BEN HARPER What Music Means To Me

What the guitar means to me is infinite mystery. I can expound if you need, but that’s it right there! It’s a permanent mystery to me. Everything in the world that we’ll ever know is based in and around a frequency, and the physicality of a frequency that brought it to life. And there are certain frequencies that are constantly resonating and that we don’t hear and that we can’t hear, and who knows how they’re resonating? But the guitar is as a powerful a transmitter for those resonant frequencies as anything you can think of.

Eric Johnson is a great example of a player like that, who can use their playing to trigger all sorts of overtones that really hit you in the soul. The only other player I can think of that can come close to Eric in that regard is – sorry, was, and it’s so tragic still – Michael Hedges. What an amazing player.

Charlie Musselwhite is that very rare and hallowed place where blues past, present and future collide. He transforms notes into emotions that feel both hauntingly familiar and brand new, as if you’re hearing them for the first time every time. He is a living legend – his harmonica playing should be beamed into outer space to search for other life forms.