Artist: Chet Atkins
Year: 1957
Genre: Country
Grade: A-
Circa 1957, inventor and innovator of the electric guitar Les Paul was forty-something-years-old and showing his age. His career was winding down. Who could take the mantle of greatest guitarist in the world?
For a brief moment, before Chuck Berry made it big, Chet Atkins might’ve held the crown. Though not as stylish as Les Paul, Atkins’ strict sense of formalism is, at times, equally mesmerizing. Country in name only, Atkins tackles everything from jazz (“Sophisticated Lady”) to samba (“Jungle Drums”) to Revolutionary Era Americana (“Yankee Doodle Dixie”).
Chet Atkins at Home
