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Who is your overall favorite guitarist?

At 44 years of age, I personally feel fortunate to have lived in an era along with some of the finest guitarists who have ever lived. I have always had an overwhelming love of music. As I look back to my earlier years of music appreciation (I took formal piano training for 17 years) I remember how my instructor would suggest exposing myself to the many different styles and disciplines of music.

These were such valuable words of wisdom. Considering the fact that this suggestion, more or less, forced me to be more open to musicians other than those that played in strictly rock and roll bands.

Wow, was I surprised to find that I could be as entertained by Chet Atkins and Les Paul as I could be by Ritchie Blackmore or Carlos Santana. Just think about some of the finest from our time. Jimi Hendrix, John McLaughlin, Robin Trower, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Eric Johnson, Steve Howe, Al DiMeola, the list could seem almost endless. All such incredible musicians.

Although it's very hard to pick one person or style in particular, let's remember the key words, "overall favorite".
I would probably have to say that my overall favorite would have to be Steve Morse (from Dixie Dregs fame).

Who is your favorite?
128x128buscis2
acefactory
63 posts
 
It's a tie: Jerry Garcia and Dave Gilmour
jim204
881 posts
 
My favourite guitarists are Julian Bream and John Williams for classical.
Although I am not a great lover of jazz I still greatly admire two of the greatest jazz guitarists, Joe Pass could do more with a pick than most guitarists could do with four fingers. The other one who I have seen a few times and has the most perfect technique I have ever witnessed is Martin Taylor. He can do things on his instrument that most others can only dream of. In one of his concerts he showed the audience his approach to music. He took one of his tunes and dissected it, by showing us how he would pick out the tune on one of his fingers then he would use his other two fingers to pick out chords and then he used his thumb to pick out the bass. The audience were gobsmacked at this as he layered these pieces together to make some of the most complex arrangements I have ever seen. To cap it all I was in the front row one concert and I had a look at his Guitar a Yamaha semi acoustic and on it near the pick guard was a signature, it said "Martin you are the best Chet Atkins". Enough said.
stuartk
2,682 posts
 
It's certainly very interesting to see what qualities people most admire in their favorites and which adjectives they employ when describing these qualities. "The best", "The Greatest", "Perfect", etc. do more to express the poster's enthusiasm than to inform others about the player's actual attributes. We tend to deeply identify with our favorites. 






stuartk
2,682 posts
 
... which renders us deeply vulnerable to confusing subjective and objective. 

We'll say "He/She's the best" when it would be more accurate to say  "They appeal to me the most". 

The two can become very easily conflated. . . 
middlemass
917 posts
 
Fripp
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