Allan Holdsworth

“When I practise scales I will play four notes on one string. If I'm playing a C major scale, starting on F, I'll play the F, G, A, and B on one string and the C will be on the A string, etc, etc. Because I found not only was it good for my hands but it was really good for interconnecting things.”

“I had always wanted to compose music for movies, but had never been given the opportunity.”

“The SynthAxe enables you to achieve a whole world of sonic textures that you cannot get with a guitar. There was nothing like it before and nothing like it since.”

“Most of the musicians I play with - aside from the form and structure of the music - the interpretation is up to them.”

“I grew up listening to Ravel, Debussy, Bartok and jazz like Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Cannonball Adderley, Charlie Christian and Django Reinhart. It was incredibly inspiring! And I was given a guitar and I said 'What the hell is this?!'”

“It falls in all the cracks, from classical music to jazz,. Anywhere there's a hole in the floor, my music falls through it. But that's OK.”

“You wait all your life to be signed by a major label, and then when they sign you, they don't want you to do what you want to do.”

“I love music - really a lot. That's why I do it. But mine just never makes it, to me. There's always something wrong with it, something I want to change. But I like that, because at least it keeps me looking, trying to find ways I can improve, which obviously are a lot.”

“When I hear 'fusion,' I think of Tricky-Dick stuff - really hairy melodies played in unison. It's like, 'Why?'”

“Whenever I watch a movie I like to imagine what sort of music I might compose for a scene, to create a particular kind of atmosphere, because when I see something I hear something.”

“As the chord changes go by, I don't so much think about a static chord voicing changing. I just see the notes on the neck change.”

“Bike riding is great for your thinking. I can't say I've written an entire tune while cycling, but riding has definitely inspired songwriting ideas.”

“If you fall in love with a woman, there's this unknown thing that gives you a force and energy, and music is like that, too. If I lived to be 2000, I'd never know anything about music. And that's great.”

“Jazz is something that's constantly changing. Its sole purpose is to let people improvise, to let them solo differently each time they play. And that's always been what I like best.”

“When I first started playing, I plunked away just like everyone else. During the Sixties I played in a blues band for a few years, and I liked it. It wasn't until I was playing for a while that I made the decision to change my style from a percussive to more of a legato approach. I just wanted a different sound.”

“I knew if I wanted to improvise over chord changes, I'd have to figure out all the scales that went with all those chords.”

“Record companies tell me to play something more commercial, but I don't want to do anything else.”

“To me, I don't see any difference between a synthesizer and an acoustic instrument. It's what's done on it that counts.”

“My dad was a fine pianist and he had a lot of great records and beautiful music.”

“For me, the only thing that makes one scale different from another is not the starting note; it's the separation of the intervals.”