Customer Reviews

Guitar: Music, History, Players

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

"Guitar" comes on like a nice, well-designed coffee-table book, albeit on a rich topic: guitars and guitarists. Immediately, it becomes much more than that. Eric Clapton contributed the forward, and author Richard Chapman, an accomplished musician, offers a brief introduction. He has a heartbreaker of a story, told in around fifty words. As an English teenager living in a village in Kent in the '60's he loved the guitar, saved his money, and bought one. His parents disapproved. "When I was 14, all my music and instruments were destroyed and burned by my father (...)" You know you are reading a work of passion and love - and great optimism, for he continues, "but this only gave me a greater determination to succeed."

Chapman surveys the guitar's music, history, and many of its most significant players. There is a gorgeous painting of Segovia, and engravings and pages from medieval manuscripts that show guitars or guitar-like instruments. You read his paragraphs in awe of his ability to tell a lot, briefly. He analyzes the music - pleasingly. You get a little music theory, and I welcomed it. In addition Chapman seems to have a deep store of music-history tidbits. On the roots of slide guitar, we learn that W.C. Handy in around 1903 "passed through a southern railroad station and saw a singer playing slide guitar with a knife, producing what he termed 'the weirdest music I ever saw.' "

The book is divided into Classical, Flamenco, Blues, Country, Folk, Jazz, Rock and Pop of the UK and Europe, Rock and Pop of North America, Latin and World. Within those categories are many subcategories. Lots of great photos. The text is orderly and elegant. Influences and origins are given careful attention. There are color and black and white illustrations - historical documents, appropriate snippets of written music, paintings, and archival material. Famous electric and acoustic guitars - Gibsons, Resonators, Rickenbackers, Stratocasters, Martins, others - are in here. There's an enormous amount of material. The layout and art direction is continuously a pleasure, the captions are consistently informative, and the glossary and index are thorough.

Chapman lets you know at the outset that the vastness of the subject necessitated an enormous amount of culling, and then paring down. He loves the guitar, and can teach it, too - and has put that enthusiasm to great use. It's a first-rate documentary that is scholarly, lively, and greatly satisfying.

With its coffee table size "GUITAR: GREAT PLAYERS AND THEIR MUSIC" could easily be passed over as one of the many glitzy but trivial volumes fit for display cases in larger bookstore chains. However, this work by Richard Chapman is not only attractively produced but also extremely thorough in conveying exactly what its title describes.

Chapters are divided into various styles: classical, flamenco, blues, country, folk, jazz, rock & pop ( UK and USA ), Latin & "World". The sketches of the famous and influential players in each of the styles are nicely done, the author having an acutely accurate sense of just what qualities stand out as particularly noteworthy with each guitarist.

To give an idea of the depth of range, profiles are included on:

Andres Segovia, Julian Bream, Nino Ricardo, Paco de Lucia, Baden Powell, Robert Johnson, Freddie King, Lonnie Johnson, Chet Atkins, Tony Rice, Bert Jansch, Richard Thompson, Django Reinhardt, Charlie Christian, Wes Montgomery, Joe Pass, Chuck Berry, James Burton, John McLaughlin, Bill Frisell, Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, Robert Fripp, Eddie Van Halen, Peter Tosh, King Sonny Ade and Frank Zappa.

Regarding the production aesthetics: Aside from the somewhat gauche cover ( typical of Dorling Kindersley publishers ), the book is tastefully laid out with numerous illustrations and photographs ( at least 50% in color ), some of which are stunningly beautiful.

The short forward by Eric Clapton will hopefully attract readers not normally interested in the "encyclopedic" approach. In the authors ( equally brief ) introduction he puts forth his reasons for writing the book, not the least of which is to inspire people and "point to some of the more obscure and overlooked areas for the benefit of the mainstream reader".

Kudos to Richard Chapman, whose vast knowledge of the guitar, its history and players is shown in quite telling fashion throughout this luxurious and learned volume.

An impressive book. It explains in easily understandable terms the range of what a guitar can do. Both theory musicians and players-by-ear can gain from this book.

The artist selection mentioned in other reviews has some rather startling omissions. Leo Fender, while not a player in the traditional sense, merited a one-sentence blurb. Les Paul, the man without whom rock would have been very different, is mentioned as endorsing a Gibson product. Adolph Rickenbacker doesn't even get that much. Everyone will have a favorite guitarist that didn't make the cut, but the omission of these three men is incomprehensible.

One bit toward the end of the book made my head spin. On Page 211, while discussing restringing, Mr. Chapman recommends using wirecutters. Your guitar salesman will love you, and you'll put your repairman's children through graduate school if this advice is followed.

All in all, buy it for the playing tips and take the rest with a grain of salt.

I use this book in my Rock History/Guitar middle school classes. It is perfect for historical tidbits that I put in a powerpoint along with video clips of the different guitarist.

I highly recommend this book!

Other reviewers either loved this book or hated it. The photographs are probably more impressive than the written content, and I think that baby boomers might like it better than the children or grandchildren of baby boomers. Lots of nostalgic photos. It filled in some of the gaps in my knowledge, but as one of the other reviewers has stated, there is more detailed information to be found elsewhere.

I bought this book since I have recently started playing the guitar and have become very interested in all things guitar. This book, while not the most detailed, does provide a large overview of the history of the guitar and its music. Some other reviewers say you could find the same information on google, which I think is wrong. While if you knew a specific guitarist you might be able to find similar information, you would never be able to find it all combined into a single source. That is why I enjoyed the book, it gave me a large overview of the entire history of the guitar, and I learned a tremendous amount. I would recommend it as a starter book for any aspiring guitarist you wants to know the history of the instrument he or she is playing.

Pros: Easy to read, beautiful pictures, interesting sections on individual guitarists, large overview of guitar's history

Cons: Limited tabs were not very helpful, some guitarists not mentioned or mentioned very little, would have liked more history on actual guitars and guitar making

It looks like all of the information found in the book came from someone typing a topic in Google. It is also worse because two of the pictures are referenced as different people. The greatest blues guitarist of all time is Stevie Ray Vaughan and the book references his picture as Jimmy Vaughan, Stevie's brother. That in itself is a reason to never even contemplating a purchase of this pathetic book. Someone should've been fired.

If you are learning to play the guitar or wonder about things like which guitar Kurt Cobain played, then this book will not only show you pictures, it explains why some players prefer to produce rich collages of sound or take a non-technical approach. Each profile of a legendary artist explores the influences and career highlights.

To make this book come alive, listen to the songs at rhapsody online (you can look up entire albums or individual songs and also look up artists featured with the guitars to find out how they sound) while you read through the book. Just reading about Jeff Beck's guitar playing is interesting, but until you really hear him play, his style will remain a mystery.

The first time I really started paying attention to guitars was when Prince played Live at the Aladdin in Las Vegas. He should be in this book, for sure!

Artists featured: Eric Clapton, Jon Greenwood, George Harrison, Pat Metheny, Django Reinhardt, Joe Satriani (Is there Love in Space? - Completely impressed me with his unique style.) and many other famous guitar players like Richard Thompson and Andres Segovia (classical guitar). Baden Powell was a real find because I love his romantic style and his music is perfect for the evenings when you want to relax.

This relatively quick read if you just want to know about the main artists (unless you read this while online and look up the songs). This book will introduce you to a variety of guitar players and styles you may not even have considered were possible.

Then, if you refer back to this book while playing, you can learn about melodies, riffs, etc. There is also a chord dictionary and an abundance of advice and technical support throughout the second half of the book.

Highly recommended if you are learning to play the guitar or just have an insatiable appetite for information. If you don't own a guitar, buying this book will encourage a purchase. The History of the Guitar section will show you how guitars have evolved since the 1500s. I was very intrigued by all the guitars, especially the blue floral pattern on the Ibanex Jem. Steve Vai is a little wild for my tastes but I love the way he plays in "Lotus Feet" from his Real Illusions: Reflections album.

This book will open up your guitar world! Beware; it can be very time consuming. Happily so...

~The Rebecca Review

This book looked interesting when I picked it up at the store. I bought it and I'm glad I did. It is very thorough with what the title of the book states. It is especially delightful to recognize as you read the book that it was written by a person who is not only very knowledgeable on the history, but also the guitar music theory itself. The way he descibes solos for example in a particular song is done very well and with insight. Very colorful descriptions of guitar playing and different styles in many songs. That's pretty hard to do. Buy it, you will like it too.

I like the DK books for reference purposes when writing first and foremost and that is why I buy them. Some of them turn out to be useful while others are completes duds and "Guitar" falls into the latter category. Unless you have a reference use for this subject, all of the information in this book is better found elsewhere or like the other reviewer said, using Google.

The book is divided up into three section. Famous guitarists, famous guitars, and guitar playing basics. The guitarist section is way to terse and really only goes into introductory detail about its subjects. The famous guitars section has a brief history of the guitar and some of the most famous brands and models. This section is ok but again, various websites and other books cover this much more in depth. Finally, you have a do-it yourself guitar lesson section. I always hate these things because rarely are they well written or constructed well enough to be useful and this one is particularly bad. Anyone looking to start learning guitar should go to a music store and buy a book (that is regular sized as well since this one is way to small) that is solely dedicated to teaching.

Bottom Line: Some decent pictures and subject matter that tries to cover a lot of ground but just doesn't end up doing anything well.