Erik Mongrain
Erik Mongrain |
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Erik Mongrain is a Canadian composer and guitarist, best known for his unique acoustic style, and his use of a two-handed tapping technique on the acoustic guitar. He was born in Montreal, Canada.
Biography
Erik Mongrain taught himself guitar at the age of 14. As a boy he was mostly interested in sports, but picked up an interest in the guitar and began to teach himself to play by ear. Erik started out playing the electric guitar, but developed an interest in classical and acoustic guitar after hearing the work of Johann Sebastian Bach. Erik taught himself to read music, and began composing.
Erik Mongrain was inspired early on by the work of Metallica, Jimi Hendrix, and Kurt Cobain. When he was 18, Erik heard the work of guitarist Don Ross, and he said "This was a new revelation to me. I finally found my niche."[1] After that, Erik was heavily influenced by the work of Michael Hedges. Erik also began to experiment with, a technique known as "lap tapping." In this technique you lay the guitar across your lap, and tap the strings on the fret board with both hands.
Current Work
Erik Mongrain plays live shows in the United States, Canada, and England. He started out with street shows, and still does perform street and metro shows, as well as at concert venues and on television. Erik's music is going to be featured in a documentary produced by Lance Trumbull for the Everest Peace Project. He was recently featured on the cover of Guild Magazine. Erik was featured in Le Journal de Montréal and was written about in Journal Espagnol Granada. They wrote,
"the visitor (to Grenada) ... discovers rather good musicians, sometimes brilliant, who makes a pure delight of the city... Erik Mongrain, 21 years old, is one of them... The young interpreter does not play in a habitual manner but rather lays the guitar on his knees like a keyboard ... before discovering this new method, known under the name of "tapping", he studied classical guitar on his own"
Erik has a rapidly growing fanbase, with over 880 registered users on his fan forum, and over 1900 fans listed on his Myspace artist page.
Erik has announced on his website that he plans to release his first CD very soon. Template:Sound sample box align right
