The multiple Grammy Award winner died unexpectedly on Tuesday after contracting bacterial meningitis. His career spanned 60 years and he released an album last summer.
Legendary British guitarist Jeff Beck is dead. The famous musician died suddenly of bacterial meningitis at the age of 78, his family announced on Twitter on Wednesday evening. Beck was considered one of the most influential guitarists in history. In the summer he released an album with Hollywood star Johnny Depp and then went on tour.
Beck played with various bands in and around London until 1965 when Jimmy Page recommended him to the Yardbirds as Eric Clapton’s successor. There he made a name for himself as a musical perfectionist and coined the unmistakable riffs of their best-known hits “Over Under Sideways Down” and “Shapes of Things”.
He later formed the Jeff Beck Group and played with Rod Stewart. He has also worked in many different formations with Mick Jagger, Roger Waters, Brian May, Paul Rodgers and Stevie Wonder, as well as with Tina Turner on her “Private Dancer” album.
First guitar made out of cigar boxes
“No one played guitar like Jeff,” Kiss guitarist Gene Simmons tweeted in response to Beck’s death. The BBC commended: “Its tone, presence and most importantly volume redefined guitar music in the 1960s, influencing movements such as heavy metal, jazz rock and even punk.”
Born on June 24, 1944 in a south London suburb, his mother wanted Geoffrey Beck, as his real name was, to learn to play the piano. But young Jeff was so fascinated by the American rock ‘n’ roll and blues legends that he built himself a guitar out of cigar boxes.
There were therefore many arguments with his parents, as the musician later revealed in the music magazine Rolling Stone remembered. But they wouldn’t have stopped him. “I suppose they thought, ‘If he’s got the guitar, at least he won’t go out and steal,'” he said. “The only friends I had were pretty shady.”