at the Conservatory, writing influential technique books for Milwaukee-based Hal Leonard, running a studio, performing in bands and teaching guitar to the likes of Mark Tremonti of Creed and Alter Bridge. But, he's hardly a household name here.

When we heard that Stetina put together a new band, Oversoulss, which is recording its debut disc and prepping for a tour with Alter Bridge, we decided it was time to talk to him about the past, present and future. If you don't know who Stetina is yet, you will soon enough.

OMC: Can you tell us a bit about your background in music; how you got started?

TS: Jeez, ancient history! My mom was an opera singer. She tried giving me piano lessons when I was little, but I wasn't into it. Then I asked for a guitar as a young teenager. Guitar was cool. So I went through a few beginner books until I got tired of playing "Mary Had a Little Lamb." Then I started learning Kiss and Aerosmith songs by ear. Got into a few cover bands in Indy, where I grew up, and started teaching guitar at a music store on the side. At 18, I had a nice scholarship to go study astrophysics, but was just too into music at that point and decided to put off college "for a year." Well, that turned out to be indefinite!

OMC: How did you land the gig at Hal Leonard?

TS: The Hal Leonard guitar author and editor Will Schmid (a UWM music professor and now President of National Association of Music Education) came to the music store I was teaching in, to show us their line of books and all. I said that's all fine and good, but most kids I teach want to learn how to rock! Why don't you have anything that teaches rock and metal? He said, "Good idea, why don't you write that book?" So I did. It became the original "Heavy Metal Rhythm Guitar" and "Heavy Metal Lead Guitar" series that has sold hundreds of thousands of copies and spawned a ton of imitator methods. Will later told me that he had heard the exact same thing from at least 20 people before me, but none of them actually delivered a manuscript. I was just the first person that actually followed through!

OMC: Were you surprised at the influence the books had?

TS: Well, I know the methods work. They are honest and direct. There's a lot of inauthentic stuff out there; I mean authors who aren't really into a style trying to cross over to sell more. If it's not authentic, that comes across in the material. Also, a big advantage for my books was that I am a musician first and an author second, so it was easy for me to create an approach that fit this subject matter best, without being burdened by any particular pedagogical viewpoint. You know, "You have to do it this way, or that way, because that's how music is taught." My books did a lot of controversial stuff at the time they first came out, like dumping standard notation among other things. So yes, I am thankful that the opportunity came my way, but I'm really not surprised at the success. The bottom line is that if something is really good, it grows "legs" and keeps on going. These books have done that. In fact, they are selling more copies now than when they first came out, which IS pretty astonishing!

OMC: Did that get in the way of your work playing in bands?

TS: For years I divided my time between authoring books, teaching guitar and playing in a band. But things changed in the mid '90s. Sales of music instruction books really took a dive with the advent of grunge. I mean, who needs to learn technique from a book when you're just strumming a few barre chords? The irony of it is that I actually liked that whole shake-up in popular music. But it wasn't too good for my income. So I started doing other things. I edited a bunch of books for Hal Leonard. I opened a recording studio and started producing local bands. I guess my own band thing sort of fell onto the back burner.