Top 10 Guitarists of 2024

Once again, guitarists have astonished our eyes and ears this year with their spectacular skills, practicing impressive string acrobatics while making it look easy. How is that even playable? Here’s our list of the top 10 guitarists in 2024.

1. Tim Henson – Polyphia

Tim Henson is a founding member of the Texan progressive rock instrumental band Polyphia. The guitarist and Instagram star is known for his vivid playing. He has a huge fan base on social media. With their latest singles, Polyphia have set a new trend in nylon string guitars and the Tim Henson Signature TOD10N-TKR signature model has been in high demand from fans. Henson is an Ibanez endorser and the brand has already released several signature instruments for him. The Ibanez TOR10N made its first appearance in the video for “Playing God”. It is a nylon acoustic electric guitar with a solid spruce top and classic bracing.

Ibanez Signature Tim Henson TOD10N

2. Mateus Asato

The Brazilian guitarist Mateus Asato is considered one of the “(…) most influential guitar players” of the modern era. He is listed in Guitar World magazine as one of the top 10 guitarists of the 2020s. And at number 3 – wow! Asato has worked with some of the biggest names in the current music scene, including Bruno Mars, Silk Sonic, Jessie J, Tori Kelly, and many more. Given his skills, Mateus understandably plays a very high-quality model, namely the Suhr Mateus Asato Classic S MN BK. This guitar is equipped with a very special passive noise cancellation system that works without batteries.

Suhr Mateus Asato Classic S MN BK

3. Ichika Nito

He simply plays everything he can get his hands on, including guitars and even harps: Ichika Nito is a phenomenon of the current generation and joins the list of extraordinary guitarists of 2024. His fascinating playing technique went viral within a very short space of time. Last year, a staggering 1.5 million subscribers were blown away by his fascinating finger skills, which range from hybrid to fingerstyle to two-handed tapping and much more. By now, that number has grown to 2.69 million subscribers on YouTube alone. There’s nothing that the twenty-something doesn’t interpret in his own individual way. Naturally, the manufacturers were keen to get him on board; the current signature model comes from Ibanez and is called Ibanez ICHI00-VWH.

Ibanez ICHI00-VWH

4. Matteo Mancuso

He was regarded early on as a guitar prodigy and performed with the best of the best at a young age: Matteo Mancuso really is a rising star in the fusion guitar scene. He inspires with his highly unusual technique and extraordinary musicality and is sometimes described as a “virtuoso among virtuosos”. Matteo is as likable as he is inspiring – and he’s simply perfect on guitar. For example, he interprets songs by Alan Holdsworth with stunning effortlessness. His collaboration with Yamaha began at the 2019 NAMM Show in Los Angeles. The international trade press repeatedly praised his incredible skills.

Yamaha Revstar RSS20 Swift Blue

👉 Here you can find Matteo’s gear on thomann.de.

5. Lari Basilio

Being both a technical and melodic player has always come naturally to Lari. Many of her fans feel that she steered the electric guitar in a new direction and at the same time took it to a new level. Having won the Samsung E-Festival in 2012 and performed in front of a crowd of 15,000 people, she also belongs on our list of the top 10 guitarists of 2024. Her signature model Ibanez LB1-WH Lari Basilio is equipped with a Seymour Duncan Lari Basilio humbucker on the bridge and two Seymour Duncan Lari Basilio single coils in the middle and neck positions. Lari is currently working on her new album and is also constantly on tour.

6. Yasi Hofer

Born in Ulm, Germany in 1992, Yasi Hofer began her musical career on the violin, but switched to the electric guitar at the age of twelve. What is a pity for the violin community is an absolute blessing for guitar fans. In addition to her multi-layered and versatile songwriting, Yasi is known for her soulful guitar solos and dynamic performances, in which she blends fusion, progressive rock, and modern blues rock.

As a 14-year-old, her great role model, grandmaster Steve Vai, brought her on stage to jam together. Since then, she has released a string of more than impressive albums, the most recent of which – “Between the Lines” – came out in 2023. She is an absolute delight, not only as a touring guitarist for Helene Fischer or No Angels, but above all with her “Yasi Hofer Trio”, artfully using her guitar to tell wonderful stories. Yasi prefers to play guitars from the Ibanez AZ series. Her main guitar is an 2021 Ibanez AZ 2204N Prestige Black, which she cherishes for its versatility.

2021 Ibanez AZ 2204N Prestige Black

7. Cory Wong

The guitarist, producer, and composer Cory Wong already made a name for himself in the early 2010s with his wild jam sessions with Prince’s rhythm section, among other things. The solo artist and Vulfpeck guitarist mainly works in the jazz and funk genres, where he has long been considered one of the most renowned artists. It is no coincidence that he was nominated for a Grammy in the “Best New Age Album” category for his album with Jon Batiste. Fender already honoured the fact that Cory Wong is a typical Strat player in 2021 with a signature model with push/pull function and special pickups. Seymour Duncan customized a pickup set for him in 2023.

8. Chris Buck

Blues rocker Chris Buck from Newport, South Wales, is no longer an insider tip. In fact, he received Music Radar’s Best Guitarist Award back in 2017, topped the iTunes album rock charts in 2021 with his band Cardinal Black, and was voted ‘Best New Guitarist’, ‘Best Blues Guitarist’ and ‘Best Pop Guitarist’ in consecutive years by the readers of Guitarist Magazine. Best known for his musical feel and unique combination of picking and fingerstyle techniques, Chris is currently on tour in Europe with his band. While the new guitar hero plays a variety of instruments, he is particularly fond of the Revstar series from Yamaha, such as the Yamaha Revstar RSP02T Sunset Burst.

Yamaha Revstar RSP02T Sunset Burst

9. Marcin

Marcin Patrzałek is one of the most extraordinary guitar virtuosos of our time. In fact, there seems to be nothing that the Polish-born guitarist cannot play. He reinvents the guitar with a breathtaking mix of percussive fingerstyle and flamenco techniques. He never lets himself be limited by genre boundaries, moving effortlessly between piano sonatas or symphonies by Ludwig van Beethoven and arranging hip-hop, metal, or laid-back dance tracks. And he’s also quite active on the Internet. Marcin’s greatest successes to date are his version of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, his interpretation of “Toxicity” (System of a Down), and Paganini’s Caprice No. 24. His videos now have well over 150 million clicks. Ibanez released a signature model for Marcin in 2022. The Ibanez MRC10-NT is an AE with a solid spruce top, cutaway, and Fishman pickup system.

Ibanez MRC10-NT

10. Rabea Massaad

Rabea actually wanted to become a drummer, but was stopped in his tracks by an accident in his youth. The result: he became a guitar sensation who’s been celebrated by his YouTube followers as one of the best contemporary guitarists. Rabea is a self-taught musician, songwriter, producer, and sound engineer.

In addition to playing guitar with Frog Leap, Toska, and Dorje, he continues to create content on his YouTube channel. Rabea has worked with a number of manufacturers that have incorporated his ideas into their production, such as the Kraken amp series from Victory. Recently, he was honoured with the Music Man Rabea Massaad Sabre Vileblood Signature model. Anyone who appears in Music Man’s signature gallery must really have made it.

Music Man Rabea Massaad Sabre

Top 10 Guitarists of 2024 – Feedback

Which guitarists were your favourites in 2024 and which ones do you think are missing from this list?

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