I got off on that, even though it was only twelve-bar blues.' He was a session guitarist on a 1964 Parlophone single by the Fitz and Startz titled 'I'm Not Running Away', with B-side 'So Sweet'.īeck (top left) in 1965 with the Yardbirds 'They were really my scene because they were playing flat-out R&B, like Jimmy Reed stuff, and we supercharged it all up and made it really rocky. Later in 1963, he joined the Tridents, a band from the Chiswick area. Beck joined the Rumbles, a Croydon band, in 1963 for a short period as lead guitarist, playing Gene Vincent and Buddy Holly songs, displaying a talent for mimicking guitar styles. In 1963, after Ian Stewart of the Rolling Stones introduced him to R&B, he formed The Nightshift with whom he played at the 100 Club in Oxford Street. While attending Wimbledon College of Art, Beck played in a succession of groups, including Screaming Lord Sutch and the Savages during 1964 when they recorded 'Dracula's Daughter'/'Come Back Baby' for Oriole Records. Beck's sister Annetta introduced him to Jimmy Page when both were teenagers. Then he was briefly employed as a painter and decorator, a groundsman on a golf course, and a car paint sprayer. Īfter leaving school, he attended Wimbledon School of Art (now Wimbledon College of Arts). Beck considered Lonnie Mack 'a rock guitarist was unjustly overlooked a major influence on him and many others.' Īs a teenager he learned to play on a borrowed guitar and made several attempts to build his own instrument, first by gluing and bolting together cigar boxes for the body and an unsanded fence post for the neck with model aircraft control lines and frets simply painted on it. Cliff Gallup, lead guitarist with Gene Vincent and the Blue Caps, was also an early musical influence, followed by B. After she replied it was an electric guitar and was all tricks, he said, 'That's for me'. Beck said that he first heard an electric guitar when he was six years old and heard Paul playing ' How High the Moon' on the radio. īeck cited Les Paul as the first electric guitar player who impressed him. He attended Sutton Manor School and Sutton East County Secondary Modern School. As a ten-year-old, Beck sang in a church choir. I just had to have one.īeck was born on 24 June 1944 to Arnold and Ethel Beck at 206 Demesne Road, Wallington, Surrey (now in Greater London). The electric guitar seemed to be a totally fascinating plank of wood with knobs and switches on it. I was interested in the electric guitar even before I knew the difference between electric and acoustic. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice: first as a member of the Yardbirds (1992) and secondly as a solo artist (2009). In 2014, he received the British Academy's Ivor Novello Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music.

īeck earned wide critical praise and received the Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance six times and Best Pop Instrumental Performance once. Although he recorded two successful albums (in 19) as a solo act, Beck did not establish or maintain commercial success like that of his contemporaries and bandmates. Rolling Stone described him as 'one of the most influential lead guitarists in rock'.

He was often called a 'guitarist's guitarist'. In 1975, he switched to an instrumental style with focus on an innovative sound, and his releases spanned genres and styles ranging from blues rock, hard rock, jazz fusion and a blend of guitar-rock and electronica.īeck was ranked in the top five of Rolling Stone and other magazines' lists rankings of the greatest guitarists. He rose to prominence as a member of the rock band the Yardbirds, and afterwards founded and fronted the Jeff Beck Group and Beck, Bogert & Appice. Geoffrey Arnold Beck (24 June 1944 – 10 January 2023) was an English guitarist.

Beck loser