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Jeff Beck

24 June 1944 – 10 January 2023

When Eric Clapton decided to leave The Yardbirds,

there was much discussion about who would replace
him. Eventually Jeff beck took the chair. Beck was a
guitarist’s guitarist.

He was an eight-time Grammy winner, was twice
inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame —
both as a member of the Yardbirds as well as
for his work with his own Jeff Beck Group. One
of the members of the Jeff Beck Group was Rod

Stewart who tweeted shortly after Jeff’s death was
announced, ““Jeff Beck was on another planet. He took
me and Ronnie Wood to the USA in the late 60s in his

band the Jeff Beck Group and we haven’t looked back
since, He was one of the few guitarists that when playing
live would actually listen to me sing and respond. Jeff,
you were the greatest, my man. Thank you for
everything. RIP.”

Before Beck discovered guitar, his mother had wanted
him to play the piano. But once his parents saw how Beck,
who was born in Surrey, England on June 24, 1944, took

to the guitar, they allowed it. “[My parents] complained
[about the guitar], but they didn’t stop me,” he
told Rolling Stone in 2018.

Eventually, Beck bonded with another boy who

was a budding guitarist in his neighbourhood,
Jimmy Page.

In 1965 after Eric Clapton quit the group

allegedly after “becoming too poppy”, he
auditioned for the Yardbirds at the
encouragement of Page, who had by then become a successful session guitarist,

He quit in November 1966 after an illness and suffering a breakdown. In 1967, he recorded the
pop single “Hi Ho Silver Lining,” , the recording best known to non-blues fans and which became
something of a disco anthem. But blues based music remained at his core.

As Paul McCartney put it. “Jeff Beck has left the building and it is a lonelier place without him.”

Constructed from various sources