Lonnie Johnson – inventor of the modern guitar solo
A hundred years ago (before World War I), the guitar was a general-purpose instrument used primarily for rhythmic support, its unamplified steel strings strummed accordingly rather than individually plucked or plucked. Light and portable, neither too expensive nor too loud (softer than the banjo), it was the ideal “parlor” instrument, useful for parties and sing-a-longs (especially in the absence of a house piano), and as an accompaniment. harmonic for more expressive solo instruments such as violin or clarinet.
In the dance bands and orchestras of the 1920s (the rock groups of their day), the guitar was typically played seated and behind with the rhythm section (bass and drums), not up front in the solo section with the instruments. glamorous (trumpet, clarinet, saxophone and trombone). But today, and indeed for many decades, the electric guitar has come to occupy a deafening foreground.
How did the simple “flat box” rise from auditory obscurity to global hegemony? Who was the first musician to step up and perform a single-note guitar solo in the manner of a violinist or trumpeter? The evidence strongly suggests that he was the New Orleans-born blues musician Alonzo “Lonnie” Johnson (1899-1970).
Born into a family of musicians, young Lonnie studied violin, piano, and guitar. As a teenager, he played guitar in his father’s New Orleans dance band. A highly skilled instrumentalist, he was also a talented singer, and in 1925 he won a contract with Okeh Records (for whom he eventually recorded around 130 sides).
In 1927, he undertook to record instrumentally in Chicago with the hugely famous Louis Armstrong and his Hot Five. An invitation to play with the most successful jazz band in the business was a rare honor, bestowed only on elite, cutting-edge musicians. Why did Armstrong ask Lonnie Johnson to sit down? It couldn’t have been because of his vocal abilities: Satchmo himself saw to that. Maybe he had something to do with his peculiar (ie, never before seen) single-note-and-pick-picking style.
The earliest known recorded performance of the single-note plectrum technique (the prototype of what we call “lead” guitar playing today) was by Lonnie Johnson on the 1927 Hot Five release “6/88 Glide” ( perhaps using an acoustic Martin round hole like the one shown above). Thus, blues historian Gerard Herzhaft’s Encyclopedia of the Blues (1997) cites Johnson as “unquestionably the originator of the guitar solo played note for note with a plectrum, which has become the standard in jazz. , blues, country and rock”.
How influential were Johnson’s Hot Five sessions in 1927? Many people like to credit 1930s guitar icons such as Charlie Christian, Django Reinhardt, and Robert Johnson with first introducing the single-note plucking technique. However, the simple chronology indicates otherwise. Fifteen years younger than Johnson, Charlie Christian (b. 1916) remembers listening to Lonnie’s records on the radio growing up in Oklahoma during the Depression. Gypsy jazzman Django Reinhardt (b. 1910), a great admirer of Louis Armstrong, no doubt first heard Johnson’s distinctive technique on the Hot Five’s seminal 1927 record. In fact, Django and violinist Stephane Grapelli didn’t form their famous Quintette du Hot Club de France until a few years later, in 1935. And Delta bluesman Robert Johnson (no relation) didn’t record a lick until 1936-37 ( the legendary Dallas/San Antonio sessions).
Yes, the world’s first lead guitarist was Alonzo “Lonnie” Johnson.