Category Archives: guitar

Celebrating Nili Brosh (born August 13, 1988), an Israeli guitarist who graduated Summa Cum Laude in 2009 from Berklee College of Music. Nili joined the progressive metal band Seven the Hardway.

Celebrating Mark Freuder Knopfler, OBE (born August 12, 1949), a Scottish guitarist and film score composer known for his rock band Dire Straits.

Celebrating Patrick Bruce “Pat” Metheny (born August 12, 1954), an American jazz guitarist and composer from Lee’s Summit, MO whose style incorporates elements of contemporary and Latin jazz. He has been awarded 20 Grammy Awards and is the only person to win Grammys in 10 categories.

Celebrating Leonard Harold “Lenny” Breau (August 5, 1941 – August 12, 1984), born in Auburn, Maine, but moved with his family to Canada in 1948. He employed fingerstyle techniques not often used in jazz guitar. A documentary entitled The Genius of Lenny Breau was produced in 1999 which includes interviews with Chet Atkins, Ted Greene, […]

Celebrating Lester William Polsfuss (June 9, 1915 – August 12, 2009), known as Les Paul, an American guitarist and inventor. Born in Waukesha, Wisconsin, he was one of the pioneers of the solid-body electric guitar and many recording innovations.

Celebrating Clarence Leonidas “Leo” Fender (August 10, 1909 – March 21, 1991), an American inventor who founded Fender Electric Instrument Manufacturing Company and later founded two other musical instrument companies. The guitars, bass guitars, and amplifiers he designed from the 1940s onward are still widely used: the Fender Telecaster (1950) was the first mass-produced solid-body […]

Celebrating David Howell Evans (born August 8, 1961), better known by his stage name the Edge, an Irish musician best known as the lead guitarist for the rock band U2.

Celebrating John Renbourn (August 8, 1944 – March 26, 2015), an English guitarist known for his work with the folk group Pentangle. Renbourn’s musical tastes took in early music, classical music, jazz, blues and world music.

Celebrating Martha Kristin Hersh (born August 7, 1966), an American guitarist born in Atlanta, GA, known for her rock bands Throwing Muses and 50FootWave. Her style ranges from jaggedly dissonant to traditional folk.

Twin Cities Guitar Observatory will begin sharing these posts on the amazing Fretboard Biology facebook page and eventually on the subscription website. If you are interested in college-level guitar curriculum involving fretboard theory and guitar technique, but without the enormous cost of college tuition, check out this program. There isn’t anything like it online. https://fretboardbiology.com/ […]