This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations .(December 2014) |
Elmer Ellsworth McMeen, III (known as El McMeen) (born June 3, 1947 in Lewistown, Pennsylvania), is an acoustic steel-string fingerstyle guitarist. His specialty is fingerstyle arrangements of sung or strongly melodic pieces, ranging from the Irish genre, to hymns, gospel tunes and pop music. He has also composed instrumentals for guitar, and has published a book of Irish and Scottish instrumental music that he arranged for classical string trio (violin, viola and cello). That book is called Celtic Treasures for String Trio (Piney Ridge, 2005). He plays and arranges guitar music almost exclusively in the CGDGAD tuning. (That tuning, developed by English guitarist Dave Evans in the 1960s, is similar to a Hawaiian slack-key tuning [CGCGAD] called "C Ni'ihau" tuning.) Acoustic Guitar magazine (Oct. 2001, No. 106) called McMeen "the king of CGDGAD tuning".
McMeen has also arranged many pieces of music in Dropped D tuning (DADGBE), and has written The Art of Dropped D Guitar, published by Mel Bay Publications, Inc. He is profiled in Marquis’ Who’s Who in the World.
McMeen practiced law as his primary vocation in New York City for many years, and was a partner in the New York City law firm of LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae, LLP for 21 years, until his retirement in 2000. After retirement from law, he has pursued music and Christian ministry work full-time. [1]
El McMeen was born in Lewistown, Pennsylvania in 1947, and moved with his family to Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, in 1960. Through freshman year in college, he played clarinet as a solo instrument, as well as in band and orchestra settings. He studied piano, and sang in choral groups. He attended public schools in Lewistown and Huntingdon, Pennsylvania, before attending Mt. Hermon School (now called Northfield Mt. Hermon School), graduating in 1965. He graduated from Harvard College in 1969, and the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1972, in each case with Honors. He was an Editor of the University of Pennsylvania Law Review. He has been married to the former Sheila Taenzler since 1971, and has three sons—Jonathan, Daniel and James—and a daughter, Mary.
McMeen started learning guitar as a senior at Mt. Hermon. At first, he did not approach the guitar primarily as a solo instrument, but used it as accompaniment for his singing. Upon reapplying himself in the early 1980s to the instrument, he encountered what he saw as an incredible breadth of music that one could try to render on guitar. He found himself attracted to Irish and Scottish music, alternative tunings, and different approaches to rendering and arranging music. McMeen’s playing is characterized by melodic emphasis, economy and great beauty of sound. His natural voice-like phrasing and skill at ornamentation and improvisation create a musical flow that gives the listener the impression he is hearing the piece for the first time, each time it is played. His improvisational approach to pieces creates an atmosphere of warm and personal immediacy. Guitar Player Magazine (Vol. 29, No. 2, 1995) referred to his music as "drop-dead gorgeous".
Oscar Lopez is a Chilean-Canadian guitarist, whose signature style blends Latin and jazz styles.
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.
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.
Niall Vallely is an Irish musician, born 1970 in Armagh, Northern Ireland. In 1966 his parents, Brian and Eithne Vallely had founded the Armagh Piper's Club, but he chose to learn the concertina instead, from the age of seven. His brother Cillian plays the uilleann pipes and low whistle, learning from Mark Donnelly. Another of his brothers, Caoimhin, plays classical piano, tin whistle and fiddle. In 1990, Vallely founded the group Nomos, which released two albums before breaking up in 2000. In 1992, Vallely completed a degree in music at University College, Cork.
William Coulter is an American Celtic guitarist, performer, recording artist, and teacher. Since 1981 he has explored the world of traditional music as a soloist with ensembles including Isle of Skye, Orison, and the Coulter-Phillips Ensemble.
Michael Chapdelaine was an American guitarist.
Tim Sparks is an American acoustic guitar player, singer, arranger and composer.
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.
Richard Royall "Duck" Baker IV is an American acoustic fingerstyle guitarist who plays in a variety of styles: jazz, blues, gospel, ragtime, folk, and Irish and Scottish music. He has written many instruction books for guitar.
Cathie Ryan is an Irish American singer-songwriter, who has released five CDs and tours steadily with her band performing at festivals, folk clubs, performing arts centers and with symphony orchestras. Known for "her crystalline vocals and insightful songwriting," Cathie Ryan has been one of the leading singers in Celtic music since her start in the 1980s. She first came to prominence in 1987 as lead singer of the Celtic music group, Cherish the Ladies, with whom she recorded two CDs. She began her solo career in 1995.
Muriel Anderson is an American fingerstyle guitarist and harp guitarist who plays in many genres. She is the first woman to win the National Fingerpicking Guitar Championship.
Pat Kirtley is an American fingerstyle guitarist, composer and guitar educator.
Al Petteway was an American guitarist known primarily for his acoustic fingerstyle work both as a soloist and with well-known folk artists such as Amy White, Tom Paxton, Jethro Burns, Jonathan Edwards, Cheryl Wheeler, Debi Smith, Bonnie Rideout, Maggie Sansone and many others. His own compositions rely heavily on Celtic and Appalachian influences and he is known for his use of DADGAD tuning.
Dáithí Sproule is a guitarist and singer of traditional Irish music. He is the grandson of Frank Carney and uncle of singer Claire Sproule.
Rob MacKillop is a Scottish composer and multi-instrumentalist, specializing in lute, theorbo, vihuela, banjo, ukulele and both classical and Russian guitar. He is an important performer of Early Music in Scotland. He is also a photographer.
Folk baroque or baroque guitar is a distinctive and influential guitar fingerstyle developed in Britain in the 1960s, which combined elements of American folk, blues, jazz and ragtime with British folk music to produce a new and elaborate form of accompaniment. It has been highly important in folk music, folk rock and British folk rock playing, particularly in Britain, Ireland, North America and France.
Randal Bays is an American fiddler, guitarist and composer. This Irish-style fiddle and guitar player first gained international recognition through his recordings and performances with Co. Clare fiddler Martin Hayes in the early 1990s.
Ed Gerhard is an American Grammy Award winning guitarist. He is known for his acoustic fingerstyle guitar playing and lap steel guitar music.
Francesco Morone known as Franco Morone, is an Italian guitar player, teacher, composer and arranger specializing in the fingerstyle technique. He is the author of several books and has recorded CDs and videos playing his original music, which combines traditional Italian and Celtic melodies with jazz, blues and folk influences. He currently performs and teaches across Europe, the United States, and Japan.
Stefan Grossman is an American acoustic fingerstyle guitarist and singer. His discography consists of 22 studio albums, 2 live albums, 12 compilations, 22 videos, and 14 collaborations with other artists. In addition, his production, compositions and guitar work have been featured on a number of albums by other artists.