Music quotes by Eric Clapton center around his deep love of music. Eric Patrick Clapton was born 05/30/ 1945 In Ripley, Surrey England to an unwedded sixteen year old named Patricia Molly Clapton. His father was a twenty year old Canadian soldier who was serving in war torn England.
I am and always will be a blues guitarist- Eric Clapton
Eric Clapton was raised by his grandmother, Rose, who had remarried to her second husband, Jack Clapp. He was a stepfather to Patricia Clapton and her brother Adrian and Eric grew up thinking that his grandparents were his parents and that his mother was actually his older sister.
Eric received an acoustic Hoyer guitar for his thirteenth birthday, but the inexpensive steel-stringed instrument was difficult to play and he lost interest. It was two years later before Eric picked it up again and started playing regularly. From the beginning Eric liked the blues, and practiced for hours to learn the chords of blues music by playing along to the records and he recorded his practice sessions so he could listen to them over and over until he was satisfied with his playing.
For me there is something primitively soothing about this music, and it went straight to my nervous system, making me feel ten feet tall- Eric Clapton
By the time he was 16 his guitar playing was so advanced that people were starting to notice him and it was around this time Clapton began playing around the clubs around where he lived By 1962 Eric Clapton started performing with fellow blues enthusiast David Brock in the clubs. Then when Eric was seventeen years old he joined his first band, “The Roosters”. He stayed with the band from January through August 1963. After which he did a few shows with a band named Casey Jones & The Engineers.
If you hand me a guitar, I’ll play the blues. That’s the place I automatically go”- Eric Clapton
In 1963 he joined The Yardbirds, a blues-influenced rock and roll band that drew from such influences as the Chicago blues styles and leading blues guitarists such as Buddy Guy, Freddie King, and B. B. King. Eric Clapton distinctive style made him one of the most talked-about guitarists in the British music scene.
Yardbirds rhythm guitarist, Chris Dreja, Is quoted as recalling “that whenever Eric broke a guitar string during a concert, he would replace it while staying on stage. The English audiences would wait out the delay by doing what is called a slow handclap”. Years later Eric Clapton would tell his official biographer, Ray Coleman, that, “My nickname of ‘Slowhand’ came from Giorgio Gomelsky. He coined it as a good pun. He kept saying I was a fast player, so he put together the slow handclap phrase into Slowhand as a play on words”.
In 1965 the Yardbirds had their first major hit, “For Your Love”, on which Clapton played guitar. The Yardbirds elected to move toward a pop-oriented sound but Eric, who was still musically devoted to the blues opposed to the move, and left the band. He recommended a replacement for himself , fellow guitarist Jimmy Page, , but Page had well-paid career as a freelance studio musician, so he in turn recommended the musician that would be Eric Clapton’s successor, fellow musician Jeff Beck.
Eric Clapton then joined the band John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers, but only played with them for a few months but later in 1965 he rejoined the Bluesbreakers. It was during this time that his playing made Eric become known as the best blues guitarist on the club circuiting England. Eric gained world fame for his playing on the influential electric blues album, The Blues Breakers with John Mayall and Eric Clapton even though this album was released after he left the Bluesbreakers.
Almost immediately after leaving The Bluesbreakers, Eric Clapton formed a new band, Cream, a three pieces power trio with drummer Ginger Baker and bassist Jack Bruce where he played his own style of blues improvisations and blues-based psychedelic pop which was highly successful.
During the 1970s, Eric played with several different bands and / or musicians and his style reflected the influence of more mellow styles of music such as that of J.J. Cale and the reggae style of Bob Marley. He recorded a version of Marley’s “I Shot the Sheriff” with Derek and the Dominos which some feel helped the reggae style of music reach a mass market.
Since then Eric Clapton has released many solo albums and has played with some of the musicians that influenced his music such as B.B. King and many others and has continued his career as one of the premier blues guitarist of the world.
I have always been resistant to doctrine, and any spirituality I had experienced thus far in my life had been much more abstract and not aligned with any recognized religion. For me, the most trustworthy vehicle for spirituality had always proven to be music. It cannot be manipulated, or politicized, and when it is, that becomes immediately obvious.- Eric Clapton
Eric Clapton has been called one of the most important and influential guitarists of all time and is the only musician to be a three-time inductee to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame , as a solo artist, as a member of The Yardbirds , and again for his work while a member of Cream. He is also ranked second in Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the “100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time” as well as fourth in Gibson’s Top 50 Guitarists of All Time and is a recipient of seventeen Grammy Awards.