Michael Alden Hedges was an American acoustic guitarist and songwriter.
Fingerstyle guitar is the technique of playing the guitar or bass guitar by plucking the strings directly with the fingertips, fingernails, or picks attached to fingers, as opposed to flatpicking. The term "fingerstyle" is something of a misnomer, since it is present in several different genres and styles of music—but mostly, because it involves a completely different technique, not just a "style" of playing, especially for the guitarist's picking/plucking hand. The term is often used synonymously with fingerpicking except in classical guitar circles, although fingerpicking can also refer to a specific tradition of folk, blues and country guitar playing in the US. The terms "fingerstyle" and "fingerpicking" are also applied to similar string instruments such as the banjo.
The baritone guitar is a guitar with a longer scale length, typically a larger body, and heavier internal bracing, so it can be tuned to a lower pitch. Gretsch, Fender, Gibson, Ibanez, ESP Guitars, PRS Guitars, Music Man, Danelectro, Schecter, Jerry Jones Guitars, Burns London and many other companies have produced electric baritone guitars since the 1960s, although always in small numbers due to low popularity. Tacoma, Santa Cruz, Taylor, Martin, Alvarez Guitars and others have made acoustic baritone guitars.
Kaki King is an American guitarist and composer. King is known for her percussive and jazz-tinged melodies, energetic live shows, use of multiple tunings on acoustic and lap steel guitar, and her diverse range in different genres.
Donald James Ross is a Canadian fingerstyle guitarist. He was the first person to win the National Fingerstyle Guitar Championship twice. His album Huron Street reached the top ten on the Billboard New-age chart.
The harp guitar is a guitar-based stringed instrument generally defined as a "guitar, in any of its accepted forms, with any number of additional unstopped strings that can accommodate individual plucking." The word "harp" is used in reference to its harp-like unstopped open strings. A harp guitar must have at least one unfretted string lying off the main fretboard, typically played as an open string.
Laurence Ivor Juber is an English musician, fingerstyle guitarist and studio musician. He played guitar in the rock band Wings from 1978 to 1981.
Preston Reed is an American fingerstyle guitarist. He is noted for a two-handed playing style and compositional approach that uses the guitar's body as a percussion instrument.
Erik Mongrain is a Canadian composer and guitarist. He has a unique and dark acoustic style, with a wide array of different techniques, approaches and textures reminiscent of Michael Hedges. Widely considered to be one of the best acoustic guitarists of the 2000s.
Antoine Dufour is a Canadian acoustic guitarist currently signed to CandyRat Records.
Thomas Leeb is an Austrian fingerstyle guitarist.
Michael Gulezian is an American composer and fingerstyle guitarist. He is noted for dramatic compositions, a penchant for manipulating metre, an affinity for open tunings, and an unconventionally free two-handed technical approach. Gulezian's use of bottleneck slide on 12-string guitar, coupled with his command of reverse analog reverbs have made his recordings notable for their dream-like sonic atmosphere. Gulezian inhabits a musical territory between his mentor John Fahey and Gulezian's friend and colleague Michael Hedges.
CandyRat Records is an independent American record label and online music store located in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin. They primarily represent instrumental guitar artists, with a focus on acoustic guitar, but include electronic music, alternative rock, singer-songwriter, and progressive rock, with musicians coming from many countries.
Sungha Jung is a South Korean musician who specializes in acoustic fingerstyle guitar. Jung creates acoustic covers and arrangements, typically by ear and/or by watching videos, and composes original songs, both of which he plays and uploads online. He is often described as a guitar prodigy, though he prefers to be known as a "guitarist" rather than a "prodigy." His YouTube channel currently has more than 7 million subscribers.
Masaaki Kishibe is an acoustic guitarist from Japan.
Mike Dawes is an English fingerstyle guitar player known for composing, arranging, and performing multiple parts simultaneously on the guitar.
Donald L. Alder, or Don Alder, is a Canadian fingerstyle guitarist, singer, songwriter, composer, and speaker.
Gabriella Evelina Quevedo is a Swedish guitarist.
Mike Dowling is an American roots music guitarist and songwriter who is best known for his solo arrangements on the Grammy Award-winning composition CD Henry Mancini: Pink Guitar. In 2005, Dowling was ranked as one of the twelve best fingerstyle guitarists in the United States.
Marcin Patrzałek, known mononymously as Marcin, is a Polish percussive fingerstyle guitarist, composer, and producer. He is known for combining fingerstyle, percussive guitar techniques with modern electronic and orchestral production. He first gained popularity in 2015 after winning the ninth edition of Polish talent show Must Be The Music, the prize for which was 100,000 Polish złoty and an additional 100,000 złoty for promotion of his music on Polish radio station RMF FM. After local success, he went on to release his debut record HUSH, the release of which was accompanied by singles including Patrzalek's percussive arrangement of Isaac Albéniz's "Asturias"; the video of the arrangement was released through fingerstyle label CandyRat Records. In subsequent years, Patrzałek's popularity grew rapidly beyond Polish borders due to multiple viral releases online. His videos were posted and discussed by notable publishers such as Rolling Stone, Metal Hammer, Classic FM, Guitar World, Billboard as well as independently. Patrzalek's performances have amassed over 150 million views online, the main contributors to this number being his solo acoustic guitar arrangements of major classical pieces such as Moonlight Sonata or Beethoven's 5th Symphony, as well as popular music, rock arrangements, and original compositions.
