Guitar heroes, that is, is a world not worth living. But let's face it, the days of Edward Van Halen, Randy Rhodes, Andres Segovia, Jimi Hendrix, Stevie Ray Vaughn and their kind are over. Today there are no stars in the guitar sky; no one is getting people excited about playing guitar today. This is especially sad for young people. In the past, the thought of being able to play what Eddie does was enough to fortify a serious commitment to practice, practice, practice. Nowadays, nobody seems to care.

What happened? While many may point the finger at the dreaded synthesizer and MIDI equipment, that explanation simply does not hold water.

Guitar meanwhile, cannot be adequately sampled due to the complexity of attack and decay sounds produced by the pick and the pickups. Keyboards could never replace guitars. And they never did. There are plenty of guitar bands out there, just no guitarists in the classic sense.

To understand what really happened, we must look back at the progression of the final guitar heroes. We can essentially assign blame to three things.

1. Overemphasis on heroism
2. Overemphasis on technique
3. Reaction to this

The first is what could be called "misguided heroism". Many young guitarists wanted so badly to be the next guitar hero that they (sometimes literally) locked themselves in their rooms and practiced until their fingers no longer responded. While this did produce a bumper crop of "hot" guitarists, there was something missing, though no one seemed to be able to put a finger on it. It comes into better focus, however, when we consider Edward Van Halen.

Edward was innovative. Yet even when he played non-innovative things, there was excitement. Then Van Halen and David Lee Roth split up. Now you tell me, has Edward's playing lost something? Listen and compare. Surely he hasn't regressed as a musician, however the content of the heroism is gone.

Click the Van Halen logo to hear a sample of "Eruption"

[requires Real Audio]

The songs were exciting then, but now they fall flat. How often do you hear a great guitar solo in a mediocre song? And if you do, how exciting is it? Along with this, think of the other guitar heroes of old. Their entire musical output was exciting - they weren't just making a song to support a guitar solo!

Unfortunately this is just what many more recent attempts at guitar heroism have fallen into. They failed to realized that their guitar heroes did more than just play the guitar - they wrote quality music, or in the case of Segovia, played great music written by others.

The second problem is closely related. When they locked themselves in their rooms, what did they practice? Did they play their blues and rock albums over and over again and jam with them like their heroes did?
Not many.
Most practiced scaled, arpeggios, technical exercises and melodic studies. They seemed to view their musicianship as building a bridge rather that as a river. Technical formulas and rigid fingerwork replaced the fluid power of spontaneous, natural, musical response. What came out was a group of incredibly impressive, tight, smoking axe-wielders. They each had their fifteen minutes of fame; perhaps Malmsteen had a half hour, but this was mostly in the eyes and ears of fellow guitarists. Regular people were impressed but not moved. Struggling so hard to be impressive, these hot shots ceased to be expressive. Their music is all but forgotten.

The third reason is a reaction to the second. Disgusted with the soulless, bland, non-musical generation of technique freaks, the next generation of guitarists reacted by abandoning the quest for musicianship altogether.

Even those moderns who are accomplished at the instrument don't show it for fear it may detract from their integrity in presenting a pure musical message. While this may be honorable, it has its price. Noteworthy in this area is Kurt Cobain, whose MTV Unplugged performance revealed he barely knows how to use his fingers. Yet Cobain's music lives on for it is music. He and his contemporaries accomplished their mission, and honest music made a temporary comeback (until the next harvest of imitators is reaped) Unfortunately, the guitar as an instrument to really play was sacrificed in the process.

We have almost come full circle. Bands that speak their hearts and minds are attracting the attention of a new audience, just as in the '60's. The musicianship is often raw, but the ideas come through. The inescapable truth is ready to be rediscovered. That your music comes through more powerfully when you play it well. We have learned the lesson that the music is far more important than the playing. The music industry itself has learned that lasting value does not come from being impressive. Musicians may like to be impressed, but people want to be reached, to be moved.

The mission of the Maestro is to bring the emphasis back to the music while still fostering the value of great musicianship. The field is WIDE OPEN for a new generation of guitar heroes who still have their priorities straight.

You may be one of them......