The unknown guitarist Steve Howe calls his favourite: “Who is this guy?”
Yes guitarist Steve Howe has always been one of the more individualistic figures in rock. A widely influential musician famed for his profoundly technical style and penchant for using an array of guitar models, he is also lauded because he has continued to follow his own path, despite the constant shifting of the zeitgeist and conventions.
That has been the crux of his career up until this point. Unwilling to follow the mainstream, Howe has continuously put his best foot forward into the kind of music that he truly wants to make. It has, in turn, made him a bit of an icon.
Displaying this unwavering sense of character, Howe insists on producing all his solo work, saying: “I know what I like and what I don’t like. My ears can’t be deceived”. This is the kind of devotion to creating his own unique sound, which not only endears him to fans but makes him a muso worth listening to.
A unique guitarist, it’s no surprise that Howe has namechecked many familiar faces when discussing the formative influences on his playing. “Well, if I’m to give you three, I’ll go with Les Paul, Chet Atkins and Wes Montgomery,” Howe revealed to Far Out in 2022. “Chet Atkins was a great country player and came up with a great country picking style; he played on The Everly Brothers stuff. But he also made a lot of great solo records, and was a very versatile player, so he inspired me to become a versatile musician.”
Despite mentioning some of the best to pick up the six-string as influences, when sitting down with Music Radar in 2014, Howe named his favourite guitarist of all time.
In another demonstration of his penchant for spurning the mainstream, he chose a niche Italian classical guitarist named Flavio Sala as his favourite. Explaining his reason, Howe said: “I’d rather choose someone that is seriously unknown but that I do believe has that secret ingredient. Some years back, I was in Venezuela, and a guy gave me two CDs by an Italian named Flavio Sala.”
Continuing, he added: “I’m sitting there listening to this whole CD, and when you listen to a whole CD, you know that it’s good because it’s an hour long. It was all this classical guitar, and I’m thinking, ‘Who is this guy? And what the hell guitar is he playing?’ I tracked him down, and he went ‘What!? Is that really Steve Howe?’ And I said, ‘This is really Steve Howe, and I’ve really got to see you!’ What’s remarkable is that he’s only 30, and he’s got all of the classical repertoire under his hands.”
The Yes man concluded: “I’ve been promoting him whenever the chance comes. I reckon within ten years, he’ll be an international guitarist. I’m really for him. Many other players have had an influence on me, but I love to see a 30-year-old guitarist knock my socks off!”
Knocking Howe’s socks off isn’t the easiest thing to do, so you know that Sala is a man worth listening to. Thankfully, we have just the ticket below.
