Quotes About Guitar

After months of playing air guitar to 'Free Bird', what really got me into guitar was watching a documentary about Jimi Hendrix and picking up the Woodstock soundtrack. Listening to his version of 'Star Spangled Banner' and 'Purple Haze.' My brother played acoustic guitar and, idolising him, I thought, 'I'm going to get a guitar.'

I've liked music since I can remember and the guitar was always the most attractive thing about music to me at that time. I played guitar in a high school band. I played guitar in various other bands up until I was 20, but nothing too serious. From time to time someone would ask me to play with a group, but I stopped playing with band-oriented projects as a whole soon after.

My vocation is more in composition really than anything else - building up harmonies using the guitar, orchestrating the guitar like an army, a guitar army.

Claude Debussy defined the guitar as an expressive harpsicord. I believe that is the best definition ever given of the Spanish guitar. This phrase is the starting point for my Concierto de Aranjuez Our guitar is the only survivor of the rich and anarchic instrumental wildlife of the Middle Ages.

I kind of grew up a guitar nerd and I tried to figure out how to shred on an acoustic guitar as a kid, while listening to jazz or whatever. So that is kind of a different thing and my church background, growing up with worship kind of the ground that I learned how to play music from. Those are all odd ways of growing up, compared to most people, so I think the music has plenty of uniqueness in that.

I still play that guitar. It's a Martin D-18 with a clear pick guard. I've played that guitar on and off my TV shows for nearly 50 years.

There are guys in country music who are wizards on the guitar. If you're a country fan, you're used to it. But as a rock guitar player, you listen.

About ten years ago, I knew three chords on the guitar. Now, in 1982, I know three chords on the guitar.

And at the time, for one of the few times in my life I didn't have a band, I just had myself and the guitar, so I was going to have to do something with just my voice, just the guitar and just my songs that was going to move someone enough to give me a shot. So I wrote songs that were very lyrically alive and lyrically dense. And they were unique, but it really came out of the motivation to - or I understood it was - I was going to have to make my mark that way.

My dad has always been very proud of me but I think I have exceeded his expectations. When I told him I wanted to be an actor and moved to New York City, I think he assumed I would be playing the guitar on the subway and collecting spare change in my guitar case. The fact that I'm not doing that means that I'm a huge success.

Then the musical instruments appeared. Dad’s snare drum from the house, Henry’s guitar from his car, Adam’s spare guitar from my room. Everyone was jamming together, singing songs: Dad’s songs, Adam’s songs, old Clash songs, old Wipers songs. Teddy was dancing around, the blond of his hair reflecting the golden flames. I remember watching it all and getting that tickling in my chest and thinking to myself: This is what happiness feels like.

I'm not too picky about guitars. I love to collect them, mostly oddballs, but I'm not married to any brand or model. Whatever guitar has the best character for the song is the one I want to use, because if you've got a style, you're going to sound like yourself no matter what guitar you play.

I do get labeled as a guitar band, but the only reason is that's the instrument I know how to play. The guitar is serving the song I'm writing. But I'm learning how to play keyboard better now so that'll start serving the song as well; it'll be another flavor. I'm not going to switch it up with big, fat drum machine beats and real swoopy synths, but yeah...

I can play rhythm guitar. I know how to hold a guitar and strum it.

My first instrument was the drums. Not quite sure why I quit and changed to guitar, but I'm sure my parents might have convinced me that the guitar was way better.

And if the world does turn, and if London burns, I'll be standing on the beach with my guitar. I want to be in a band, when I get to Heaven. Anyone can play guitar, and they won't be a nothing anymore.

I wanted to be an actor, an astrologer, an astronaut; a lot of different things were going through my mind. But I also wanted to play guitar. I mentioned to my parents that I wanted an electric guitar for Christmas. They got me one! I sat there all Christmas morning making a lot of loud horrible noise.

I loved the guitar, and I had all of this music in my head. My passion for the guitar and the ideas for what I could create musically were equal. So that's where I was.

Around middle school I studied jazz guitar and ended up playing in a jazz band for a bit. But, after high school, I haven't even touched a guitar.

I had given up the guitar between '75 and '78. I completely lost interest. I was sick of hearing other guitar players and I was tired of my tunes.

When you heard Jimi Hendrix, you knew it was Jimi Hendrix. He introduced himself with his instrument. His attack to a guitar man, was, oh, something else! You think of one of the great American ball players, or one of the great fighters of the world, you know, that's the way he would attack any note on his guitar.

To be honest, I'm one of the least-technical guitar players around. I just want a guitar to feel good and sound good. That's it, period.

When I got my first guitar, I played along with everything I heard that had guitar in it, like the Ramones, Nirvana and Sublime, as well as whatever hip-hop and R&B stuff was on the radio.

When Lonnie Mack came out with the guitar instrumental "Memphis" I thought, Oh God, finally somebody we guitar players can relate to !

I even played bass for a while. Besides playing electric guitar, I'd also get asked to play some acoustic stuff. But, since I didn't have an acoustic guitar at the time, I used to borrow one from a friend so I could play folk joints.

I always liked playing music and I always wanted to be good at playing guitar. I always saw myself as an old man living in the mountains playing a guitar, but I didn't really turn that into a desire to be a professional musician or a singer or a rock star or anything like that.

Seeing my children makes me come most alive. I come home and I see my kids' faces light up when they see me at the door with my guitar case. They run to me, we hug. I never go beyond a few weeks without being in their presence, so they have adjusted quite well.

With all these great (guitar teachers) around here, don't cop their licks, COP THEIR ATTITUDE.

That it's a lot harder to make a keyboard sound not-cheesy than a guitar.

My older brother was the guitar player in the neighborhood band. My parents were the cool ones that had the basement for rehearsal. Rather than hang with my peers after school, I wanted to just listen to the band. More than that, I wanted to play.

Once I picked up an electric guitar, I lost interest in piano, and I just wanted to rock. I studied piano for so long, I got burned out on it.

I was really young, but I can't say that I wrote much of anything. I liked to scribble; I thought of it as that. But I was playing guitar and ukulele when I was in second grade.

It's how I learned to play guitar - sitting with Led Zeppelin and Cheap Trick records, backing the needle up and learning how to play along. When the band started, by doing something that was very obvious to us and sort of traditional, it set us apart at the time from what was happening musically.

I like to play guitar, jam out, play the blues, go watch movies. I love movies.

This is going to sound crazy, but I can hear music in my head. I can imagine a piano or a guitar playing, and I can sort of think out.

My life has been a roller coaster ride, but somehow I've always been able to land on my feet and still play the guitar.

If something is too hard to do, then it's not worth doing. You just stick that guitar in the closet next to your shortwave radio, your karate outfit and your unicycle and we'll go inside and watch TV.

I first picked up the bass guitar when I was twelve years old, and fooled around with it. By the time I was thirteen I got pretty serious about it.

I've seen a lot of people getting into Jazzmasters because of me, and, well, people don't know what they're in for. I mean if you're looking for endless sustain, you're going to have to get it out of your hands (laughs). Because a saxophonist gets it out of his breath. You've got to work for it on the guitar - it means you have to pull it out of yourself, otherwise, what are you doing? You end up playing a lot of noise or scale exercises.

That's why I love music so much. It completely saved me. There are so many feelings you can't explain, and you can hear one note on a guitar and somehow that sound explains what you can't put into words.

Hunting Bears is a complex song. A bear, as you know is another term for a chubby chaser. The guitar line is actually the sound of a fat man's thighs rubbing together as he approaches another lardy male for a night of sexual deviance.

Gonna wind it up on my guitar. Gonna make that silver sing.

I've got four or five records in my head at a time that I try to work on and I would like to do a guitar trio record next - since The Police I've mostly made records with keyboards.

If you really love guitar, you're going to spend every waking hour stroking the thing.

What an unfortunate instrument the guitar is! An instrument of such great nobility, a genuine monarch of music-- reduced to a pitiful lump of wood with six strings, constantly abused by people with no ear and no voice.

I love to photograph the tools of one's trade: Duncan Grant's paintbrushes, the typewriter of Herman Hesse, or even my own guitar, a 1957 Fender Duo-Sonic.

Because I don't play guitar any more, African harmonies and rhythms have been an inspiration to me. I love the raw origin of the sound. It complements my voice and words naturally.

At some point I decided I didn't want to learn any more guitar technique. I was at that level where the next mountain there was to climb was Van Halen and I didn't really like Van Halen.