Quotes & Sayings About Guitar Player

It's cool. One of the dudes who I made my album with who I'm a very good friend of for quite a while, I lived on his sofa for a while. And he's a professional guitar player, and he played for One Direction. And so I'd wake up on a sofa sometimes with Harry from One Direction on the other sofa, and I'd kind of be like 'you alright?' — Ed Sheeran

And they kind of left to find a guitar player at the very end, so you know, I don't really take it as any slight that I wasn't able to play on the record. It's flattering just to play with them period. — James Iha

My earliest musical memory was getting to watch my dad play drums in a local band. He's a banker by trade, but a drummer at heart. I remember seeing the guitar player do the solo from "Werewolves of London" with his teeth, and that was the moment that had me hooked. — Charlie Worsham

Anybody who's a guitar player that's spent that time with another guitar player, there's nothing better than that. — John Frusciante

My mother was a very beautiful lady, I thought. She was very good to me. I guess - she died when I was nine and a half, but if she had lived, I probably wouldn't be trying to play guitar. She wanted me to be known, but as something else. Not a guitar player. — B.B. King

What draws people to the instrument is the love for guitar players that play a certain way. I mean, even though it wasn't intentional, it was hard to avoid copying Eddie Van Halen. He was basically the *bleep* back then. — Tom Morello

At school I had a really hard time being a guitar player. It's like being a male ballerina in a way. It's not the norm. — Orianthi

Look what venison does to a goofy guitar player from Detroit? I'm going to be 54 this year and if I had any more energy I'd scare you. — Ted Nugent

I'd always had an interest in guitar from about seven years old. But I first actually had lessons when I was about fifteen in Scotland, in Edinburgh. There was a folk club there and a girl called Jill Doyle taught me the guitar, who happened to be Davey Graham's sister. Davey Graham is one of my heroes and always has been. Fantastic guitar player. And he's had a strong influence on me all the way through. — Bert Jansch

I've been in a band, so I understand the politics. Sometimes the bass player doesn't like what the guitar player is doing, and you have to sort of even that out. — Ric Ocasek

There are many excellent guitar players but I have to say Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton are still at the top! There are many imitators but very few genuine articles. There is so much more to playing than a fast blur of notes, like feeling and emotion from the soul. It's like punctuating a sentence and knowing when to lay back and not fill up all the space. Those are the things I tried to teach my son Tim when he began playing. — Merrell Fankhauser

In Utero is a testament to the artistic vision of Kurt Cobain. It's kind of a weird record, and it's strangely beautiful at the same time. And if you look at Kurt's paintings and his drawings - he even did a sculpture for me - it's a rising, tortured-spirit person. It's kind of weird. It's done well, but it's like what Dave was saying about having your own sound. Kurt was a great songwriter. He knew he had a good ear for a hook [and was] a great singer, great guitar player, and In Utero is a good representation of what he liked in art and how he expressed himself. — Krist Novoselic

For me, I'm more of a songwriter than a guitar player or singer. And not having things to work on was really kind of nice. — Doug Martsch

If you play music for no other reason than actually just because you love it, the skills just kinda creep up on you. — Nuno Bettencourt

So, it's like: I'm an OK singer; I'm an OK guitar player and you put them together and ... it's just OK. — Callie Thorne

Duane Allman was the best guitar player I ever heard who didn't read a note. — Gregg Allman

I was just a kid in 1987 when I heard of the Pixies, the year after I graduated high school. But I had my band together, and my best friend at the time, Corey Hickock, who was the guitar player in the band that would become STP, Mighty Joe Young, turned me on to the Pixies. — Scott Weiland

I'm fine with being thought of as a guitar player, and if I can get any recognition or respect for doing that, that's a pretty good thing for me. — Paul Weller

But I've come to the point in my evolution on the instrument where I realize that I can't play the same stuff that just a guitar player or organ player would play - and I need to embrace that in a big way. — Charlie Hunter

There are so many good guitarists out there, I am by no means a very good guitar player. — Marnie Stern

There's no leader of this band, and there never will be. That's the key. You can't control how the public perceives you-people see rock'n'roll bands as the guitar player and the singer. — Shannon Hoon

At the apex of Prince's career, I listened almost exclusively to metal. My sister actually purchased 'Purple Rain' on cassette, which I write about in my anthology ["Chuck Klosterman IV: A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas"]. And I felt ashamed that I liked Prince so much. A typical rock fan would be embarrassed that they liked Warrant or Ratt at the time, but I had the exact opposite experience. And I had this overwhelming fear that Prince was actually a better guitar player than any of the metal gods. — Chuck Klosterman

A good player can make any guitar sound good. — Mike Bloomfield

As far as being a 'player's player,' you've only got to go to Nashville or Argentina and you can forget about it. The world is full of amazing guitar players, and you know it, and I know it ... it's a humbling experience ... — Mark Knopfler

I'm basically a keyboard player, so if it's got a keyboard on it, I'll give it a shot. I played a lot of organ in the early days. I can make a few chords on guitar, but that's about it. — Ray Stevens

Still to this day, I am deeply satisfied when watching a guitar player who is connected with their art and instrument. GuitarTV helps you tap into that connection, and to each other. — Steve Vai

I started piano lessons at age six but didn't take music seriously until I was a teenager, when I thought about a career in music. I studied classical music, and my instruments were guitar and piano. I played keyboards in bands, and after high school I went to Vienna to study at the Academy of Music. I also became a session player, which culminated in my work with Tangerine Dream. — Paul Haslinger

Guitarists shouldn't get too riled up about all of the great players that were left off of 'Rolling Stone Magazines' list of the Greatest Guitar Players of all Time' ... Rolling Stone is published for people who read the magazine because they don't know what to wear ... — Joe Satriani

It was never my first choice to be a singer/guitar player. I really wanted to play drums. — Ryan Adams

Basically, I'm just a guitar player that figured out I wasn't ever gonna be able to buy dinner with my guitar playing so I got into songwriting, which is a little more profitable business. — J.J. Cale

The whole reputation of being a rock guitar player, I could really care less about it. Still, when I hear new groups today I do occasionally hear something where I think ... ahh, I've heard that lick before. — Tom Verlaine

I feel so lucky to have been in a group where it was a real band. This wasn't a singer and guitar player and some other guys. — Robbie Robertson

I wasn't originally a bass player. I just found out I was needed, because everyone wants to play guitar. — Tina Weymouth

Badfinger was pretty good. It was a very sad story, though, because the guy, he ended up killing himself, Pete Ham, who was a lovely fellow, he was a good guitar player and a great singer, he wrote, the most famous tune I would imagine is "Without You", you know the Harry Nilsson record. — George Harrison

My brother, who's ten years younger than me, worked with me in the studio when he was very young. He's a guitar player and does programming as well. To have the working and personal relationship coincide has been very natural. — Atticus Ross

I didn't come in and say: "I'm a singer." I came into the band as a second guitar player and a vocalist, but not the songwriter. I had been writing poetry for years, so I sort of had the nature of the words. I felt like no one else could sing my lyrics, so I took a crack at it. — Paul Banks

Being a professional wrestler was never one of my goals in life. I always wanted to be some kind of entertainer. I used to want to be a rock singer or a guitar player but I can't sing and I can't play the guitar. — Ric Savage

Yeah," he says. "We've been friends since kindergarten. Funniest guy I know," Matt says with a chuckle. "He's a great guitar player, too. He's in a band with some guys from Omaha South. He keeps trying to get me to join."
"What do you play?" I ask.
"Baseball," Matt jokes. — Cat Patrick

Private listening really took off in 1979, with the popularity of the Walkman portable cassette player. Listening to music on a Walkman is a variation of the "sitting very still in a concert hall" experience (there are no acoustic distractions), combined with the virtual space (achieved by adding reverb and echo to the vocals and instruments) that studio recording allows. With headphones on, you can hear and appreciate extreme detail and subtlety, and the lack of uncontrollable reverb inherent in hearing music in a live room means that rhythmic material survives beautifully and completely intact; it doesn't get blurred or turned into sonic mush as it often does in a concert hall. You, and only you, the audience of one, can hear a million tiny details, even with the compression that MP3 technology adds to recordings. You can hear the singer's breath intake, their fingers on a guitar string. That said, extreme and sudden dynamic changes can be painful on a personal music player. As — David Byrne

To be a great band it's like you have that telepathy. You know when the bass player's in back of you without even looking. You know when your guitar player's coming up to you to lean up to you and sing into your microphone. You just know these things. You feel it. You feel the energy of it. — Scott Weiland

By far the most astonishing guitar player ever has got to be Django Reinhardt ... Django was quite superhuman, There's nothing normal about him as a person or a player. — Jeff Beck

I grew up not really listening to guitar players. Especially when I was studying music, I was just interested in piano players and arrangers and composers; I came to playing in a band from the perspective of someone who never expected to play guitar in a band. — Daniel Rossen

One of the things that was crucial for me I got from Rory Gallagher, which was the idea of, like, being a guitar player for life and living it. — Rory Gallagher

I was never really a virtuoso guitar player per se. — Mick Jones

My dad was good friends with the Bad Medicine Blues Band - one of the only blues bands in Fargo, as you can imagine! He took me out to see them play when I was 12 years old and I was really inspired by their guitar player, Ted Larsen. — Jonny Lang

Neil Young does throw in a major seven chord here and there, so if you're a new guitar player learning Neil Young songs, you'll learn some seven chords, and some different positions. Nothing too complicated, just enough to kind of open up your knowledge a little bit. — Jesse Harris

We've done every record on our own. Its produced by our guitar player and sometimes we'll have some help mixin' it and have some outside engineers but for the most part, it's done by the band and I think that's the reason why CKY sounds like no other band, 'cause we make our own albums. — Jess Margera

I only took about five guitar lessons in my life from an actual teacher. I learned fast that that wasn't for me. I didn't have the attention span to learn that way. So I learned the basics from my dad, then just from playing on stage, and watching other guitar players. — Jason Aldean

Michael Bloomfield was the antithesis of a collector ... he didn't care how old a guitar was; all he wanted was something that sounded good when played it ... and he cared nothing about the collectibility of an instrument ... his philosophy was "A good player can make any guitar sound good" ... to Michael, a guitar was just a tool ... — Nick Gravenites

Phil Robson is a disturbingly good jazz guitar player! — Dave Liebman

Besides being a guitar player, I'm a big fan of the guitar. I love that damn instrument. — Steve Vai

The thing about guitar players is we're all like a brotherhood or sisterhood. We don't care if you're great, good, bad, in between or whatever. As long as you love it, then we're all going to help each other. — Tommy Emmanuel

The gut-strung guitar, the classical guitar, that is a whole different world on its own. When you think what the guitar can do and what every individual player does with a guitar, everyone has their own identity coming through the guitar. — Jimmy Page

This was the danger of sharing your dreams with your parents. If you told them you wanted to learn to play the guitar, all they heard you say was, "I want to learn to play the guitar," and then they found some practical, convenient, cheap way, often involving a church basement, for you to do it. But Hector had not come up with any plan of his own. And owning a guitar seemed like an important stepping stone on the way to being a guitar player. So he pawned his soul and said he would take the lessons from the Presbyterian youth minister. What the hell, he thought. Or heck, he thought. What the heck. — Lynne Rae Perkins

'Aqualung' marks the point at which I had the confidence as a songwriter and as a guitar player to actually pick up and play the guitar and be at the forefront of the band. It's also the album on which I began to address religious issues in my music, and I think that happened simply because the time was right for it. — Ian Anderson

I'm an old guitar player who has fallen into television and is so happy he did. — Chuck Lorre

I feel my spot is somewhere between a bass player and a rhythm guitar player. I play with a pick. I play very aggressively. I always have a distortion pedal in line, and I play less melodies and do more stuff against the guitars that create melodies. — Nikki Sixx

I bet a chef could get more pussy than a guitar player right now. — Roy Choi

I don't know of a guitar player that has only one guitar. They're never happy with one. I'm never happy with just one of them. I woke up and ended up with six, even if you can only play one at a time! — Les Paul

When I think of a lot of the players I admire, they could always play their parts without hiding behind distortion and sustain. Put the time in. Hear your mistakes. Yeah, it sucks, it's humbling, it makes you want to throw the guitar out the window. But if you work on your mistakes, they'll eventually go away, and you'll become a strong player. — John Petrucci

A guitar player goes on the road, and he misses his girlfriend for a while, but he manages to get along. A horn player gets out on the road, plays two or three towns, and then he'll get lonely, and next thing you know, he's packed up and left. It's better not to hire him in the first place. — Albert King

My older brother was the guitar player in the neighborhood band. My parents were the cool ones that had the basement for rehearsal. Rather than hang with my peers after school, I wanted to just listen to the band. More than that, I wanted to play. — Jill Sobule

I dedicated all the time I had to it. The 10 hour workout was just what I put in the magazine at the time, but for me it was every waking moment. — Steve Vai

My music is so mine, it's hard to turn it over to someone else. I have to be really involved in the production. It's like someone else taking care of your kids - if they don't treat them well, you're going to be pissed off. I'm actually co-producing [Backwoods] with my guitar player of 20 years, Kent Wells. We make a good combination ... I think we're going to have a real good record. — Dolly Parton

I forget what the official name of it was, but they did an all-day of roots music - every kind of music you can imagine from around the country - New Orleans Jazz to Indian flute players, R&B, you name it. I met and became good friends with (blues guitar player) Joe Louis Walker. He was on the show. — Scotty Moore

James Ralston, my guitar player, has performed with Tina Turner for about 22 years. Jim Hanson on bass has played with Johnny Cash, Rodney Crowell and Bruce Springsteen, and they're fantastic musicians and amazing singers they get a really cool vocal sound together. — Vonda Shepard

My stepfather met my mother when I was seven years old, and he was a guitar player. So he caught me messing with his guitar, his electric guitar, and he tried to show me some chords, but my hands were too small. — George Benson

I started out playing guitar because Jimi Hendrix was my hero, so my roots were really based on Jimi Hendrix and his style of playing. — Joe Satriani

I think there are some good players coming up. I think we are at a point where people can swallow a guitar solo in a pop rock record again. — Gary Cherone

You think back to Tele players, and James Burton was the one who started it all. He inspired Roy Nichols (guitar for Merle Haggard & the Strangers), Don Rich (guitar for Buck Owens & the Buckaroos), and guys like that to push the envelope and expand on that sound ... I really identify with that kind of thinking ... those guys to me are the reason why any of us do this.. — Brad Paisley

I always had wished somebody else would sing my songs, but there wasn't anybody who knew them, so I sang them myself and eventually became a better singer and guitar player. — Buffy Sainte-Marie

I think I'm a songwriter. I grab an instrument to make my body a song, but I'm not a player as such, maybe a little more on guitar, but certainly not piano. — P.J. Harvey

Another guitar player who had a tremendous influence on my life was Howard Roberts ... I'd listened to a lot of Tal Farlow, Johnny Smith and Kenny Burrell, and I was certainly into those guys, but I was awestruck at the intensity and fire in Howards' guitar playing ... for me, it became a roadmap ... — Jeff Baxter

Hendrix was the bass player for Little Richard. We were both left-handed, but we would use a right-handed guitar held upside down and backwards. He developed my slides and my riffs. In fact he used to say, and this is documented, 'I patterned my style after Dick Dale.' — Dick Dale

I did a song, "Court and Spark," for a Joni Mitchell tribute album that's yet to see the light of day. So she's someone I'd like to do something with, sure. I worked with the great guitar player Bill Frisell on Phantom Moon - that was fun. I'm such a fan; he's amazing. — Duncan Sheik

Steve Van Zandt, the poor guy, doesn't get to play enough as it is with me hogging a lot of the solos. Steve has always been a fabulous guitarist. Back from the day when we were both teenagers together, he led his band and played lead and was always a hot guitar player. — Bruce Springsteen

I came from the last couple of years in a generation where we didn't have a computer around so we didn't waste as much time on the internet as we do now so I had large chuncks of time which to devote to doing something. — John Mayer

It keeps me in touch with younger musicians who are constantly saying, 'Have you heard this new artist, or this new guitar player?' It keeps you reaching. — Gary Burton

Pegi just recorded "I Don't Want to Talk About," written by Danny Whitten, the original Crazy Horse guitar player and singer who's all over Early Daze, an album of songs from the beginning of Crazy Horse that I have been working on compiling recently. Danny was every bit the artist I am, but he died of a heroin OD in the early seventies. Every time I hear Pegi sing that song, it makes me tremendously sad. She sings it so beautifully, phrasing it to break my heart. She does it justice. You can see I have some unfinished business with Danny. — Neil Young

Eventually as a teenager, I was pulled up on stage by James Brown's saxophone player, Maceo Parker, during one of his concerts and scatted on his stage for 20 minutes. After I was done, Maceo's bass player got down on one knee as if he were proposing, took a string off of his bass guitar and coiled it up around my ring finger. He hushed the crowd and said into the microphone, "Wendy, from this day forward you are married to music. You have a gift from God. You must devote your life to using this gift or else you will deprive the world of something so special." I got the chills. — Wendy Starland

It's not like you're being fake, it's just the way you color it, like a guitar player uses pedals or different effects. That's why I get so mad about people who are down on vocal reverb. It's not a crutch, people, it's an aesthetic choice! — Kelly Hogan

I don't like the word 'rock star' or 'super star.' I am a guitar player, a songwriter who got lucky because I stayed at it and didn't give up, long enough that people noticed me. — Randy Bachman

People always lean toward who's the best guitar player, who's the best singer? I don't see it that way. They're all the best, you know? They've all gotten your attention, you've admired them, you've tried to sing like them. That makes them the best, each and every one of 'em. — Gregg Allman

I think you have to know exactly what you want. Whether you want to be a guitar player or a musician, you have to be really focused on it if you really want to do it. — Jonny Lang

The early years when I was starting, blues player, you wasn't always welcome in a lot of the other places. People usually have preconceived ideas about blues music. They always feel that it's depressing and that it's just something that a guy sit out on a stool, grab a guitar, and just start singing or mumbling or whatever. — B.B. King

I wouldn't say I'm a very technical [guitar] player. I'm more intuitive - it's always more about chasing an abstraction. — Annie E. Clark

There comes a point with any collaboration like that where you start having other interests creatively. I was moving in one direction musically, and as a guitar player, Mark wanted to move in another direction. That was essentially the reason we broke up. — Scott Stapp

I'm a bass player from way back and Paul is a guitar player and we've been in many bands. — Adam Jones

I thought it was too 'glam rock' to practice. The problem is that now I'm a pretty bad guitar player. — Laurent Brancowitz

When I got my first Marshall amp, it was so empowering. No one ever forgets their first Marshall amp if you're a guitar player pursuing a big powerful sound. I mean, no one ever forgets their first Marshall amp. — Kirk Hammett

I'm a struggling guitar player. — Megyn Kelly

It's always funny to me when people use the phrase 'Best guitar player in the world'. There are too many variables such as technique, uniqueness, emotional investment in the notes, etc. But If I had to pick one, it would be Tommy Emmanuel. Watching him perform can be a study in artistic and virtuosic human achievement. — Steve Vai

In general, we like to play as a band - guitar, piano, and voice. We also tour with a bass player, a drummer, and somebody who plays keyboard and guitar. We try to play all of our parts and flesh it out to get a lush sound, while also keeping the energy of a three-piece punk act. We want to be the best of all possible worlds. — Andrew Dost

The Grand Ole Opry used to come on, and I used to watch that. They used to have some pretty heavy cats, heavy guitar players — Jimi Hendrix

My brother was very important to me. And he played guitar. So that's what I wanted to be. I wanted to be a guitar player. So he was the first one to inspire me to do something with my life. And I was so glad that he was there. — Bootsy Collins

I wanted to be a blues guitar player. And a singer. And a songwriter. Not a shock jock. — John Mayer

The Hamsters really kick ass - Slim is one of your greatest guitar players — Walter Trout

I've known Shawn for several years. And he's just an amazing talent. He's a great writer, a marvelous, marvelous guitar player, and plays really good fiddle. — Guy Clark

I don't even wanna say female guitar-players, just guitar-players, because music of all things doesn't need to be gendered and stratified, that's so boring. — Annie E. Clark

Barney Kessel is definitely the best guitar player in this world, or any other world. — George Harrison