One day in 2007, Ana Popovic walked into Gruhn Guitars in Nashville with a shoe box full of $20 bills from merchandise sales at her shows.
She walked out, $20,000 later, with a 1964 Fender Stratocaster, which has been her constant musical companion — and favorite guitar — ever since.
“It is a fantastic and a fabulous guitar,” Popovic tells Guitar Player. “I was living in Amsterdam at that time but was playing American. I’d found out I was pregnant with my son and was like, ‘Oh my goodness, my life is gonna change so much. I don’t know how much diapers cost. If I don’t buy this guitar now, I’ll never buy it.’ “
The Strat wasn’t the only electric guitar the Serbian-born Popovic put her hands on in Gruhn. But, she says, it was love at first pluck.
“I spent about four, five hours trying guitars,” she remembers. “There were a lot of incredible guitars in that store, but somehow this one really stole my heart. It just had something about it, and the sound that I really wanted. It would react to anything I would do, every hit or every note, if I played with a pick, if I played with fingers…It was like it was alive.
“And it still is. It’s a constant inspiration to me, especially live. It just reacts to every strum differently. I’m really fortunate to have it.”
Popovic does acknowledge that the Strat “wasn’t in mint condition by any means,” as evidenced by the still scuffed-up finish. But she’s never had any work done on it during the past 18 years. “It’s all original ’64, and that’s it,” she says.
Popovic adds that her relationship with the Strat intensified during the past few years, after she was diagnosed with breast cancer during late 2020 before making her latest album, 2023’s Power. “You have a really, really bad day when you get that horrible news and when the future is so unclear,” Popovic recalls.
“And then what do you do? You’re in panic, right? At that moment I actually look at my guitar, I actually think about my guitar or take my guitar in hand. It’s been a lifesaver, really. I’ve had that in the past; when I have a difficult time I always turn to my music. My music has always been there for me…ever since I was a teenager. It’s the one job I’ve ever had…and the guitar is so important to my music, right?”
Popovic, who also directs her own music videos, is continuing to tour in support of Powerwith North American and European dates booked into the summer and the Rhythm & Blues Cruise during October. She’s also in the “final stages” of her next album. “We’re mixing already,” says Popovic, who now lives in Los Angeles and recently purchased a villa in Detroit that she’s refurbishing.
“It’s really fun, so different from anything else I’ve done” and, she adds, further exploring the brassy, big-band approach of some of Power‘s songs. “I think it’s a musical style that’s somehow different. I let a few of my close people hear it, and they say, ‘It’s so strange how different it is, but it’s still you.’ But I don’t think anyone should be scared of that. It’s still me. It’s just a fresh approach to the sound and the music.”
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