He’s an outstandingly tasteful, understated player. He’s a bit like Eric Clapton - often writes fairly mundane songs, but plays awesome solos. (Although Eric hasn’t done much awesome anything recently, unless I’ve missed it.)
As for having the chops to play the speedier enc of the rock canon - to be honest, I doubt it. It’s a different sort of skill to play that fast, that consistently. More to do with being a technician than a musician, if that’s not being too snobby.
It’s the solo soundtrack work that does it for me, too - Theme from Local Hero being a particularly good example, well-noted, si.
I don’t think you’re going to get much agreement, TMB. I’ve heard more praise for his songwriting ability (both lyrics and melody) than his guitar.
As for “awesome solos”, Knopfler’s are not improvised but written note for note so he’s not in the same category as Clapton. And yes, I have seen both of them play the same songs live on the same tour multiple times and Clapton’s are different one night from the next, Knopfler’s are not.
I hope you know what I mean when I say that to me, Clapton plays solos, and Knopfler plays instrumental passages 
I don’t think you’re going to get much agreement, TMB. I’ve heard more praise for his songwriting ability (both lyrics and melody) than his guitar.
As for “awesome solos”, Knopfler’s are not improvised but written note for note so he’s not in the same category as Clapton. And yes, I have seen both of them play the same songs live on the same tour multiple times and Clapton’s are different one night from the next, Knopfler’s are not.
I hope you know what I mean when I say that to me, Clapton plays solos, and Knopfler plays instrumental passages
The question isn’t about his song writing, I know, but who else could write a great song about the founder of McDonald’s? 
I think he is a great guitar player. Studying his fills and solos has taught me how to play melodically, how to select notes and place them, and how to enhance a piece of music rather than dominate it. My playing doesn’t sound like Knopfler, but just about everything I play has been influenced by listening to him. I would rather listen to Knopfler than any other guitarist. In my opinion, every note he plays belongs where he plays it.
That’s what David Gilmour does, too - but they’re damn good instrumental passages.
Here’s what I wrote last night when I was the first person replying to this thread, only to find that the SDMB went down while I was writing. Grr.
Truly excellent player - his fingerstyle-but-not-fingerpicking approach gives his tone a unique sound. He tends to be a very restrained player - he can play a few flashy figures on leads, but for the most part he is precise (NOTE: I guess this speaks to **Princhester’s **“passages” comment). He doesn’t use feedback - just a bit of gain - and has very little crunch in his tone, but his overall touch is phenomenal.
I find myself tiring when I hear him play a Stratocaster - he tends to go with the 2 & 4 positions - which combines either the neck pickup or the bridge pickup with middle pickup - on a Strat you get that thinner, quacky tone. After basically trademarking that tone on Sultans of Swing, he overplayed it a bit IMHO.
But that riff for Money for Nothing on a Les Paul? Fuggedaboudit - great stuff.
On a geeky note - he has an extensive vintage guitar collection that he uses quite a bit. While he has typically been associated with Strats and Custom-Made Strat replicas, he actually plays a wide variety of guitars. He also favors Komet amps - really high-end, hand made things of beauty. I could geek out in either direction.
Finally - regarding the comments on Eddie Van Halen’s lead style - wow, I would beg to differ. To me, there is a WORLD of difference between EVH and, say, Yngwie Malmsteen - and much MORE in common between Knopfler and EVH. If you think Eddie is worshipped because of the complexity and speed of his leads, you are falling into the exact same traps as the over-the-top shredder types. They pull those aspects of Eddie’s style out and put 'em on steroids - and the world yawns. Eddie focuses on the song first - sharp, catchy pop-rock songs. Let’s remember: writing memorable songs and consistently getting hits is very, very, very hard to do. Eddie does that - 'nuff said.
But there’s more - within that context, he knows how to fit a lead. Not too long, not too short. More often a melodic instrumental passage - think Runnin’ with the Devil and Ain’t Talkin’ Bout Love - or a weird tapping way to produce a short melodic passage, like the chorus and leads parts of Dance the Night Away. But either way, it fits the need of the song and the song’s structure. If you were to ever analyze which leads you remember and why, I suspect you’d realize that the best leads do this - and that most leads don’t.
But there’s more - when he does deliver this efficient lead, he blows doors. Yeah, he incorporate fancy techniques, but does so in a very natural, organic way. It’s just his voice - that’s what’s so amazing. He falls down the stairs and somehow lands on his feet.
Sorry for the hijack - but there are so many misconceptions about Eddie as a guitarist, this seemed as good a time as any to address them…maybe this should be another thread, if there is a discussion to be had?
I think you are on shaky ground here.
Are you saying that Knopfler “writes” his solos, presumably to some musical model, rather than just burning one off and then repeating it, with variants, like everyone including Ecca?
Much as I love Clapton I don’t think he is a great innovator - he recycles the same familiar musical figures over and over, just better than anyone else.
Knopfler at least created a sound that was his own, so extra marks there IMHO.
It’s the solo soundtrack work that does it for me, too - Theme from Local Hero being a particularly good example, well-noted, si.
I don’t have as much experience seeing Knopfler live as Princhester does, but my limited experience does not quite agree with the premise that he writes his solos. When I saw him in concert with Dire Straits many years ago, the solos which I knew how to play note for note were definitely not reproduced in performance. In Sultans of Swing, for example, he quoted some of the lines from the record, and the two solos occupied the same number of bars as on the recorded versions, but the solos overall differed quite a bit in content from the record. The signature banjo-style roll at the end was the only part Sultans which was exactly like the record.
When I saw him again a couple of years ago, the experience was similar. There was nothing jarringly different about any of the solos in terms of style, but the lines were quite different from the recorded versions I have spent so much time learning note for note.
Damn, you beat me to it. Of course, it helps that you’re on the other side of the world 
Communique is my favorite Dire Straits album – even though I’ve had it since 1984 or so, I still listen to it occasionally.
Rolling Stone lists him at #27, but their top 100 list omits Steve Vai, which makes me question it’s authority.
Although he has a limited range, I also like Knopfler’s vocal stylings. His cover of ‘The Lily of the West’ with The Chieftains, on their album ‘The Long Black Veil’, is simply amazing.
I’m not a musician of any sort, so I can’t speak to Mr. Knopler’s technical ability. But, I bought the first Dire Straits album a few weeks ago on CD. I had not listened to it in years because I had it on LP.
After all this time, it still blows me away. Just the right note at just the right time.
That pretty much sums him up, and it’s why he’s my favorite guitar player.
Ditto Alex Lifeson.
Yeah, and even worse are those guys like Itzhak Perlman and Yo Yo Ma who not only play stuff note for note, but don’t even write the notes. What a bunch of losers.
At 15, I was hooked on Sultans of Swing when it came out. At 44, I am still hooked, not just with that song, but with most of his music.
Listening to “Where Do You Think You’re Going?” still gives me goosebumps.
Knopfler is one of my very favorites. He is woefully underappreciated. With Mark, it’s not a matter of how tricky a passage is, and it’s not a matter of being blasted back into your chair. It’s the way he makes you feel. He can play a phrase with an uncommon amount of feeling and beauty. The way he can paint an atmosphere in a song such as Telegraph Road or Private Investigation is unsurpassed.
I’ve seen him in concert once. It was not simply a recital of songs from his recordings. That would have been impressive enough. Onstage, he had room and time to cut loose with brilliant extended solos, and cut loose he did.
I don’t think we are much in disagreement. I shouldn’t have said that Knopfler writes his solos note for note because I don’t really know what the precise process he follows might be. All I know from personal experience is that when I’ve heard them, night on night on the same tour, they are the same. If there are variants, they are minor. Neither myself nor my fellow Knopfler fanatic friends who used to follow DS (including a couple of very serious guitarists and musicians) could hear any significant variation. Whether they are written note for note or he improvises one early in a tour, refines it and plays it I don’t know. I do know from having read interviews with those who work with him that he is a control freak when it comes to his music (and that isn’t said as a criticism) and insists on everyone playing exactly things just as he wants them. Against that, it is not hard to imagine that he applies the same to himself.
As for EC, I agree. Although he’s variable. On an ordinary night he does more recycling of stock figures, but if he’s really firing he plays things that are less recognisable (and usually better).
I think you and some others have taken my post the wrong way. EC and Knopfler are in different categories. I didn’t say and didn’t mean that EC was “better” whatever that means. If I had to choose between them I… Umm. Do I have to?
Howcum nobody “criticizes” a concert violinist for playing the same thing, as written, night after night?
I hope it is apparent from my last post that I am not criticizing MK for that. He writes great stuff, then he plays it. Nothing wrong with that.