“My guitar is not a thing. It is an extension of myself. It is who I am.”
– Joan Jett
The guitar has arguably shaped the landscape of modern music more than any other instrument. Around 1 in 5 people know how to play the guitar, that’s nearly 1.5 billion people! The love for its sound, image and legacy is truly universal.
But do you know how the instrument came to be?
Guitar
Noun | ɡɪˈtɑː/
A stringed musical instrument, with a fretted fingerboard, typically incurved sides, and six or twelve strings, played by plucking or strumming with the fingers or a plectrum.
The history of the guitar is an exciting one, namely because its roots go back four to five thousand years ago to the birth of modern civilisation. In fact, almost every society throughout history has been known to use a variation of the instrument.
So here it is, a brief (or as brief as possible) history of one of the oldest instruments known to man.
AVAILABLE ON
BERT TRANSCRIBED: THE BERT JANSCH SONGBOOK
Bert Transcribed presents 24 songs by legendary singer-songwriter and guitarist Bert Jansch. Each song has been meticulously transcribed and annotated to detail every aspect of Bert Jansch’s groundbreaking style and technique.