Wow–unexpected and quite a shock to this casual fan. One of the greatest guitarists of his generation. No details about cause of death yet. 
Truly one of the great ones. One of the most distinctive voices on the guitar I know. I never really loved his music, but I’ve always been totally in awe by his mastery of scales and harmony, and the sheer complexity of his soloing style.
I can’t find it right now but earlier today I came across a quote from John Mclaughlin to the effect of: “I’d steal everything from Allan Holdsworth if I could just figure out what he was doing”.
A master. I saw him in Santa Barbara around '84. Thanks Mr. H.
Very jealous. I sadly never got to see him. Here’s the video I posted to FB to honor him, from the same year.
R.I.P.
Was always intrigued by this guitar.
Not a guitar, per se. A guitar-shaped triggering device from back in the day.
I’d heard the years had taken a heavy toll on him, and the most recent endorsement video showed him not looking terribly well.
Saw him back in the day, at the old 9:30 Club of all small places. Probably everybody in attendance was a musician, I’d bet - he never played or composed for the masses. But what a talent. When the editors of Guitar Techniques magazine - all monster players themselves - call you the Best Guitarist Alive, you haven’t wasted your ability.
I got into Holdsworth in a period that was kinda of my great awakening. I was a metal guy growing up and when I was 17 I heard this guy just wailing and killing it at the New Mexico state fair. I ran up and it was Roy Clark. The Hee Haw guy, which blew my mind. Who knew the Hee Haw guy was freaking amazing…
That woke me up and I started looking for other players outside of metal and somehow or another got Metal Fatigue. It freaked me out in a good, ‘what the hell is that?’ kind of way.
I saw him live a year or so after that, iirc. The man was a badass.
Slee
Felix and Oscar would concur
One of my personal favorite guitar players. RIP Mr. Holdsworth; you done good.
One of the greatest unsung guitar heroes of all time.
He influenced so many other heroes Eddie Van Halen, Vernon Reid, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, Yngwie Malmsteen, Tom Morello, the list goes on and on and on.
here is another nice obituary.
Another remembrance:
- “For several years in the 1970s, through my own band and ‘UK’, I listened to him nightly, launching sheets of sound on an unsuspecting audience, changing perceptions about what guitars and guitarists should or could be doing, thrilling me half to death.I would have paid to be at my own gig.” *–Bill Bruford
Now THAT is an obituary.
Okay, so here’s my story: In 1983 I was 16 years old and walking to my job stocking shelves at the Oak Tree at the Broward Mall. I’m walking thru the mall parking lot when I see a cassette tape just lying on the pavement. I picked it up because it didn’t look broken, saw that it was an album called Road Games by some guy named Allan Holdsworth. I had never heard of him, but I figured when I got to work I’d throw it in the boombox in the stockroom to see what it sounded like.
At the time I was already a fan of Frank Zappa, Pat Metheny, Jeff Beck, Jaco Pastorius, Randy Bernsen, etc. And I was blown away by what I heard. Clearly in the same league as these other guys (a master of his instrument), he was also clearly not like them at all. I must have listened to that cassette about 12,000 times. Eventually it broke and I was without any Holdsworth for a few years, until I finally found Metal Fatigue on CD. I made the fantastic decision a few years back to acquire the box collection of his studio output, The Man Who Changed Guitar Forever. He was the guy who I first saw with a Steinberger, and now I own both a Steinberger guitar and a bass.
A lot of my life came about because I picked up a discarded cassette tape in the Broward Mall parking lot when I was 16, is what I’m saying. Allan Holdsworth and his music added much to my life, in way that I never could have envisioned or imagined. THAT, to me, is the very definition of an impactful artist. I am forever grateful that I found that tape, that I picked it up and that it didn’t turn out to be something ordinary but was instead something truly extraordinary.
So again I say: RIP Mr. Holdsworth; you done good.
Yeah. Really sad. A truly lovely guy. I saw him play once, probably over 25 years ago. Quite amazing. I first heard him in ‘UK’, and the guitar on that still astounds.
Friend of mine has a Holdsworth guitar, it is a really nice instrument. (His is the two pickup model, so not quite as pure as the original.) Alan’s stuff with the SynthAxe was interesting, but I always preferred him with the real thing.
I have a copy of his “Searching for the uncommon chord” somewhere. Daunting stuff to say the least, but his “quaffer’s commentary” in the back - an essay of the pleasures of the pursuit of real ale in British pubs is a wonderful read.
That is a great story Bo. Thanks for sharing.
Mine is so mundane: EVH and others began dropping Holdsworth’s name as The Guy n guitar mags in the late 70’s. I listened to his stuff and though it was very Coltrane like, which for me meant “harmonically outside what I could understand musically” ;). I knew it was good, I knew he was brilliant, and I knew I wasn’t ready for it.
I just kept checking back in, listening to Holdsworth just like I listened to Giant Steps and Eric Dolphy’s work. I got there but there was never a big a-HA!, just a deepening awareness of how damn good he was and how I would need really understand how a musical mind at his level works. Seeing him live helped with that.
You have to see it happen to understand.
Here is a great video of a concert with Bill Burford and Jeff Berlin from 1979.
This Allan Holdsworth video keeps appearing at the top of my YouTube lists. It certainly is a fantastic video, and I highly recommend it
Allan Holdsworth & Alan Pasqua: Live at Yoshi’s
