By the name of Tommy Emmanuel. He is a mostly instrumental fingerstyle guitarist who plays songs from just about every genre you care to think of. I think this quote from shredding legend Steve Vai pretty well sums it up…
“Well Tommy Emmanuel is not the future of guitar playing because even in the future I don’t think people are going to be able to play like him. The first time I saw Tommy I was stunned into silence.”
One of life’s great pleasures is seeing a genuine master at work, and Tommy is one such master. He has become so adept at fingerstyle, his songs often sound like more than one guitar is being played, but there is not. I have long thought that the mark of a great instrumentalist is that when you listen to a song of theirs then hear the title of the song, you think “of course that’s the title”. In other words, they say so much without saying a word. I know of nobody better at this than Tommy.
I had the pleasure of seeing him live about 10 years ago in Blenheim, a smallish city near the top of the South Island, having already been a fan for some years. It was just him, two acoustic guitars, and an amplifier, and it was one of the most entertaining nights of my life. Not only is his playing ability beyond words, but he is hilariously funny, a consummate showman.
I think most people turned up to the show cause they had nothing better to do. When people sat down, I could see maybe half a dozen people holding little brown paper packages containing the CDs of Tommy’s being sold in the auditorium. But then the first half of the show ended, we all went out for a break. Then when everyone came back in, I swear, at least every second seat someone was holding one of the aforesaid brown paper packages :)
Enough talk from me. A Youtube video paints a thousand words. Here’s Tommy playing Classical Gas like he wrote it, but first goofing off a bit…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8tuuVqgMNkA
And here’s his official site…
http://www.tommyemmanuel.com/
Enjoy.
BruceMeyer
Yes indeed. Tommy is everything you say. Really good.
Lois Romer
tommy has been around for a long time and he is great
Joel Murdoch:
Yes and very very :) But his success outside of Australia seems relatively modest, and that’s a real shame.