Guitarists Who Frequently Use Eb Standard Tuning
For those of you who don't understand music, Eb Standard Tuning is where all of the strings on a guitar are tuned down a half step (one note lower than standard tuning). A lot of guitarists use this tuning to loosen the strings a little bit and make the songs easier to play. To be on this list, the guitarist must frequently (or have frequently) used this tuning while playing. Feel free to add more examples.
Jimi Hendrix (born November 27, 1942 - September 18, 1970) was an American rock guitarist, singer, and songwriter.
Although his mainstream career spanned only four years, he is widely regarded as one of the most influential electric guitarists in the history of popular music, and one of the most celebrated musicians of the 20th century. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame describes him as "arguably the greatest instrumentalist in the history of rock music". Hendrix is consistently ranked on lists of musicians who died too soon. Jimi was one of the first rock guitarists to drop his guitar down to Eb (he also frequently used D).
Stephen "Stevie" Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954 – August 27, 1990) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer. In spite of a short-lived mainstream career spanning seven years, he is widely considered one of the most influential electric guitarists in the history of music, and one of the most important figures in the revival of blues in the 1980s. All of his work with Double Trouble is in Eb Standard. It was pretty much a necessity for him because he used.12 gauge strings, which are really heavy by guitar player standards.
Edward Lodewijk "Eddie" Van Halen (January 26, 1955 – October 6, 2020) was a Dutch-American musician, songwriter, producer, and inventor. He was best known as the lead guitarist, occasional keyboardist and co-founder of the hard rock band Van Halen. All of his prime Van Halen work (except for some parts of 1984) is in Eb standard tuning.
Saul Hudson, known professionally as Slash, is a British-American musician and songwriter. He is best known as the lead guitarist of the American hard rock band Guns N' Roses, with whom he achieved worldwide success in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
David Howell Evans, better known by his stage name the Edge, is an Irish musician and songwriter best known as the lead guitarist, keyboardist and backing vocalist of the rock band U2. He used Eb standard tuning on the first three U2 albums and the songs "Bullet the Blue Sky" and "Desire", and he continued to use it while playing live throughout the 80s and the early 90s.
Paul Daniel "Ace" Frehley is an American musician, singer and songwriter best known as the former lead guitarist and founding member of the rock band Kiss. All of Kiss' 70s songs (with the exception of some of the songs on Dynasty) are in Eb tuning.
Billie Joe Armstrong is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and actor who is best known as the lead vocalist, primary songwriter, and guitarist of the punk rock band Green Day, which he co-founded with Mike Dirnt. He's also in side-project groups such as The Network, Foxboro HotTubs, Pinhead Gunpowder, and The Longshot. His first group was a band called The Lookouts which disbanded after their 2nd album. He released a solo album consisting of covers in 2020 called "No Fun Mondays" ranging from rock and punk covers. He has a 2 and a half octave vocal ranger, but over time in 2020 and onwards his range has gotten slightly higher. Most notably in their Father Of All album, and during various ...read more. Most of Green Day's early stuff (such as Dookie and Insomniac) is in Eb.
Jerry Fulton Cantrell Jr. is an American musician, singer-songwriter and guitarist best known as the founder, lead guitarist, co-lead vocalist and main songwriter of the rock band Alice in Chains. Most of Alice in Chains' stuff is in Eb standard.
He and the rest of Motorhead started tuning their instruments down when they recorded Overkill; from then on, they played in Eb standard tuning.
Kirk Lee Hammett is the lead guitarist and songwriter for the heavy metal band Metallica and has been a member of the band since 1983. Before joining Metallica he formed and named the band Exodus. Metallica has played in Eb standard tuning since 1995.