Guitarist Extraordinaire Who Impacted Rock Music Globally (Part 1)

 

Jimi Hendrix
   Guitarist Extraordinaire.

One of the greatest guitarists the world has ever seen was a touring musician for Little Richard’s band and the Isley Brothers before actually becoming well-known as a solo artist in his own right. Jimi Hendrix bridged the cultural gap between various musical genres (blues, soul, jazz and progressive rock), raising the benchmark to the next level in the process and setting the British music industry on fire.

Hendrix brought with him his own peculiar genius, which he developed through playing American black music on the US soul circuit. He shared this love with British rock icons such as Pete Townshend, The Beatles and Eric Clapton.

Born in Seattle, Washington (the birthplace of the Boeing Aircraft Corporation), on the 27^th November 1942 to parents Al Hendrix and Lucille Jeter and given the name James Marshall Hendrix, Jimi was a self-taught musician who wrote most of the brilliant tracks that marked him out as someone special. He perfected an extraordinary left-handed technique which transformed guitar playing into an art form which has never been repeated by any other recording artist since. Hendrix also used the wah-wah pedal with great mastery and was able to create in live performances (for example at the Woodstock festival) simulated sound effects such as machineguns, bombs and screams using just his guitar and without the assistant of his band members on stage.

Jimi Hendrix’s corporate impact started in the late 1960s with the lifting of trade restrictions on the import of Fender Stratocasters into the UK. Jimi helped to make this particular guitar the biggest-selling electric guitar in history. Before Hendrix’s arrival, all the top rock and blues guitarists in the UKwere using Gibsons and Rickenbackers. They soon switched to the Stratocaster. Hendrix’s legendary white Strat which he played at Woodstockwas auctioned at Sotheby’s in Londonin 1990 for £174,000 and later resold in 1993 for £750,000. The guitar is now on permanent exhibit at the “Experience Music Project” in Seattle, where a whole room is devoted to Jimi.

                    Researched and compiled by
                              Mr K Tomlin Music Historian

                        RCM Music/Signaturesoundsonline 2013