Guitar: Music History Players [Paperback] Review

"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 inKent 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 There are color and black and white illustrations - historical documents, appropriate snippets of written music, paintings, and archival material.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.

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Product Description:
From flamenco to folk, classical to country, and blues to rock-and-roll, Guitar: Music, History, Players is a truly definitive look at an instrument that has captured the imagination of generations. In addition to tracing the guitar's origin from over two thousand years ago to the present day, the author focuses on 300 artists, featuring highlights of their performing careers and analyses of their style and technique along with tablature of their most famous songs.

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