Instrumental rock is rock music that emphasizes instrumental performance and features very little or no singing. Examples of instrumental music in rock can be found in practically every subgenre of the style. Instrumental rock was most popular from the mid-1950s to mid-1960s, with artists such as Bill Doggett Combo, The Fireballs, The Shadows, The Ventures, Johnny and the Hurricanes and The Spotnicks. Surf music had many instrumental songs. Many instrumental hits had roots from the R&B genre. The Allman Brothers Band feature several instrumentals. Jeff Beck also recorded two instrumental albums in the 1970s. Progressive rock and art rock performers of the late 1960s and early 1970s did many virtuosic instrumental performances.
Electric blues is blues music distinguished by the use of electric amplification for musical instruments. The guitar was the first instrument to be popularly amplified and used by early pioneers T-Bone Walker in the late 1930s and John Lee Hooker and Muddy Waters in the 1940s. Their styles developed into West Coast blues, Detroit blues, and post-World War II Chicago blues, which differed from earlier, predominantly acoustic-style blues. By the early 1950s, Little Walter was a featured soloist on blues harmonica using a small hand-held microphone fed into a guitar amplifier. Although it took a little longer, the electric bass guitar gradually replaced the stand-up bass by the early 1960s. Electric organs and especially keyboards later became widely used in electric blues.
Virginia's musical contribution to American culture has been diverse, and includes Piedmont blues, jazz, folk, brass, hip-hop, and rock and roll bands, as well as the founding origins of country music in the Bristol sessions by Appalachian Virginians.
Blues rock is a fusion genre and form of rock music that relies on the chords/scales and instrumental improvisation of blues. It is mostly an electric ensemble-style music with instrumentation similar to electric blues and rock. From its beginnings in the early to mid-1960s, blues rock has gone through several stylistic shifts and along the way it inspired and influenced hard rock, Southern rock, and early heavy metal.
Susan Tedeschi is an American singer and guitarist. A multiple Grammy Award nominee, she is a member of the Tedeschi Trucks Band, a conglomeration of her band, her husband Derek Trucks's band, and other musicians.
Robert William Cray is an American blues guitarist and singer. He has led his own band and won five Grammy Awards.
Scott Henderson is an American jazz fusion and blues guitarist best known for his work with the band Tribal Tech. He was born in West Palm Beach and raised in Lake Worth Beach.
Sue Foley is a Canadian blues guitarist and singer. She has released 15 albums since her debut with Young Girl Blues (1992). In May 2020, Foley won her first Blues Music Award, in the 'Koko Taylor Award ' category.
Dave Bainbridge is an English guitarist and keyboard player who has played with The Strawbs since 2015 and Lifesigns since 2016. With Dave Fitzgerald, Dave co-founded the Christian progressive and Celtic folk themed band Iona.
Canadian blues is the blues and blues-related music performed by blues bands and performers in Canada. Canadian blues artists include singers, players of the main blues instruments: guitar, harmonica, keyboards, bass and drums, songwriters and music producers. In many cases, blues artists take on multiple roles. For example, the Canadian blues artist Steve Marriner is a singer, harmonica player, guitarist, songwriter and record producer.
Matt Schofield is an English blues guitarist and singer. His band, the Matt Schofield Trio, play their own material, a blend of blues, funk and jazz, as well as covers of blues classics such as Albert Collins' "Lights Are On, But Nobody's Home".
Tony Saunders is an American bass player and synthesizer player in the genres of jazz, gospel, R&B, pop and world music. He is a composer, arranger, music producer, and head of his own studio.
John Antonopoulos, known professionally as Johnny A., is an American musician, guitarist, and songwriter.
Paul Nelson was an American Grammy award winning blues and rock guitarist, record producer and songwriter. He played and or recorded alongside artists such as Eric Clapton, Buddy Guy, and members of the Allman Brothers Band. He was the hand-picked guitarist to join Johnny Winter's band in 2010, performing on and producing several of Winter's albums, including the Grammy Award-nominated I'm a Blues Man, Roots, and Step Back, which won the Grammy Award for Best Blues Album, debuted at #1 on the Billboard chart for Blues Albums, and Independent Albums, and debuted at #16 on the Billboard 200 albums chart, marking the highest spot in Winter's career. Nelson was also a Blues Music Award recipient for Best Rock Blues Album, and was inducted into the New York Blues Hall of Fame and was a recipient of the KBA award from the Blues Foundation. He received a Grammy nomination for his work as producer and performer on Joe Louis Walker's, Everybody Wants a Piece.
In the early morning of Monday, August 27, 1990, American musician Stevie Ray Vaughan was killed in a helicopter crash near East Troy, Wisconsin, at age 35. He was one of the most influential blues guitarists of the 1980s, described by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as "the second coming of the blues".
Jimmy Bowskill is a Canadian blues singer, guitarist and bassist based in Toronto, Ontario.
Ulrich Ellison is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist and music producer from Austin, Texas. He is the founder of the group Ulrich Ellison and Tribe, which won the 2015 Austin Music Award for "Best Funk/Soul/Blues" live band.
Tommy Z is an American electric blues guitarist, singer, songwriter, record producer and audio engineer, who has released four studio albums and one live album to date. He has been described as a "blues treasure" by Jim Santella (WBFO), and as "one of WNY's best kept secrets" by Sarah French of Blues Matters! magazine. In 2007, he was inducted into the Buffalo Music Hall of Fame.
Eric Tessmer is an American blues guitarist residing in Austin, Texas. The Austin Chronicle named Tessmer the best guitarist in the city for 2017–2018, based on their annual poll.
