I mean, think about it.

Justin King:

Mark Kroos:

Ben Randall:

And I'm not 100% sure but I think Eddie Van Halen might have been self-taught.

what about brian may, carlos santana, mark knopfler, slash and the likes?

4085639 I've never heard of any of those guys except for slash, and though he's admirable, I don't think he should be considered one of the greats.

OH MY GUSH!!!Dr Brian may is the lead guiter of queen, carlos santana is an awesome latin rock guitar player, mark knopfler was the lead guiter of dire striats, next thing you say you never heard of eric clapton

just so you won't get it, here are some songs that show the skills
Dr (PhD in physics) Brian May (Was hard to find live since the song came after they stopped proforming since the lead singer was fallng apart for AIDS)(The lead singer was ferady mercory, who died in 1991, from AIDS, the last live show he did was in 1986)

Carlos Santana

Mark Knopfler

and just in case you don't know, Eric Clapton

4084247

I've never really been one for lessons, because alot of the times it's boring things that I didn't come to learn. Chords, scales, modes, the works. In my opinion, if you can make a good riff, you don't need chords. Now, don't get it twisted, chords can help with the making of a good riff, but ultimately, if you're making good riffs, you've probably gotten past the need for chords in the first place. Plus, when it comes to scales and modes, you can just figure your own out, or just straight not use one.

That being said, almost all of my favourite guitarists are self-taught.

People such as George Harrison (The Beatles), Eddie Van Halen (Van Halen), Leigh Stephens (Blue Cheer), Slash (Gn'R), Tony Iommi (Black Sabbath), Mick Mars (Motley Crue), Rory Gallagher (Rory Gallagher), Jarret Netnin (Satan's Satyrs), were all self taught, and they all kick ass.

4608562 I feel the exact same way. But according to the rest of the world we're factually wrong and not aloud to learn our own ways of doing things even though it can achieve us our goal.

4608808

To be fair, Lessons do have their place. Take drums, for instance. You can learn how to play on your own, but lessons will more the than likely turn you on to new kinds of rhythms and music, which will give you quite the edge. Even if you could figure out the rhythms on your own, drum lessons will push you to play your best, as alot of it is just building stamina and learning rhythms.

The thing is, this doesn't apply so much to guitar, since guitar is all about melodies, it's essentially a tiny orchestra at the tip of your fingers. Any style of music that you could take a lesson to play you could learn by just listening to the music in the first place, and since most of the time all they're teaching are chords anyways, it just falls apart. If you're making a chordy thing in your head, and you know where you wanna go next, but you don't know the fingering, explore the fretboard. It'll take longer, but ultimately it's that much more satisfying when you do find it.

its all about how you learn, buckethead (the most technically skilled guitar player in history) was taught by paul gilbert

5221138 I'm pretty sure that technically speaking, Van Halen is the most skilled guitar player of all time. Where Buckethead is good with rock and metal, Van Halen is good with both of those, as well as flamenco and other finger style types of music, so not only is he as good as Buckethead in rock and metal, but he's also more versatile.

I mean, I hate both of theirs music, but I'm just sayin'.

5221289 van halen was legendary for his time and helped influence shredding with eruption but buckethead is alot more versatile than he seems. listening to more soulful albums like colma and electric sea aswell as more groovy and funky things like his praxis and c2b3 bands and even the very intense horror-esque things that hes made as death cube k really is just the tip of the iceberg concerning his variety. his finger plucking is phenomenal and to see an example of it look up a video called young buckethead is god. and it's really just icing on the cake that hes one of the few that can do eight finger tapping with no effort at all.

5221304 Olay, well, you've got me there.

5221304 I have to ask, though: Can Buckethead play guitar and sing at the same time? Because unless the riffs you're playing are really simple or the lyrics have a similar rhythm and tempo to the guitar, I wouldn't hesitate to consider it more difficult than both shredding and finger style.

5221322 id guess he probably could if he were actually a singer, since hes capable of playing while doing doing things completely unrelated to playing and not even glancing at his guitar. theres even a video of him playing while being completely blinded by his bucket which had fallen over his eyes. plus id consider doing that well is more a testament to multitasking skills than skill with an instrument.

5221355 Your voice is an instrument. I'd say singing while playing guitar is an instrumental skill along the same lines of playing two separate pieces on a guitar at the same time:

Same thing with drumming, actually. How any of those drum players have enough concentration to play a clapper beat on the kick and a 4/4 on the cymbals at the same time, I'll never know.

vocals are an instrument, but playing two instruments at the same time doesnt make someone more skilled with either, it just means you're familiar enough with multitasking those thingsto do them at the same time. les claypool is a great bassist and a terrible singer yet he can do both as if he were two different people but hes still a bad singer and hasn't improved in over 20 years

and for a drummer its all a matter of rythm in my experience, with all the rythm section going off eachothers queues and keeping eachother in time

5221453 I think Les's singing is fine. And just because his voice sounds "bad" to you doesn't mean his singing doesn't require talent. Skilled does not equal good, i.e. Van Halen's music makes me want to sink knitting needles into my eardrums up to the hilt, but that doesn't mean he has no skill. As a matter of fact, I genuinely prefer generic chugfests and hi-gain power chords in modern metal over the shredtastic million-notes-per-second bullshit you'll hear in older metal. But just because it sounds better doesn't mean it's harder.

5221508 but les doesnt know how to sing, hes said that many times before. i think his voice sounds fine for primus but its pretty blatantly obvious that hes never even attempted to learn how to do it, he just talks in a silly voice while playing. the whole "talent doesnt equal listen-ability" isnt really something you can use in a argument since its something that cant be seen from an objective view point in any way at all

5224615

its something that cant be seen from an objective view point in any way at all

Point?

5224630 i just dont see why the statement was necessary since all it did was tell me what kind of music you liked when it wasnt really needed

5224638 You had literally said "Les isn't good at singing ergo he's not skilled" and that was my way of saying no.

5224662 except that its true, hes even said that he doesnt know anything about singing, its his thing

5224676 And? Please explain how this helps you prove that singing while playing guitar doesn't require guitar skill.

because its more testament to a persons skills as a multitasker and their familiarity with the instrument than as a musician. just because someone can do it doesnt automatically make them better than anyone else who cant

5224716 Alright, you win.

But I still think it's a huge skill indicator.