Danny Gatton Guitar Tab Books, Instruction DVDs, Solos, Licks, Transcriptions, Video Lessons

 Danny Gatton Plays "Elmira St. Boogie"

Guitarists who like Danny Gatton also like:
The Chet Atkins Solo Guitar Collection

Danny Gatton - Telecaster Guitar Wizard!
Compiled & Edited By Steven Herron

    Danny Gatton was born in Washington, D.C. in September 1945. A virtuoso guitar player who could easily play nearly any type of music, Danny was focusing more on jazz throughout the last few years of his life prior to his sudden death. Gatton, whose dad had been a professional rhythm guitarist, started playing guitar when he was 9 years old.

    The legendary guitar players Les Paul and Charlie Christian were his early jazz guitar idols and he figured out a lot of guitar solos from their recordings. Danny Gatton was in his very first band, The Lancers, by the time he was just 12 years of age. He played jazz guitar with The Offbeats throughout 1960 - 1964 and hung around in Nashville where he worked for a little while as a studio session guitarist.

    After a period of time of working day jobs and performing at bars at night throughout the 1970s, Danny gained some attention for his performances with Liz Meyer & Freinds and with other groups in the Washington, DC location. Gatton recorded "American Music" in 1975 and the exciting "Redneck Jazz" in 1978, performing jazz on the latter with a band that included pedal steel guitarist Buddy Emmons. He later on led a group called The Redneck Jazz Explosion.

    Danny Gatton's fame was initially made in country music (while he was touring with Roger Miller) and rockabilly where he was thought to be one of the leading guitarists. He was nicknamed "The Telemaster" and was in some cases dubbed "The world's best unknown guitarist". His recordings varied from rockabilly to rock and bluegrass to blues and he always appeared on the brink of making it big - although that never ever happened.

    Danny usually played a 1953 Fender Telecaster with Joe Barden pickups and Fender strings. For a slide, Gatton in some cases made use of a beer bottle or mug. He chose to utilize an Alka-Seltzer bottle or a long 6L6 vacuum tube as a slide, but his audiences liked the beer bottle! He always played slide overhand, citing his earlier training in steel guitar. Among the amplifiers Gatton is said to have actually made use of are a 1959 Fender Bassman and a greatly modified Fender Vibrolux Reverb.

    After using standard Fender guitar picks, Danny switched to a jazz design teardrop pick after Roy Buchanan suggested them to him. He was capable of complex passages combining garage, bluegrass, and bebop sounds - all executed with incredible clearness and at blistering speeds! His playing technique was a hybrid mix of pick and fingers, mostly his middle and ring fingers on his right hand.

    The basis of Danny Gatton's picking methodology was utilizing banjo rolls. He was an accomplished banjo player and from that he utilized the traditional Earl Scruggs right hand approach. His forward roll included a plectrum downstroke, then middle finger, then ring finger. His backward roll included middle finger, then a pick upstroke, then a pick downstroke. He had a classical guitar left hand approach - thumb behind the neck, fretting with arched fingers.

    In 1992 Gatton changed gears by recording a straight-ahead album set called "New York Stories" for Blue Note Records. Some setbacks led to him returning briefly to session work however in 1994, he worked with organist Joey DeFrancesco on "Relentless". Due to primarily unknown personal problems, on October 4, 1994 Danny Gatton committed suicide leaving behind no explanation. He was only 49 years old.

Jazz Guitar Chords & Arpeggio Patterns - Stacy McKee - This unique book includes 300 jazz guitar chord formations and matching single note arpeggio patterns in a quick reference format that no one has ever done before! Cross indexing makes this manual extremely easy to use and regardless of what style of music you play, we know you will find this to be a valuable, "must have" addition to your library.  Stacy McKee was the featured guitarist with "Les Brown and The Band Of Renown" and for a limited time only, we will include an exclusive copy of his book FREE with your first order!
==> Click here to see the Stacy McKee Chord Melody Solo Collection <==