Chuck Berry

Though not technically accomplished, his guitar style is distinctive — he incorporated electronic effects to mimic the sound of bottleneck blues guitarists, and drew on the influence of guitar players such as Charlie Christian and T-Bone Walker to produce a clear and exciting sound that many later guitar musicians would acknowledge as a major influence in their own style. In the film Hail! Hail! Rock 'n' Roll Eric Clapton states 'If you wanna play rock and roll — or any upbeat number — and you wanted to take a guitar ride you would end up playing like Chuck because there is very little other choice. There's not a lot of other ways to play rock and roll other than the way Chuck plays it; he's really laid the law down " In 1992 Keith Richards told Best of Guitar Player "Chuck was my man. He was the one who made me say 'I want to play guitar, Jesus Christ!' Suddenly I knew what I wanted to do." Berry's showmanship has been influential on other rock guitar players, particularly his one-legged hop routine, and the "duck walk", which he first used as a child when he walked "stooping with full-bended knees, but with my back and head vertical" under a table to retrieve a ball and his family found it entertaining; he used it when "performing in New York for the first time and some journalist branded it the duck walk."

The rock critic Robert Christgau considers him "the greatest of the rock and rollers," while John Lennon said that "if you tried to give rock and roll another name, you might call it 'Chuck Berry'." Ted Nugent said "If you don't know every Chuck Berry lick, you can't play rock guitar." Read Less