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Allan Holdsworth

Allan Holdsworth · Spotify · Courtesy of Spotify

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Allan Holdsworth

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British musician (1946–2017)

Person · Open Library

Works
3

Top works

  • Allan Holdsworth - Reaching for the Uncommon Chord*
  • Just for the Curious (with CD) (Cpp Media Video Transcription Series)
  • Melody Chords for Guitar by Allan Holdsworth

via Open Library + Wikidata

Music · MusicBrainz

Type
Person
Gender
Male
Origin
United Kingdom
Active from
1946-08-06
Active to
2017-04-15
1980savant-garde jazzexperimentalfusionguitarinstrumental rock

via MusicBrainz · CC0

Listeners · Last.fm

Listeners
146,742
Total plays
2,582,899

Tags

Fusionjazzjazz fusionguitarProgressive rock

Allan Holdsworth (6 August 1946 – 16 April 2017) was a British guitarist and composer. He released twelve studio albums as a solo artist and played a variety of musical styles spanning a period of more than four decades, but is best known for his work in jazz fusion. Holdsworth is noted for his advanced knowledge of music, through which he incorporated a vast array of complex chord progressions and intricate solos; the latter comprising myriad scale forms often derived from those such as the di

via Last.fm · Allan Holdsworth

Recent publications · Crossref

5 total works indexed

  1. Gene Ontology: tool for the unification of biology

    · 2000 · cited 36,889x

  2. Array programming with NumPy

    · 2020 · cited 23,431x

  3. New Guidelines to Evaluate the Response to Treatment in Solid Tumors

    · 2000 · cited 13,419x

  4. DETERMINATION OF SERUM PROTEINS BY MEANS OF THE BIURET REACTION

    · 1949 · cited 12,994x

  5. A human gut microbial gene catalogue established by metagenomic sequencing

    · 2010 · cited 9,934x

via Crossref · CC0

Key facts

Born
( 1946-08-06 ) 6 August 1946, Bradford , West Riding of Yorkshire , England
Died
15 April 2017 (2017-04-15) (aged 70), Vista, California , US
Genres
Jazz fusion instrumental rock progressive rock
Occupations
Musician composer producer
Instruments
Guitar SynthAxe violin
Years active
1969–2017
Labels
CTI JMS–Cream Warner Bros. Enigma Relativity Intima Restless Polydor Gnarly Geezer Megazoidal Sony Universal Eidolon Efformation
Formerly of
'Igginbottom Nucleus Tempest Soft Machine The New Tony Williams Lifetime Pierre Moerlen's Gong John Stevens Jean-Luc Ponty Bill Bruford U.K. , Gordon Beck Gary Husband Jack Bruce Chad Wackerman HoBoLeMa Level 42 Planet X Anthony Crawford

via Wikipedia infobox

~30 min read

Encyclopedic overview

Allan Holdsworth (6 August 1946 – 15 April 2017) was a British jazz and rock guitarist, violinist and composer. He contributed to numerous bands, including Soft Machine, U.K., The Tony Williams Lifetime, Pierre Moerlen's Gong, Bruford, Level 42, and Planet X, in addition to solo work in multiple genres.

Holdsworth was known for his esoteric and idiosyncratic usage of advanced music theory concepts, especially with respect to melody and harmony. His music incorporates a vast array of complex chord progressions, often using unusual chord shapes in an abstract way based on his understanding of "chord scales", and intricate improvised solos, frequently across shifting tonal centres. He used myriad scale forms often derived from those such as the Lydian, diminished, harmonic major, augmented, whole tone, chromatic and altered scales, among others, often resulting in an unpredictable and dissonant "outside" sound. His unique legato soloing technique stemmed from his original desire to play the saxophone. Unable to afford one, he strove to use the guitar to create similarly smooth lines of notes. He also became associated with playing an early form of guitar synthesizer called the SynthAxe, made by a company he endorsed in the 1980s.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Allan Holdsworth” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.