Best acoustical guitar - any type music

Rather than suggest specific recordings for you to try, I'm going to focus instead on acoustic guitarists, both classical and jazz:

1. Classical and flamenco guitarists: Andres Segovia; Manitas de Plata; the Romeros (look for their 1960's recordings on Mercury's "Living Presence" re-issue CD's); Christopher Parkening (perhaps the greatest living classical guitarist).

2. Jazz/world/miscellaneous: Django Reinhart (the brilliant Gypsy jazz guitarist from the 1930's and 1940's); Charlie Byrd (almost any of his recordings on Riverside or Concord); Egberto Gismonti.

You might find the following Web site on acoustic guitarists of interest:
http://www.museweb.com/ag/

Many years ago, while in high school, I took some lessons from Charlie Byrd, and have loved the acoustic guitar ever since. I hope you will share your comments with us as you discover new artists or recordings that you particularly like.

One of the more annoying aspects of getting older is that the brain cells don't fire quite as rapidly as they used to, and I often get additional ideas after making a post. So, bear with me. There are three other classical guitarists that I should have included, since I have many of their recordings and think highly of their abilities:
Julian Bream; Eliot Fisk; and John Williams. I also mentioned the Romero family -- you might also look for recordings by one member of the family, Pepe Romero.

Good listening to you.

Wow ... these are terrific recommendations. Thanks! I'm putting together a list of CD's right now to buy. I'll keep you posted on my thoughts (for whatever they're worth) on the first round of CD's. I'll take any more recommendations you've got. This has been fun. You can never have too much music.

Be sure not to neglect the late, great John Fahey. Labelled as an 'American primitive', the man was certainly a visionary and straddled numerous genres with much experimentation & extrapolation. His earlier works focus on acoustically based recordings and are nearly all worthy of your attention. I would also heartily recommend "Of Rivers and Religion', a mid-'70's recording with a full band that dove into a strange nether-region of languid guitar strum/jug band fusion that to this day seems timeless. Sandy Bull (also recently passed on) is another great one. His first two albums, "Fantasias for Guitar & Banjo" and "Inventions" are great and, although featuring some electric guitar work are primarily acoustic guitar-based and offer up an amazing blend of classical, traditional and avante-garde stylings with the heavy influence of a variety of ethnic musical stylings. He even features an oud on many recordings and admits a serious debt to Hamza El Din for much of his inspiration for some of his classic pieces. He would be legendary just for his 'Blend' (from "Fantasias") and 'Blend 2' (from "Inventions") compositions if nothing else. Robbie Basho, a compadre of John Fahey who also recorded on his Takoma record label did some fascinating work along a similar path. Heavily influenced by eastern philosophies and musical idioms with a complex and very lyrical feel. The above musicians veer away from the path of the more classically based composers offered up in this thread, but are well worth looking into.

I am not sure that anyone on here will know who this artist is, but I'll take a shot. Maybe SD will know him.
The greatest guitarist to have ever recorded in the 20th century, is Vicente Gomez. He can be seen in the 1941 film classic "Blood and Sand". The recordings he made in 1939 on Decca 78s(later transferred to Decca Microgroove LP entitled "GUITAR RECITAL"), were so incredible, that I have yet to hear any Guitarist of his equal. Laurindo Almeida, and Segovia would tell you the same, as even on the back of thier early LP liner notes Gomez is mentioned as Perfection itself. This work was transferred recently with terrible over-application of Noise reduction on a CD by Doremi. The CD is entitled Segovia and his contemporaries Volume 5. It also will let you compare the Segovia versions to the Gomez versions. You can draw your conclusions. The CD is available from ALLEGRO IMPORTS. IT IS AN EDUCATION......Frank