I recently "discovered" Andy and I have been completely blown away ever since. Since then I have also been listening to Don Ross, Tommy Emmanuel, and Antoine Dufour. I saw Tommy in Atlanta last week and he was amazing. I'm hoping to get to Andy's show in Florida b/c I have never heard him live.

Who else would you recommend?

I seriously can't get over some of Antoine's new music. His older stuff is good, but this new album is just phenomenal. I've been listening to it nonstop lately. Craig D"Andrea, too - "Crazy is Catching" is right! I was humming his songs for a week after I saw him with Andy and Antoine. And, of course, I'm huge on Hedges and Don Ross.

But, in my opinion, Pierre Bensusan is not only one of the best guitarists (and most unique!), but one of the best musicians today. According to my iTunes, I've listened to his album "Intuite" 20 times straight through at least, with more plays on other random songs. Pierre is music at its purest.

Nathan,

Good call! Antoine's new album is so good, I really love it. I hope he gets as much attention with "Existnce" as I was fortunate enough to get with "Art of Motion" through Youtube and vairous other things. It's really one of the best fingerstyle guitar albums out there, in my opinion.

Pierre is a genius. I don't honestly get into his music as much as some of my other favorite guitarists, but his ability and musicality is unearthly. An inspiration to us all!

Emory,

I always site 4 guys as my big influences; Michael Hedges, Don Ross, Billy McLaughlin, and Preston Reed. Please check out any of those guys if you haven't. Without discovering their music, I might be playing polka on the accordian these days!

There are other acoustic guitarists I like alot and drew inspiration from including; Stephen Bennett, Masaaki Kishibe, Dominic Miller, Acoustic Alchemy, Brad Roberts, and Isato Nakagawa. I'm sure there are more but I am feeling a bit tired and having a hard time remembering everybody...

I like a lot of electric guitar players as well. Here are some; Robert Fripp, Eric Johnson, John Petrucci, Joe Satriani, Adrian Belew, Mattias Ecklund, Frank Zappa, James Hetfield, Shawn Lane, and Jason Becker to name a few.

Tommy is another genius, but similarly with him, I don't really get into his music that much. When he plays, it looks so completely effortless. I remember when I first saw him perform in 2000. I was just blown away. He has such a command of the instrument, you'd think he knows every last thing there is to know about playing a guitar.

He and Pierre are the greatest acoustic guitar players living, I believe.

Rock on!
Andy

1.) Tim Reynolds
2.) Leo Kottke
3.) Tony Rice

Andy,

Thanks for the post. I've got to say that your music has reignited my passion for the guitar. What do I have to do to convince you to come do a show in Atlanta?

It'll happen man. We are going to get there soon for sure. You aren't the only one in Atlanta requesting a gig. In fact, 2 people from Atlanta flew all the way up to Asbury Park, NJ and New Haven, CT to see me while I was there earlier in Feb. And that was the only reason they flew up! I couldn't believe it. I think that means I need to get my ass to Atlanta!

Hope to see you ASAP!
Andy

I love the few that have mentioned already... like Antoine, don ross, Tommy, etc.

but I have to name a few that have not yet been mentioned

Ulli Bogershausen - its a crazy german name for a great guitar player! I guess he can be like you andy in that he doesn't make things stupidly hard for the sake of it, but he makes great pieces of music!

Masa sumide - he was something i just discovered and i fell in love with the song "Say No More" and it turns out he plays loads of funky stuff too with hard percussion stuff too, etc.

I swear, before I found your music andy, I never knew there were so many great japanese guitarists! (although I'm starting to think Masa is korean since his blog is in that language yet he;s got a japanese name :S )

Well I like alot of guitarists. Andy has had alot of infulence on my aspirations this last year.
Don Ross' tune Klimbim was what made me what to be a fingerstyle guitarist. I never thought about starting
a band again (aside from the chance to play Def Lep covers)

This list is everyone I can think of right now. Mostly fingerstyle soloists, but my start was in classic rock.
Bear McCreary composed some of the most amazing music very for the new Battlestar Galactica
Everyone who likes music and should check him out

* indicated not a fingerstyle soloist

In no paticular order
Don Ross
Andy Mckee
Antoine Dufour
Don Alder
Preston Reed
Johnathan Nicholson
Jimmy Page*
Dave Mustaine*
Dave Beagle*
Alex Degrassi
Michael Hedges
Yngwie Malmsteen*
Craig D'Andrea
Tim Thompson
Billy McLaughlin
Glen Roth
Michael Chapdelaine
Justin King
Eric Mongrain
Thomas Leeb
Edgar Cruz
David Gilmore*
Lawrence Juber
Lots of great fingertsylists I've check out on myspace

Im Ben Mancke, an aspiring fingertsyle guitarist. On the old Andy forums the members were glad that I posted a link in the
"recommdended listening" section. I'm not trying to spam. I think that fingertsyle guitar fans will genuinely enjoy the tunes.
Everyone of the guitarists on the list are somewhere in my music. I figered I'd mention my stuff at the end of this post since i coundn't find a recommended music section.

Haha! I can assure you he is 100% Japanese. We are good friends and met up in Taiwan several years ago. I've had him over here in the states for a few gigs and I went over to Japan for some shows with him as well. He is fantastic and so friggin' funky! And hilarious!

And Uli writes some cool tunes as well, nice melodies in there!

And Ben,

That is a great list there! Thanks for mentioning Thomas Leeb in there, he is a great player and dear friend. He's a real sweet guy and his new album is rockin' it! Check it!

Thanks for coming back to the new forums!

A

This post was last modified: 02-29-2008 03:55 AM by Andy McKee.

Cool thread, I'm new to fingerstyle so it's great to have all these names to look up for more inspiration and songs to play

P.S - Instrumentally Guitarded, I just checked out your Myspace page and your stuff sounds very nice mate!