The guitar is a wooden musical instrument that has six strings which produce sound. It is held flat against the player’s body and played by plucking the strings with the dominant hand while pressing selected strings against the frets with the fingers of the
opposite hand. The guitar is classified as a chordophone –meaning the sound is produced by a vibrating string stretched between two fixed points. There are three main types of the modern guitar. The classical guitar is also known as the Spanish guitar or nylon-string guitar, the steel-string acoustic guitar or electric guitar and the Hawaiian guitar which is played across the player’s lap. The loud, amplified sound and sonic power of the electric guitar played through a guitar amp has played a key
role in the development of blues and rock music, bot and performing guitar soloists, and in many rock subgenres, notably heavy metal music and rock.
Electric guitar
The electric guitar has had a major influence on culture. The guitar is used in a wide variety of musical genres worldwide. It is recognised as a primary instrument in every genre.
History of the guitar
The guitar is a plucked stringed musical instrument that probably originated in Spain early in the 16th century. It is derived from the Guitarra Latina, a late-medieval instrument with a waisted body and four strings. The early guitar was slimmer and deeper than the modern guitar, with a less pronounced waist. It was closely related to the Vihuela, the guitar-shaped instrument played in Spain in place of the lute. The guitar originally had four courses of strings, three double, the top course single, that ran from a violin-like pegbox to a tension bridge glued to the sound board.
The 16th-century guitar was tuned C–F–A–D, the tuning of the centre four courses of the lute and the vihuela.
Best guitarists in the word
Mark Knopfler, Eddie Van Hale, Brian May, Chuck Berry, Eric Clapton, David Gilmour, Jimi Hendrix and Jimmy Page are regarded as the best guitarists of the world.
Yashodhara Paranagama
9 H
Musaeus College
Colombo 7