Michael Pearson: guitar improviser is fort hood victim, rip

Soldiers know they put their lives at risk... but this is none the less a tragedy. TIS condolences to the families and friends of the fallen:



Michael Pearson loved guitar improvisation:

Pfc. Michael Pearson taught himself to play the piano and became a guitar virtuoso long before he joined the Army last year. "He had a little Jimi Hendrix in him," a relative said Friday as the family gathered to grieve in suburban Chicago.

Before the attack at Fort Hood, Pearson was preparing to deploy to Afghanistan to become a bomb disposal specialist. His family knew he had received a series of inoculations and, when they learned of the shooting, figured that Pearson would be safely elsewhere.

He died Thursday at age 21.