It's easy to make the case that the guitar is the most popular instrument in the world. It's certainly one of the most numerous, with more than 2.5 million guitars sold every year. Acoustic or electric, they come from a huge range of manufacturers from around the world. Country music, blues, rock, pop and jazz all evolved and expanded thanks to the guitar. In fact, you'd be hard pressed to find a musical genre that hasn't embraced guitars. It's unique sound is thanks to its combination of materials, typically all wood construction, and the way it's played. Because the guitar is played with fingers on the strings and a combination of strumming and picking, every player has a signature sound. While in many ways guitars are similar to violins and banjos, no instrument has found similar mass appeal in modern music.
The Musician's Friend team is delighted to help you find the perfect guitar. If you're looking for the perfect instrument for a young musician, check out these guitars for kids. If you're shopping for yourself, narrow your search by category or by brand. You'll find all of the most popular models from every top brand.
There are guitar builders with roots stretching back to the 19th century. Those include C.F. Martin, Gibson, Gretsch and Washburn. There are 20th Century innovators, like Fender, G&L, PRS, Jackson and Taylor. Smaller boutique builders like Tom Anderson, Friedman and Duesenberg make many guitars in limited runs. Builders from Japan, Korea and other Asian countries like Yamaha, Ibanez, Alvarez, and Takamine have become guitar-building experts. Traditional European builders haven't been lost in the mix, either. You'll find classical guitar builders like Manuel Rodriguez and Cordoba, as well as Swedish and German builders like Strandberg, Hagstrom and Warwick. Musician's Friend offers a wide selection of guitars for every level of player.
Basic guitar construction comprises a body, neck, bridge, saddles and nut, strings and a tuning mechanism. Electric guitars add pickups, a pickup selector, volume and tone controls. Acoustic guitars vary widely in tonewoods and bracing design. Modern manufacturing technology means that today's guitars are higher quality and more consistent that at any time in the past. With so many guitars to choose from, you can spend days, or even weeks, making a decision. You can always take the traditional path of looking at what types of guitars your favorite guitarists play, and make one of those choices. Knowing a little bit more about what goes into a guitar can also help find a clear path to the instrument that's right for you.
This is where the choices really expand. There are three basic categories: hollowbody, semi-hollowbody and solid body. Within those categories are buried a huge range of choices. Each of these guitars can be non-cutaway, single-cutaway or double-cutaway. If you're mostly playing rhythm, you might not want or need a cutaway guitar. If you're soloing a lot, upper fret access will be more important.
Hollowbody guitars can be full-depth or thin-line. Thinline hollowbodies have been popular in blues and soul/R&B music. Some hollowbody guitars are simply reduced body sizes from the original acoustic versions, since the pickups eliminate the need for size to obtain volume. Semi-hollowbody designs have long been a standard for blues and jazz players, combining the warmth of a "jazz box" with the feedback resistance of a pure solid-body guitar.
Since solid-body guitars rely primarily on the pickups for sound, the range of shapes and sizes is truly mind boggling. From traditional forms like the Fender Telecaster and Gibson Les Paul, through the jet-age streamlining of the Stratocaster, Jazzmaster and Jaguar, to the ultra-modern (and sometimes ahead of their time) character of the Gibson Explore and Flying V, guitars became fashion statements as much as purely musical instruments.
The most popular acoustic guitars are flat-tops. This traditional style is available in a number of sizes and body shapes ranging from tiny (Baby Taylor) to gargantuan (Gibson Super Jumbo). Obviously, the larger the guitar, the louder it is. Dreadnoughts like the ever-popular Martin D-28 are favorites of both flat-pickers and finger stylists on the basis of sheer volume and projection.
The smaller body sizes, variously called parlor, orchestra, and 000, make up in warmth and charm what they lack in sheer output. The Taylor Grand Concert and Grand Auditorium are popular choices in this size range. Think about what kind of venues you normally play, and consider the range of acoustic-electric pickup systems when deciding on the right guitar. As with every type of guitar, it's important to find the one that matches your personal musical voice.
There are still a handful of purely acoustic archtop guitars from various manufacturers, though they are very much a specialty item these days. But, if you're doing a solo jazz act or aspiring to be the next Freddie Green (Count Basie's long-time rhythm guitarist) they're worth checking out.
One of the primary factors in how a guitar feels and plays is the neck. Variations in scale length, commonly between 24.5" and 25.5", determine string tension, a major contributor to sonic personality. Shorter scale lengths, like the 24.5" of many Gretsch guitars or 24.75" of most Gibson guitars, give lower tension and tend towards a warmer sound. It's easier to bend strings on a shorter scale, but sometimes the lower strings can lose a little clarity.
Longer scale lengths, like the 25.5" standard used by most Fender guitars, gives a brighter, snappier sound at the cost of higher tension. You have to work a little harder to bend strings on a longer scale, but many players feel the increased note articulation is worth it. PRS guitars use a median scale length of 25", which they feel provides the best compromise between the two extremes.
These same factors apply to acoustic guitars, with most dreadnought size bodies having the longer scale length and smaller parlour and orchestra size bodies staying with a shorter scale for the warmer tones associated with it. As always with "feel" issues, your mileage may vary, which is why it's important to get your hands on as many variation as you can to learn what suits your playing best.
Mannes guitar faculty includes renowned guitarist Michael Newman and newly arrived classical guitar star João Luis, both alumni of Mannes. They are joined each semester by guest artists from all over the world who lead students in master classes, special projects, and innovative coursework. Recent visitors include Oscar Ghiglia, Roland Dyens, Benjamin Verdure, Eliot Fisk, and Scott Tennant and William Kanengiser, members of the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet. These masters are currently joined by our resident guitar ensemble, the Newman & Oltman Guitar Duo.
Berklee College of Music was the first institution of higher education to grant a degree with guitar as the principal instrument. To this day, Berklee's Guitar Department remains the largest and most stylistically diverse guitar program in the world.
Many of the world's most ground-breaking guitarists studied at Berklee, including Mike Stern, Leni Stern, Kevin Eubanks, Bill Frisell, Gillian Welch, Emily Remler, John Scofield, Steve Vai, St. Vincent, and Adrianne Lenker and Buck Meek of Big Thief. Our alumni community includes current and former faculty such as: Mick Goodrick, Pat Metheny, Sheryl Bailey, Wayne Krantz, Tomo Fujita, David Tronzo, and Tim Miller. Meet some of our alumni.
The Guitar Department at Berklee offers the most comprehensive guitar education in the world. We provide private instruction, labs, and ensembles in all styles, including jazz, blues, rock, metal, funk, fingerstyle, classical, world music, microtonal music, and the avant-garde.
Connect with us 24/7 on our virtual guitar campus to check out concerts, informal performances, short lessons, master classes, interviews, and department updates from chairs, coordinators, faculty, alumni, and students.
"Virtuosismo" and "technical dominance" are the words used by the press to describe American guitarist, Jay Kacherski. A native of New York, Kacherski has performed around the world as a soloist and member of the Grammy nominated Texas Guitar Quartet. He has performed at distinguished music festivals and venues such as the Festival International de Guitarra de Taxco, Mexico, the Florida Guitar Foundation, the Brevard Music Center, Round Top, the New Orleans International Guitar Festival, the Austin Classical Guitar Society, and the International Guitar Art Festival in Shenzhen, China. He has also collaborated with Grammy-winners and nominees such as the chamber choir Conspirare, Chilean flutist Viviana Guzman, the Los Angeles Guitar Quartet and renowned American composer Libby Larsen.
Jay Kacherski is currently on the guitar faculty at Loyola University of New Orleans, the University of New Orleans, and McNeese State University, as well as NOCCA, the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts. He has presented at music conventions and festivals throughout the U.S. and is often invited to adjudicate at national and international competitions. As a teacher, his students have been finalists and winners of international solo and chamber music competitions and recipients of scholarships for continued study.
The full line of Michael Kelly acoustic guitars are feature-packed and built on sound. Each utilizes classic dovetail construction along with either solid spruce tops, or a wide selection of exotic wood tops. Then we enhance that sonic foundation with the features and feel that you want. Our cutaway guitars give you more neck access and a comfortable feel. As with all Michael Kelly instruments, we start with sound and playability, and then take it up a notch with our boutique guitar visual design elements.
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