Golden Age of Guitar Instrumentals

Rock and Roll Guitar Instrumentals
Today's lick of the day pays homage to the great Duane Eddy, master of the "twangy guitar" and a founding father of the rock guitar instrumental genre.  In the 1950s Duane enjoyed huge cross-over pop success when he developed a musical formula that featured the electric guitar as the main solo voice.  His signature style, rooted in country, jazz and blues, utilizes very accessible singable melodies generally played in the bass register of the instrument.  Likewise today's lick is in E and uses a simple sparse melody based on the E Major Scale (E-F sharp-G sharp-A-B-C sharp-D sharp) in the first position.  Note the string bends of G to G sharp and F sharp to G that impart a blues-guitar quality to the folksy melody.  The lick is processed with a noticeable amount of tremolo and reverb, which are not only sound effects but significant colors in the Eddy approach.

Learn this lick and then practice to