Fretless guitar

A fretless guitar is a guitar without frets, such that fingering its strings at particular positions on the string is done by pressing the string against its fingerboard. A "fretboard" in fact is just a fingerboard with inlaid frets, hence the principles for fingering the fretless is almost the same as the fretted, but with three exceptions :

2) the resonance of strings is different and may require more apt plucking or modified amplification (pickups) to achieve desired volume, and

It operates in the same manner as most other stringed instruments and traditional guitars, but does not have any frets to act as the lower end point (node) of the vibrating string. On a fretless guitar, the vibrating string length runs from the bridge, where the strings are attached, all the way up to the point where the fingertip presses the string down on the fingerboard. Fretless guitars are fairly uncommon in most forms of western music and generally limited to the electrified instruments due to decreased acoustic volume and sustain in fretless instruments. However, the fretless bass guitar has gained fairly widespread popularity and many models of bass guitar can be found in fretless varieties. Fretless electric bass is particularly popular among jazz, funk and R&B players due to the similarity in feel and sound to the acoustic double bass.

Guthrie Govan

Guthrie Govan (born 27 December 1971 in Chelmsford, Essex, England) is an English guitarist and instructor, known for his work with the bands The Aristocrats, Asia (2001–2006), GPS, The Young Punx and The Fellowship, as well as Erotic Cakes (a vehicle for his own music) and Steven Wilson more recently. He is a noted guitar instructor through his work with the UK magazine Guitar Techniques, Guildford's Academy of Contemporary Music, Lick Library and formerly the Brighton Institute of Modern Music. He is the 1993 winner of Guitarist magazine's "Guitarist of the Year" competition.

Biography and early playing career

Govan began playing guitar aged three, encouraged by his father but initially learning mainly by ear. His father taught him five chords and introduced him to his extensive record collection. He began by listening to 1950s rock 'n' roll such as Jerry Lee Lewis and Little Richard, followed by The Beatles, Cream and Jimi Hendrix, and then Frank Zappa and AC/DC etc., working out chords and solos from listening to the records. Half-Scottish, Govan was also heavily influenced by Zal Cleminson of the Alex Harvey Band who he considers to have been "his Jimmy Page". At the age of nine he and his brother Seth Govan played guitar on a Thames Television programme called Ace Reports. At secondary school he was exposed, via older classmates, to "shred" guitarists of the time. His first electric guitar was a Gibson SG which he now keeps at home.