page_title: Jazz guitarist
section_title: Fusion, technique, and invention
hierarchical_section_title: Jazz guitarist / Fusion, technique, and invention
caption_attribution_description: Stanley Jordan (July 31, 1959) is an American jazz/jazz fusion guitarist, best known for his development of the touch technique for playing guitar.
context_page_description: Jazz guitarists are guitarists who play jazz using an approach to chords, melodies, and improvised solo lines which is called jazz guitar playing. The guitar has fulfilled the roles of accompanist and soloist in small and large ensembles and also as an unaccompanied solo instrument.
  Until the 1930s, jazz bands used banjo because the banjo's metallic twang was easier to hear than the acoustic guitar when competing with trumpets, trombones, and drums. The banjo could be heard more easily, too, on wax cylinders in the early days of audio recording. The invention of the archtop increased the guitar's volume, and in the hands of Eddie Lang guitar became a solo instrument for the first time. Following the lead of Lang, musicians dropped their banjos for guitars, and by the 1930s the banjo hardly existed as a jazz instrument.
  Amplification created possibilities for the guitar. Charlie Christian was the first to explore these possibilities. Although his career was brief, it was influential enough for critics to divide the history of jazz guitar into pre- and post-Christian eras.
context_section_description: When rock guitarist Jimi Hendrix became popular in the 1960s, he created the persona of the guitar hero, the charismatic solo guitarist dazzling the audience. He created possibilities on guitar through the use of electronic effect units. Hendrix inspired many musicians to pick up electric guitar.
  One of them was Larry Coryell, who combined jazz and rock in the 1960s before the term jazz fusion was common. English guitarist John McLaughlin followed Coryell and Hendrix, but he explored other styles, too, such as blues, electronic, folk, free jazz, gypsy jazz, and Indian music. McLaughlin recorded an album of acoustic jazz in the early 1980s with guitarists Paco de Lucia and Al Di Meola. English guitarist Allan Holdsworth played jazz rock in the 1980s that as inspired by John Coltrane. Lee Ritenour is among the most popular jazz fusion guitarists. He established his name in the 1970s as a busy studio musician who recorded with acts in many genres.
  The hammer-on is a common technique in guitar, but in the 1980s Stanley Jordan was the first to extend the technique into his entire playing style. Jordan taps the fretboard with the fingertips of both hands, playing the neck of the guitar like a piano. Enver Izmaylov, a native of Uzbekistan, uses a similar two-handed technique to adapt his country's folk music to jazz. Others using tapping techniques to a lesser degree include David Torn and Tuck Andress. Some fusion guitarists reacted against the excesses of their predecessors by playing in a more restrained style. These include Larry Carlton, Steve Khan, Terje Rypdal. Mike Stern began his career with the band Blood, Sweat & Tears, then was a member of Miles Davis's band in the 1980s. 
  Charlie Hunter invented the eight-string electric guitar, giving the impression of two guitarists simultaneously. He adapts to guitar the Hammond B3 organ grooves of Jimmy Smith and Larry Young.
caption: Stanley Jordan playing the fretboard like a keyboard
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