JPF Home Page Forums Musician Gear and Techniques Guitars and Guitarist Forum When did guitar playing become a competition?

We hear so much about who is the "BEST" guitar player all the time. And why so-and-so is better than somebody else. So much more so than with any other instrument.
Why is that?
When did that start?

Was it with "Clapton Is God" or did it pre-date that?

Personally, I find the who competition thing kind of obnoxious. I mean, of course it's important to be competent on your instrument. But really, the whole shredding thing has kinda destroyed a lot of "great" guitar players for me.

These guys could be music that is more-suited to the songs at-hand. And, after all, isn't the song or the composition what it's all about?

Anyway, I'm projecting. That's what it's about for me. Still, I don't see the same kind of competition or head-cutting with other instruments, at least not nearly as much.

When?
With whom?
Why?

Um Todd

I think the better question might be when did it ever stop being a competition?

For ages guitar players have been trying to become the best at what they do. I am not sure the travelling minstrels had this problem, but it's quite possible they did. Remember that Robert Johnson (supposedly) sold his soul to the devil to become a better player. Jimi Hendrix sacraficed everything in his earlier years just to learn to play guitar. Before Eddie was a shredder guitar God he was a nerdy little teenager who sat and played guitar and piano for hours at a time trying to get better and better. The more things change the more they stay the same.
Derek

Um Derek
Not saying that folks aren't trying to get better. Of course we're trying to get better. We're always trying to get better. But when did we really start FOCUSING on getting better than the other guy.

I'm talking about the OVERT competition between and among guitar players, not just trying to improve.

And yeah, it may have been forever ago.

But then answer the second half of the question: why is this competition so much more prevalent among us guitar players than most other instruments? Why don't we have French Horn head-cutting competitions?

Hey Todd

I think it's because the french horn players know their place. I have thought about this for a long time and the guitar is truly a unique instrument in that, it's portable; it can be played by itself to great effect and it's fairly simple to grasp the basics of playing (ie easy to learn). That said it is also a hard instrument to master in that no matter how good you are there is always someone better. Now here is where it gets interesting... we don't all have to compete on the same level!

There are many different wonderful styles of guitar playing it's a very diverse field (you won't be hearing many french horns in death metal). So there are many levels one can acquire skills. Plus there are many different types of guitars. In the acoustic category alone there are unamplified self amplified (resonator) 12 string and composite (ovation) guitars. Every (wooden) guitar naturaly develops it's own resonance and tonality. As far as I know most Sax's don't "mellow" over time.

So as you can see the guitar is a very simple yet very complex instrument with a wide variety of choices. Anytime you have something on this level you can expect people to be competitive! It's because people want to carve out a notch for themselves in a field where only brilliance really shines (since there are so many guitar players out there). So being the best means working harder than everyone else. I equate guitar players to althletes in that your best is never the best for long.

So there is the long answer the short answer

You think your chops are better than mine?
Derek

Hey Pop, Just my opinion but I think it evolved during the early rock and roll days and is fan based. In other words music fans started this and not the musicians themselves.
Guitar players have people who influenced them, and how many times have you said "I could never play as good as so and so".
That doesn't mean that you want to compete with them you just want to maybe emulate their skill.
I can guarantee that it was a music fan who painted "Clapton is god" on that wall and it wasn't Jeff Beck. Ben

Competition and comparison seems to be human nature. I try hard not to focus on it, because a moment of inspiration, a great run on an instrument, an especially good performance on a particular night, a song that comes out of thin air...these moments transcend that sports mentality.

When I finish a song and like it, I don't think about beating someone else...I just think about the possibility of others liking it too. I don't want to conquer, I want to share.

But competition keeps popping up everywhere...and when I look at the songs ahead of me on OurStage...I wanna take 'em down.

But really...how do you say Eric Clapton is better/worse than Jimmy Page? They're so different and so good.

True Mark

But, don't we all aspire to greatness? I think we look down on competition as being wrong, but with out competition what world would we live in? Competitiveness is often the mother of innovation! The idea of how can I do this better is always on our minds. One thing I will say is we should never aspire to be as good as or better than someone we should aspire to be the best we can be, to me that is the only way we can compete.
Derek

See... this is what I was looking for. A good discussion of when and why.

And Derek, I am CERTAIN that my chops are NOT as good as yours. That's why I started writing songs, in the first place!!! (I knew that I was never going to be VanHalen/Clapton/Beck/Rhoads/Vai/whoever.)

And you make a good point about the variety of styles... Jimmy Page could never be Andre Segovia, just as Segovia could never be Jimmy Page. So why compare them? Or why even compare Page to Hendrix? Yeah, they have similar styles, but they are unique to themselves.

Reminds me of a great quote from Keith Moon:
"There's a lot of talk about you being the best drummer in the world. Do you think that you're the best drummer in the world?
"Well, I think I'm the best KEITH MOON-STYLE drummer in the world!"

Very good Todd!

And actually my little barb about my chops was my attempt at whimsy apperently it failed lol. I think you are probably a better guitarist then me in some ways and in fact possibly in many! My point was that there is a certain amount of arrogance in rock and roll music. I'm better than this guy or that guy. Either way though you are absolutely right. It's not about being better than the other guy, it's about being the best you can be. There are guitarists out there I probably could play circles around, but they might be better at arppegio's or making their sound fit the style better than me. I haven't even begun to master the guitar and I doubt I ever will.
Derek

Don't forget that Jimi Hendrix was also a showman, lavish outfits, doing tricks and stunts on stage, and that memory gets intertwined with his guitar ability so his name often comes up first when people discuss great guitar players. I never thought that was fair to guys like Clapton who preferred to be a "sideman" playing guitar. I may catch some flack but I think Hendrix has always been overrated by the public because of that.
Clapton did say in his book that he thought that Hendrix WAS one of the greatest guitar players he had ever met, and a good friend. But not in a competitive sense. Ben

It all started when we stopped wearing six-guns on our hips.

Hey Jack

Very good and true observation! I was watching a documentary on the life of Eric Clapton last night and even though he was modest about his work other people certainly weren't. I like what John Lee Hooker said about him though "it seems all he played was the blues they call it rock or pop or whatever it don't matter cause it's still the blues" I think that's about the most open statement I've heard recently about a musician. We try to classify things so much, rock, southern rock, arena rock etc etc add nauseum. I think what Hooker points out is very relevant it's all what it is "MUSIC!" and instead of trying to pinpoint some exact stereotype of music, country, rock, classical. Let's just enjoy it for what it is "MUSIC" and hope that it's good .
Derek

If you don't wear a six-gun on your hip how do you control hecklers?

Hmm that's a good point Doug... Maybe we all should invest in some paintball or air pellet guns lol.
Derek

And there is competition with other instruments - first chair in orchestra or lead trombone (or whatever). In popular music there are also the best drummer/bass player arguments. The guitar competition is more public because the focus/hype is more prominent on the bands/artists.

Thankfully I don't have to worry about competition - I'll just take my three chords and play in the corner

Steve V

problem is, in most bands, there's only one bass player. Sure would be nice to play second or third bass sometimes

Q- How many guitar players does it take to screw in a light bulb?

A- One to do it, three to say "I can do that"!

On the topic of actual competitions, I entered a fingerstyle competition a few years ago, kind of a dare. I placed 9th out of 27, not so bad. But I didn't like to one bit, the clique of competitive guitar players is weird; a bunch of kids and bald guys strutting around beating the crap out of their guitars trying to impress the judges with flair rather than soncrafting. Although there are some amazing performances at these events, it's really not my thing.

I think rock genre kind of created this with a lot of help from the Guitar Magazines. It was a way to sell magazines to young guitarists to see where their idols ranked.

Someone mentioned shredders on here. Personally the majority of these guitarists miss the mark for me. Playing 70 notes in 1.4 seconds, while impressive to some, sounds like noise to me. I have to hear melody. That is what makes me hum or sing a song all day. I have never heard a shred tune and tried to hum or sing the riff. Now think of some Gilmour solos. Ever hum those out? Chances are you have.

Exactly, Dazed!!! He has to be the best melodic solo player in rock music..maybe ever. I tell all of my guitar students who ask about soloing to learn atleast one David Gilmour solo, it'll do ya good!

I tell them just what you have said, try to sing it, if you can then it will get stuck in the listeners head and then they'll want to hear more. When a guitar solo appeals to the ear as melody, not just fluffy technique, then it goes right to the part of the brain that not only stores, but seems to desire such melodies as heard in Eine Kleine Nacht Music, Amazing Grace, Jingle Bells and yes the solo from Another Brick in the Wall.

I always think of Comfortably Numb

But it really seems to me that it is musicians that flock to the elite guitarists. Eric Johnson for example. The guy is amazing. I ask my non guitarists friends if they like him and the response is usually, "Who?"

Nobody's heard of ME yet either!! LOL

You hear a lot of shredders at Guitar Center. They play their fast lead and sort of look at you while they do it.

Guitar center was written off my list years ago. I pretty much stick to Carvin now. Hard to hear shredders that way

I used to see Eric Johnson a lot when he was with a group called the Electromagnets back in the middle 1970's. Back then I felt he was technically the best electric guitar player I had ever seen. I liked his music a bit more back then, too, because he played more variety. I am not a fan of the shredder guitar, but he sometimes played much more melodically than most of those guys. I would chat with him from time to time when we both happened to show up in my favorite music store. He was a nice guy.

I think up until the sixties most guitarists wanted to play like someone...not necessarily better than someone but like them, the sixties is when acts started becoming famous across the pond and had fans on two continents, clearly the British invasion spurred the competiton along, Clapton, Pete Townsend, Jeff Beck, Jimi...these guys were good and loud and had amazing amounts of fans. They were way more melodic in their playing than what we call shredders today...most shredders develop a cult following or niche market fan base...I think Van Halen bridges areas of fan base alot of the other shredders don't- and again he is very melodic in his playing at times. Competition amongst guitarists, mostly by way of the media and the fans, seems to me, started there in the sixties with that British Invasion---til then everyone just liked the other cats sound and wanted to pinch some licks...MJ

Hey Todd only guitarists have ego competitions? I know a few bassists, drummers and keyboard players who would tell you different. Not to mention singers. LOL

Choosing the "best" player of any instrument - or any artistic endeavor - is impossible. Best at what? Feel? Tone? Expression? Technique? Technique in what genre? And best tone or feel is entirely subjective. Usually I just interpret these things to mean "who's your favorite." People are competetive about everything, so I think there's always been some sort of "who's the best" as long as music has been around. It's just part of human nature. As to why there might be more of it for guitar, it's probably due to the guitar's popularity. There are so many players, and so much marketing.

I'm probably dating myself here but i remember "battles of the bands" before the British invasion, like early sixties. I remember a couple of bands that I had thought were the greatest thing since sliced bread. Then hearing them a few years later, after my senses matured a little, wondering what I thought was so good.

Isn't this thread very 'rock-centric'? I reckon there has historically been fierce competitiveness in jazz. Even pre-jazz, rag-time and barrelhouse piano players would play (sometimes literally) head-to-head in cutting contests. What about jazz horn players, - if you wuz gonna try sitting in on an after-hours session in a Harlem club in the 'forties, - you better have some chops. And what about Chicago blues clubs in the 'Forties and 'Fifties?

The 'cutting' thing has never only been about guitarists, AND goes back way before rock n' roll, in my opinion.

Cheers, all
Karl

well....being the best gives me a special perspective...

but, seriously, folks...

i'm 62..the question ofwho's the best has existed as long as i can remember...when i was a kid most guys said johnny smith was the greatest for pure chops...joe maphis was the fastest, tal farlow played the best solos, segovia was the best classical player, cht atkins was the best fingerstyle..etc. etc.

sme with tenor players and drummers...the big debate over best drummer goes back to the 30's and 40's with guys like gene krupa and buddy rich....competition is part of performing..it's natural...
we hear more about guitar players because guitar is big business and hype equals dollars...
jimi hendrix checked into the dirt hotel about a hundred and forty years ago and he's still on the cover of various guitar mags every month..

the beat goes on.....

bob young

Hey Bob nice to see you posting again. How you keeping? hope all is well.

thanks, big jim

feeling good here..how about you?

bob

I'm OK Notice you have posted a lyric will see if I can pick any holes in it. LOL