Who invented what tapping technique?

^Absolutely true! Crazy s%$# was going on!

^Did I forget to mention that EVH was awesome in concert. A true rock legend.

^Both answers work for me.

^ Then it was Ed.   Eventually everyone wanted to sound like Yngwie but even then Eddie was the undisputed king, by far the biggest rock guitar influence between 1979 and 1985.   And he deserved it.   It wasn't just the tapping either-- his use of pinched harmonics, volume swells, percussive slapping (as on 'Mean Street'), echo/volume arpeggios (as in 'Cathedral'), and a ton of other "neat noises" as he called them.

Atavachron wrote: ^ Because Eddie understood the importance of the tone and power of amplification in rock guitar which gave the hammer/pull effect much more immediacy and gain, as compared with Steve's restrained approach.

Dean wrote: The phrase used with EVH was "popularised tapping" and I think that is fair.

I agree, but EVH made tapping more obvious - I remember when a mate and I first heard "Eruption" we thought it was a keyboard, whereas I didn't know Hackett had used tapping until a few years ago.

All I can say is I have seen footage of Django tapping as well as anyone. He is the earliest I have seen recorded. They have footage of him at the liberty science guitar exhibit doing just that.

Edited by wmanser - October 12 2014 at 20:06

Smurph wrote: Didnt Don Cab invent tapping? :-D

himtroy wrote: There's classical pieces that utilize tapping...so it was certainly well before the 1900s.

I don't know what everyone's talking about. Tapping is done with the fret hand absent the use of the picking hand. That's been around...well..a long time. Steve Hackett has never been credited with inventing tapping, unless someone some where made a typo or misspoke. Steve Hackett has been credited with, and has only claimed credit for, inventing two-handed tapping, which uses both the fret hand and the picking hand to hammer and pull against the fret board. Had anyone else done this before him. I'd like to know. I know of no one.

I recall there being a Frank Zappa interview in which he says explicitly that he was unaware of anyone using the technique before Eddie Van Halen, clearly unaware of Steve Hackett using the technique well before (was Zappa even aware of Steve Hackett period?). In Steve Hackett's case, there are specific places on recordings where it can be identified as early as 1971. There is also film evidence from Six Hours Live, which shows him doing it as early as 1972, which is clearly before it was popularized.

It is important to know who came up with it and when or at least how fresh it is at a particular time. My first introduction to Shadow of the Hierophant was after the technique was popularized. I was disappointed and thought it sounded unimaginative. Later, when I became more aware of the chronology, I understood that it was very imaginative at it's own time in history, and learned to appreciate it differently.

As far as using the pick to hammer against the fret board, all I know is Adrian Belew credits Frank Zappa with showing him that technique.

Steve Rothery from Marillion had a twist on things. He used a technique in which he bent a string, and while it was bent, he hammered one time on a note ahead on the fretboard with his picking hand, held the note down, and then unbent the string (with his right hand). I know of no one else who has combined two-handed tapping with string bending. If anyone knows someone, I'd like to know. Note, the lack of innovativeness on the part of Marillion has been an issue for many people.

Dean wrote: Slartibartfast wrote: Find the guy who invented the guitar. Pretty much. Tapping strings rather than struming or picking is probably as old as the guitar itself, along will left-hand hammer-on and pull-off techniques (which is really just left-hand tapping rather than right-hand or free-hands which uses both), just as tapping and plucking violin strings (with either hand) as been around as long bowing. Hacket is credited as being the first Rock guitarist to use the technique on record, but I think that is more re-discovery than invention. The Chapman stick was invented in 1969 - it is a fair assumption that the technique was around long before the instrument.

I will go with this.