Joe Satriani admits to being "shamed back into my woodshed by so many young players" during lockdown

(Image credit: Joseph Cultice)

Joe Satriani really has nothing to prove now, but even as the trailblazing electric guitar player readies new album Shapeshifting for release on 10 April (we'll have a full interview on it with him soon), he's keen to shine a light on what he's discovered from new guitar talent during the Coronavirus lockdown. 

In a recent Facebook Live chat with fans he had this to say about a recent revelation:

"One of the things, when you're sitting at home, is that you wind up looking at your phone a little bit more than you should because social media starts to bring your attention to a lot of really great players," Satch explained.

"I find it so inspiring"

"So I had been shamed back into my woodshed by so many young players that can play a million more notes than I could squeeze in it at any given second, and they make it sound really great, and they've got great timing, great musical taste, but I find it so inspiring.

"It reminds me - when I was a lot younger, going back three-decades-plus, I'd be sitting in a teaching room, looking at young players, and just being amazed at how much talent always just comes through the door. You never know...

"I'll probably get back to that later today after this, I'll be practicing. It's kind of more important to put your heart and soul into the music you want to play. That's really what people love.

"They just want to hear personal expression to help them make sense of this absolutely insane world we live in. If you're a musician out there, get to work, make some music for everybody."

Good advice indeed, and you can check out both parts of the full live stream below.

Part 2

Joe Satriani's new album Shapeshifting is released 10 April 

Rob Laing
Guitars Editor, MusicRadar

I'm the Guitars Editor for MusicRadar, handling news, reviews, features, tuition, advice for the strings side of the site and everything in between. Before MusicRadar I worked on guitar magazines for 15 years, including Editor of Total Guitar in the UK. When I'm not rejigging pedalboards I'm usually thinking about rejigging pedalboards.