Richard
Hugh Blackmore, (born 14 April 1945) is an English guitarist. He has been a founding
member of both Deep Purple and Rainbow and is currently a member
of the band Blackmore's Night.
Influenced in
his youth by early rockers like Hank Marvin and Gene Vincent, and later,
country pickers like Chet Atkins. Later on with organist Jon Lord he
co-founded hard rock group Deep
Purple in 1968, and continued to be a member of Deep Purple from
1968-1975 and again from 1984-1993.
Blackmore
co-founded the hard rock group Deep Purple in 1968 with Rod Evans (vocals),
Nick Simper (bass), Jon Lord (keyboards), and Ian Paice (drums). The band
had a hit US single with its remake of the Joe South song "Hush"
after three albums Evans and Simper were replaced by Ian Gillan (vocals)
and Roger Glover (bass).
With Deep Purple and Rainbow, Blackmore almost
exclusively played a Fender Stratocaster. He is also one of the first
guitarists to use a "scalloped" fretboard where the wood is
shaved down between the frets. It requires the player to play with a
lighter touch as pressing hard will cause the note to sound sharp. The
result is increased control of vibrato and bending at the cost of making
chordal playing more difficult. Other scalloped neck users include John
McLaughlin, Yngwie J. Malmsteen, Uli Jon Roth, and also Steve Vai, whose
signature Ibanez is scalloped above the 20th fret.
One of
Blackmore's best-known guitar riffs is from the song Smoke on the Water. He
plays the riff without a pick, using two fingers to pluck two adjacent
strings held in a IV interval.
In his
soloing, Blackmore combines blues scales and phrases with minor scales and
ideas from European classical music. His resulting style has been referred
to as "neo-classical" and has been emulated by many modern heavy
metal guitarists.
Blackmore ranked #55 on Rolling Stone Magazine's "100
Greatest Guitarists of All Time
