Headline Feature by Brett Ratner

Wolf Marshall is a unique individual among guitar players.

Ironically, what makes Marshall unique is his ability to copy the playing style of guitarists ranging from Randy Rhoads to B.B. King. And when Marshall "copies" something, he doesn't merely learn the licks. He zones in on the most minute details, whether it be the gauge of the strings to the thickness of the picks to the settings and mic placement on his collection of amps.

The fruit of his labor is Wolf's extensive collection of highly effective educational materials, including his contributions to the popular Star Licks series. You can check out Wolf's books, videos and audio recordings by visiting Wolf Marshall's "Guitarland" at www.wolfmarshall.com, but to learn more about the man himself, read on.

Via the phone and email, The Amplifier tapped into Wolf's philosophies on playing, education and why the Gibson sound is crucial to the history of popular music as we know it today.

Amp: In regard to the nickname "Rich Little of the Guitar," one can compare what you do to the job of a session player in that you can emulate a variety of styles (especially in a studio environment). What are the similarities and differences about what you do in comparison to a session player?

Wolf: My role in the studio goes beyond emulation. For projects like Hal Leonard Signature Licks, the goal is to get as close as is humanly possible to the original piece of music. This gets into specifics like reading and playing licks note-for-note, in exact positions on the same strings, and with the original phrasing -- i.e., use of legato versus staccato, bending, and vibrato. It all also involves refining the equipment angle -- I always strive to recreate the authentic sound in terms of guitars and amps. This may seem like minutiae but the elements add up to the totality of the performance, which I take very seriously. A conventional session player rarely reads a note-for-note part on a rock date. Usually it's chord charts, a head arrangement, or just an arranger's direction like "solo a la B.B. King" or even something as open-ended as "Burn!!" On the other hand, a classical or "legit" studio musician always reads. What I do often lands squarely in the middle -- reading rock licks which were originally improvised and recreating them with a bit of my own interpretation.

Amp: You are obviously as fascinated with education as you are with playing. What do you enjoy about teaching others? When and how did you discover your knack for teaching?

Wolf: I get a real joy from helping other players grow and improve their art. I believe every musician is constantly developing and progressing, and we all share knowledge and licks with each other -- it's the tradition, the way guitar is learned. And it never ends. In the last ten years, I've had the enviable opportunity to swap licks with Stevie Ray Vaughan, Larry Carlton, Slash, Brian Setzer, Andy Summers and many others. Every time, it was an exciting and enlightening experience. It began in my earliest junior high school bands when I had to teach other guitarists and bassists the exact parts for Hendrix, Cream and Zeppelin songs so we could play together. In one way or another, I've done it ever since -- as a leader in sessions, arranger, producer, member of a band and ultimately an educator. I found a particular niche in the early '80s when the guitar education industry exploded with transcription songbooks, tab magazines, instructional audios and videos. I was heavily involved with all those media from their inception. That's why the internet possibilities are so compelling -- this is where all the information media and the interactivity will meet. In the near future my web site, Guitarland, will offer it all -- from special tab lessons to the most detailed information about how to obtain sounds.

Amp: Many instructors teach scales, chord inversions and theory. Your methods of instruction vary from this. Could you list off some advantages of your methods?

Wolf: I teach conventional theory -- scales, triads, inversions and the like. However in my approach I am concerned with putting the information and techniques into practice, particularly in the setting of rock and blues music. The advantage is that the elements are presented in a true musical context. The Wolf Marshall methodology proceeds to show how traditional theory works within those styles -- which are often perceived as having no theory or, at best, obscure and arcane forms of it. This perception places a tremendous barrier between the evolving student and the music. I strive to break down those barriers and make the music understandable and ultimately digestible to the growing player. For example, what scale is favored by B.B. King to obtain a certain sound and how does Eddie Van Halen use triads and inversions to create an interesting chord riff. The Personal Trainer in Guitarland breaks all these sometimes confusing components of theory, exercises and technique points down into fun-filled bites for easy consumption.

Amp: Learning to cop Clapton licks note for note is great and all, but what can a student hope to gain from your instruction in terms of developing a unique style and sound?

Wolf: Rock music is comparable to the "oral tradition" of learning where ideas and concepts are passed along without any written form of documentation. Thus, rock and blues guitar styles are learned and finally mastered by watching and absorbing and finally re-interpreting the work of the masters who preceded you. Eric Clapton put his style together from pieces of Robert Johnson, the Kings: Albert, Freddy and B.B., Chuck Berry, Muddy Waters and Buddy Guy to name a handful. And these influences can be detected as living inside certain classic Clapton licks. For example, the guitarwork in "Strange Brew" (Disraeli Gears) is a clear reference to Albert King, and the comping on "Walking Blues" (Unplugged) is directly from Muddy Waters' "Feel Like Going Home." Similarly, a blues or rock guitarist grows by absorbing many players' licks note for note. You become a master and hopefully an artist by presenting your own mosaic of influences reassembled in a unique and personal form. Brian May put it succinctly when he said, "No one creates in a vacuum." The operative word is many. Play a wide variety of note-for-note licks and you can't help but reorganize them in a unique manner. Hemingway said it best with this philosophy: "Steal from one, it's plagiarism. Steal from many, it's research!" In my Power Studies series, the focus is on a varied repertoire. The student is given the opportunity to play along with full tracks of must-know tunes by Hendrix, the Beatles, Clapton, Van Halen, Kiss, Aerosmith, and many others. In this environment, they can recreate for themselves the same musical setting as the masters and test their own mettle. Again the possibilities will be amplified to the maximum in my web site.

Amp: When you aren't emulating the styles of others, what do you like to play? What is the Wolf Marshall sound? Where can people go to hear your compositions?

Wolf: I enjoy playing many musics. It depends on the mood and the surroundings. At home, I love to play bebop jazz and chord-melody solos on my old ES-175 with flatwound strings. In fact, I play with a local jazz organ trio whenever possible to keep those chops up and for sheer satisfaction. But I also love to fire up the Marshalls, and crank out hard rock and electric blues whenever the occasion arises. Other times, it's acoustic slide guitar licks on a Dobro. And I am completely fascinated with classical guitar. Sometimes only Villa Lobos' Prelude No.1 on nylon string will do.

The Wolf Marshall sound is a composite of my influences, and there are way too many to list exhaustively. One example can be found on my instrumental track, "Rainbow Roll" on Guitar's Practicing Musicians, Volume 3. The title is an offhand reference to a variety of styles. Compositionally, it was my attempt to mix a minor blues with hard rock, and add a power pop bridge a la Queen. In the soloing, I was thinking a blend of traditional electric blues with 80s metal and Jeff Beck weirdness.

Amp: Having seen your web site, you are obviously savvy to the internet. How do you see the web fitting in the grand scheme of music and/or music business?

Wolf: The internet is the future, period. The potential for disseminating information is awesome, and we've only seen the beginning, the tip of the iceberg. I believe the next couple of years will produce huge breakthroughs, comparable to the tab books, mags, and videos of the '80s, but more groundbreaking and exciting. With the advent of web-TV, or a variant of it, the internet will be readily available and not as intimidating for the average consumer. As a result, the whole area of interactivity will become refined and manageable. Then we will see great advances in content development and content application. Even with the technology of today, it is possible to communicate on a mass scale information which would be impractical in any other format. For example, check out my web site, Wolf Marshall's Guitarland: http://www.wolfmarshall.com. It goes way beyond what can be done in the print world. In cyberspace, it is practical for me to share details about amp and guitar settings to produce certain sought-after sounds. It's a great frontier for the new media and info pioneers. We're gearing up for it all right now in Guitarland.

Amp: Last but not least, tell me about some of your Gibsons? Being a connoisseur of tone, talk briefly about what type of sounds you can get from your various Gibsons.

Wolf: Currently, I have a Les Paul Standard, ES-335, ES-175, Flying V, and L-5 acoustic, as well as a Dobro. They all have their remarkable sonic assets.

The Paul is a sunburst 1988 reissue which has incredible sustain and very thick, warm tone. I use it for the singing lead guitar voice which is early Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page, Santana, Aerosmith, Mike Bloomfield, Gary Moore, Randy Rhoads and Slash. You can hear it through different amps in my Power Studies series. It was re-wired for the out-of-phase effect on "Money For Nothing" on my Dire Strats signature licks CD. That was a very unusual sound which is another side of the classic Les Paul tone. I also used it to fatten the main riff on "Rainbow Roll."

The 335 is the consummate blues axe and perhaps the most versatile; I use it for blues, jazz, rock, pop and more. Mine is a new dot-neck reissue model in cherry with a gorgeous, very striking flamey wood grain. You can hear the 335 throughout my Classic Blues signature licks CD. It was used to cop the tones of John Lee Hooker, B.B.King, Freddy King, Otis Rush, and Fenton Robinson on that record. It sounds amazing plugged right into an old 4x10 Bassman. It will also figure prominently in my upcoming Cream CD for later Clapton tracks.

The Flying V is a 1981 reissue in Korina which is now considered to be a modern classic. I used it for the Albert King tracks on my Classic Blues CD as well as for the Metallica track on Power Studies One.

The ES-175 is pure nostalgia -- the classic jazz axe and a personal all-time favorite guitar. It's a sunburst 1958 model with two P-90 pickups, set up with heavy gauge flatwound strings. I used it to emulate the sound of T-Bone Walker ("T-Bone Shuffle" on Blues Classics CD). This is currently available as a soundclip on my web site in the Lick of the Week. I am looking forward to adding a reissue ES-175 with humbuckers at some time in the near future. They are great guitars, suitable for jazz a la Joe Pass, Wes Montgomery and Jim Hall as well as funk rhythm, rockabilly, early electric blues and progressive rock (just ask Steve Howe).

The L5 acoustic is a vintage 1940 model. Recently, I used it to play some of the accompaniment rhythm parts on my Clapton Unplugged CD. This was to duplicate the original parts played by Andy Fairweather Low on a Gibson Super 400.

I also used a new Dobro resonator acoustic for all the slide parts on that CD. This was excellent right out of the box and is now a prized guitar voice in my stable. It has a unique tone, especially when played with a bottleneck in open tuning, which is indescribable and haunting -- definitely one of the loneliest and evocative guitar sounds in history. One note on that baby and you're transported back to the Mississippi Delta in the pre-war era.