T-Bone was a blues guitarist and one of the pioneers of the electric guitar. His electric guitar solos were some of the first heard on blues recordings.

Most of T-Bone’s music was recorded from 1946–1948, including “Stormy Monday” which he recorded in 1947. He followed with “T-Bone Shuffle” and “Let Your Hair Down, Baby”, both considered blues classics.

Jimi Hendrix referred to T-Bone as his childhood hero.

T-Bone was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 1980 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987.

Happy 100th Birthday T-Bone!

The Blues Foundation Music Awards

The Blues Foundation is Memphis-based, but world-renown as THE organization dedicated to preserving blues music history, celebrating recording and performance excellence, supporting blues education and ensuring the future of this American musical art form.

Founded in 1980, The Blues Foundation has over 3500 individual members and over 185 affiliated local blues societies representing an estimated 50,000 fans, musicians and other professionals around the world.

Its signature honors and events–the Blues Music Awards, Blues Hall of Fame, International Blues Challenge and Keeping the Blues Alive Awards–make it the international center of blues music.

The Blues Foundation’s 31st annual Blues Music Awards will be held Thursday, May 6th, 2010 at the Cook Convention Center in Memphis, TN.

The annual event is often a marathon, typically running 7+ hours including performances by the various nominees.

Here are some of the Blues Music Award nominations for 2010:

Best Instrumentalist – Guitar

• Derek Trucks
• Duke Robillard
• Joe Louis Walker
• Lurrie Bell
• Ronnie Earl

Best New Artist Debut

• Greg Nagy – Walk That Fine Thin Line (Big O Records)
• Joanne Shaw Taylor – White Sugar (Ruf Records)
• Marquise Knox – Man Child (APO Records)
• Monkey Junk – Tiger in Your Tank (Beefy)
• The California Honeydrops – Soul Tub! (Tub-Tone Records)

Contemporary Blues Album of the Year

• Candye Kane – Superhero (Delta Groove)
• Joe Louis Walker – Between a Rock and the Blues (Stony Plain Records)
• Rick Estrin and the Nightcats – Twisted (Alligator Records)
• Ronnie Earl and the Broadcasters – Living in the Light (Stony Plain Records)
• Tommy Castro – Hard Believer (Alligator Records)

Historical Album of the Year

• Freddie King – Taking Care of Business 1956-1973 (Bear Family Records)
• Muddy Waters – Authorized Bootleg: Live at the Fillmore Auditorium (Geffen Records)
• Gary Moore – Essential Montreux (Eagle Records)
• Little Walter – The Complete Chess Masters 1950-1967 (Hip-O Select)
• Sean Costello – Sean’s Blues (Landslide Records)

You can find the complete list of nominees and read more at THE BLUES FOUNDATION.
 

The event will also be simulcast on Sirius XM Radio by the Program Director of B.B. king’s Bluesville, Mr. Bill Wax, at Exit 74, on the XM Highway.

CLICK HERE to listen at 8PM EST.

BUT THAT’S NOT ENOUGH!!!

For all of you wanna-be guitar designers, click on the image to the left and watch your screen morph into a guitar designers pallet of options.

Be patient as this site may take a minute or two to load…but I guarantee it will be worth the wait!

This is an amazing graphics application that will allow you to customize the Color (Plaintop, Flametop, Quilttop), Body (Finish, Binding, Pickguard), Neck (Ebony, Rosewood, Maple, Inlays), Pickups (Bridge, Neck, Screws), Hardware (Tuner, Bridge, Controls, Toggle) and so much more.

Special thanks to Frank Montag for the creative genius and programming behind the scenes.

I am having a lot of fun with this one…!!

[Video]

The myTouch 3G Fender Limited Edition is available for $179.99 with a new two-year T-Mobile agreement.

I will admit, it’s pretty cool!

It was titled:  “Here’s To The Guitar Hero“.

I told myself on that day that if I was still writing posts for the blog one year later that the blog would be a success.

I wondered if I could come up with enough interesting guitar-related articles to keep it going.

I also wondered if anyone would find the site, read what I had to say, enjoy the content, visit it on a regular basis, tell others, etc…

Today, after 118 blog posts, several site re-designs, dozens of complimentary emails and a few thousand unique monthly visitors… TheGuitarBuzz has an audience.

Thanks to all of you.  I promise to keep it going.

On that note, I have a couple of “Life Moments” to share with you.  After all, the definition of a BLOG is a Web-Log of what is going on in my life… so here goes.

A few days ago I had the joyous experience of giving my 13 year-old daughter her first guitar for Christmas.  I looked into her eyes and told her that I finally understood what it meant to say “it’s more blessed to give than to receive”.  She does not live with me and I was concerned that learning would be a challenge, so I put together a book for her with basic guitar chords and a few lead sheets of her favorite songs.  We spent about 30min together and I showed her how to apply the fingering illustrated on the chord charts.  When she called me to say that after 4 days she could play all of the chords to her favorite Taylor Swift song, I broke down in tears.

I reminded her that I picked up my first guitar at age 48… and that she had a 35 year head start on me.

I will be taking a few days away from the blog while I fly the family across the country to be with my mom (age 77) who started chemotherapy treatment a few days ago.  She’s beat cancer two times in the last 12 years… knowing her, she will do it again!  Keep her in your prayers.

I’ll be back soon.

-GuitarDaddy

You can now follow TheGuitarBuzz.com on Twitter!

Click the image to the left, or link to http://twitter.com/TheGuitarBuzz and you will receive short notices (tweets) that a new post has been added to TheGuitarBUZZ.

And so that my “tweets” are not just duplicates of my RSS Feed, I promise to throw in a few extra tidbits of guitar related stuff every few days.

Thanks for your support and encouragement about the blog.  I hope you enjoy reading it and following it as much as I enjoy writing it.

The show is called NAMM, which stands for National Association of Music Merchants.  The long form of the name is no longer used. Today, they simply say that NAMM stands for the interests of the global music products industry.

Admission to the trade show is restricted to companies that meet the association’s Membership criteria; in general, those companies that manufacture, distribute and/or retail musical instruments/products — in other words… the show is not open to the public.

Today, I received approval to attend the show as a result of the industry related content I write about on TheGuitarBuzz.com.  I will participate as a member of the media and will report about the events at the show on TheGuitarBuzz.com.

I will be traveling to Aneheim, California, January 14-17, to fill my head with the latest and greatest our industry has to offer.  I plan to meet with all of the major manufacturers to better understand what they are doing to break ground with new technology and add value to current product offerings. While I am there I will have the opportunity to visit with literally hundreds of people who are influential in the growth of the music industry.

Along with industry heavyweights, there will be many artists in attendance — many of whom endorse the products of exhibitors.  For example, last year Eric Johnson was at the Fender exhibit and Steve Vai was at the Ibanez exhibit.  With free concerts every night, I think I am heading for a 4-day stretch with 6 hours of sleep!

1- Before I took up guitar, I didn’t listen to instrumentals. With no words to sing along to, I just wasn’t interested. Now I love to put on some lyric-less Dick Dale or Leo Kottke or Link Wray because I can now appreciate what goes into making that sound.

2 – The original bridge pins on my Alvarez were white with black dots. A while back I switched to black pins with white dots. This did not improve my playing.

3 – I’m no masochist but I like it when my fingertips are sore. That means I’ve been working at it a lot and enjoying it a lot.

4 – It amazes me that Leo Fender couldn’t play the instruments he designed.

5 – I think if I started taking lessons again I could really make a leap.

6 – Once I start to get a song down, I tend to get tired of it and want to move on to something new. I wonder if I have a case of adult attention deficit disorder or something along those … Hey, look! There’s something shiny!

7 – I played so well yesterday I thought I was wearing someone else’s fingers.

8 – I’m working on a joke that starts “A Gold Top Les Paul and a Sunburst Strat walk into a bar …” but that’s as far as I’ve gotten. I can’t even decide what kind of drinks they would order.

9 – I would have enjoyed “It Might Get Loud” more if the director had found someone other than Jack White to represent the younger generation. No disrespect to Mr. White.

10 – There’s something about the fretboard that bothers me. There are markers on the third, fifth, seventh and ninth frets but the next one is the double-dot marker on the12th. Shouldn’t it have been on the 11th fret? Can anyone tell me why?

11 – If I ever have to tune a guitar by ear, I’m sunk.

12 – I recently put a ding on the front of the Alvarez when I accidentally knocked a stapler off the desk. It’s not especially ugly but I was briefly distraught.

13 – Finger-picking sure sounds prettier than strumming but I’m just not ready for it yet.

14 – I’ll never be able to do a full F chord but I’m OK with that. I’ve got the baby F down.

15 – Regarding No. 12, it already had a couple of other minor dings. That just gives it character, right?

Be sure to click over and read the ORIGINAL 25.  I am still laughing at most of them!

Very well written.  And so true… so very true.

Every year the amount of money spent by consumers on Halloween costumes, decorations and candy rises. Even with the economy the way it is, experts predict spending for this Halloween will leap by double digits. With everything going on in the world right now the fun and youthfulness of Halloween couldn’t have come at a better time. The holiday gives everyone a “pass” for the day to slow down, have fun and be a kid again!

The National Retail Federation projects that this year, $5.77 billion (yes, that’s billion with a “B”) will be spent on the holiday, rising from $5.07 billion in 2007, a 14 percent increase.

This is how it breaks down:

* $2.1 billion on costumes
* $1.77 billion on candy
* $1.58 billion on decorations
* $320 million on cards

The way I look at it, that’s a LOT of money being spent on one evening.

I think I’d rather celebrate Halloween by buying something that will last a lifetime… a New Guitar!

Another publication has joined the ranks of the multimedia age… Guitar Player Magazine, which is known online as GP2.

The September issue features a great review of “10 Budget Solid Body Guitars”. You can read the entire issue by CLICKING HERE.

The August Issue is also online and you can read that one by CLICKING HERE.

While I love the use of technology and the benefits interactive media brings to the guitar reading public, there is something I enjoy about sitting back in my easy chair with my favorite beverage and a guitar magazine.  It’s similar I suppose to our nations love affair with the printed newspaper… even though the days of news print are clearly numbered.  I mean, where do you look for headlines?

So tell me which you prefer… Guitar Magazines or Online Guitar Magazines?