DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Everything Else... Best guitar performance of all time?

I posted a video of him earlier in the thread. He is certainly one of the greats and respected highly in the guitar community.

I, personally, find guys like him super technically skilled but fairly soulless musically. I really just don’t enjoy listen to them play. Unlike guys like SRV that you can’t take your eyes off.

I have that performance on DVD, pretty amazing.

Yngwie is my favorite of all time. I've seen him six times dating back to '87. Although he's always been stuffed into the "metal" genre, he's more appropriately labeled "Neo-classical", not that he needs any labels. He's influences are pretty heavy Bach, Beethoven, Vivaldi and Paganini (one of his early nicknames was "The Paganini Voodoo Child").

He plays a Fender Strat with a scalloped fretboard - if it wasn't, it may catch fire lol.



Incredible performance for a 21 year old and a little nod to Jimi at the end:





An all-time great performance of one his most popular songs... Composed at the age of 18:

His style is much the same style Randy Rhoads exemplified. His roots were of the classical variety. He too was classified as heavy metal. He died at the age of 25. I'll always wonder what might have been had he lived a long life. I think he would have been considered one of the greats of all time. In some circles he is.

I was never particularly impressed with Malmsteen.

In our education as musicians, we were relentlessly drilled on scales and arpeggios. We drilled because those two elements are the backbone of Western tonal music.The more we drilled, the more "under the fingers" these elements became. Result: entire chunks of any piece can be played by muscle memory alone without reading every single note, and without second-guessing what we are doing.

So all that drilling on scales and arps were very useful tools in service to music-making. They are tools... not the actual creative product.

YM is very fleet of finger. He's very dexterous. However, imho, his solos seem quite shallow and unimaginative. He seems to rely heavily upon those two elements with very little in the way of originality or creativity.

As I've mentioned before, note selection is paramount for me. All the speed/chops in the world cannot make up for a lack of melodic content. Give me Clapton or Gilmour over YM any day.

I'm reminded of something Miles Davis once said, when he was being interviewed by Down Beat magazine. The interviewer was playing 'drop the needle' during Miles' interview, asking for his initial reactions to some hot young trumpet players. After about 15 seconds of one blazingly fast example, Miles just said: "Turn it off." When asked why, he said:

"These young cats don't know when to NOT play. They need to shut tf up sometimes, and let the music breathe. Talk and talk all day long, and don't say [s-word]"

That's kinda Yngwie in a nutshell for me.

others' mileage may vary.
.02

I remember PMing you and asking why Gilmour wasn't typically mentioned as one of the very greatest guitar players of all-time.

I don't know enough about music to determine if he is or isn't. I just know he is my favorite. You mentioned this earlier and I tried to expound on it, but I love how he took his time. I love how things escalated. I love how the song was more important than the individual recognition.

The first time I saw Floyd was in Pittsburgh in 1975. They put on a hell of a tech show that was far ahead of it's time, but on stage.........they were dudes in jeans and black t-shirts. They were not the show. Their music and the message were the show.

I think all Floyd songs tell a story. I think the musicians are all great story-tellers. A lot of folks don't like him, but Waters is a great, great songwriter. Gilmour is a masterful storyteller on his guitar. Mason was content to do his thing and blend in w/the others. I think Richard Wright is so vastly underrated as a keyboardist. He is also a great composer and a very good song writer. He came up w/all sorts of innovations that set the mood for Floyd's songs. One of the reasons I played the Shine on You Crazy Diamond performance was because of just how haunting Wright's keyboard play was. I think that totally set the mood for the entire song and perhaps was the essential link to the album?

So, you have a great song-writers in Waters and Wright, a true innovator on the keyboards like Wright, a guitar player that is a storyteller of genius quality on guitar and has a voice that can tug at your heartstrings even though it might not be distinguished. A drummer who does his job. Then, Floyd would bring in Dick Parry and his sax solos would blend in perfectly w/what the others were doing while adding some much-needed soul to the the songs.

Gotta throw this in here even if it messes w/the flow of the post. You mentioned know when to shut up. I remember listening to an interview on BBC way back in the day w/Roger Waters and he talked about how huge silence was w/Floyd's music. He talked about how they would often pause for a beat and then hit that significant note and how that made it much more noteworthy. I know that isn't what Myles meant, but I think I probably have addressed that throughout this entire post and I just decided to add this fact to this particular paragraph after I finished writing the entire post. I think it is significant to mention the silence thing.

I don't want to be vulgar, but I think Floyd's music is like great love-making. Sure, there are times when you want to go crazy and perform at a frenetic pace, but the most satisfying performances are the ones that start slow and explore for hidden treasures. They build in urgency and speed as they progress and eventually reach a satisfying and unique climax that leave the participants w/a feeling of exhilaration.

I feel dirty after reading this. lol

Sorry Eve and bonefish. Hell, maybe I am the only one who thinks of that connection? Probably not, though. LOL

Btw Eve.........I was talking about Pink Floyd, as you well know. Here is a song that tied to your post. Hope you know I am just playin'

I know. Hugs.

I loved one of the comments for that vid:

"Prince's guitar didn't gently weep, it stood up and demanded respect!"

I'd love a Pink Floyd cover of Careless Whisper.

Nice. I remember quite a few nights back in the day when we'd fire one up and listen to those long Allman Brothers jams. There's something about large guitar players that I like. Here's Johnny Hiland...this guy can really play the blues, and if you watch he rarely uses his pinky finger.

That was nice!

Joe is a fantastic guitar player!

Here's a young lady I forgot about. Anyone like myself that's a less than mediocre acoustic guitar player will be amazed by this girls talent with chord changes and cleanliness. She doesn't miss a note, and everything is so clear and crisp. She's got videos dating back from when she was 14 years old (now 22), and they are all good...especially the Beatles and Pink Floyd arrangements.

That was really good!

Everything she does is good. When I picked up a nice acoustic guitar a couple years ago, I was looking for some videos with acoustic versions of some songs I wanted to learn and stumbled upon her. I was blown away.

J/C

Led Zeppelin comes to my immediate thoughts

She got a subscribe out of me and sent it to my wife at work.

I enjoyed that. Good addition.

I don't mean to throw this thread off-track and I would be coll w/no one responding to this post, but damn man..........Jim Croche. The guy had a way of keeping it real and even more importantly........he could tug at one's inner soul w/songs like I've Got a Name.

He was an excellent guitar player, but I think his real talent was song writing and getting people to listen to the stories of those songs. I remember seeing him all the time on talk shows and variety shows....and then he was gone.

Frank Marino when he played Johnny B Goode live would shred on guitar

Here's 2 of the best playing the same guitar at the same time:

Roy Clark was not only a great guitarist but a great musician in general. Very underrated by so many people.

People undersell Glen Campbell, too.
Phenomenal guitarist.