WATCHING LUCA STRICAGNOLI play live feels almost like a sporting event where one witnesses a well-trained musical athlete performing extraordinary feats of virtuosity. It’s obvious to anyone that he is no ordinary guitar player. I took visiting family members to see him play at Freight & Salvage in Berkeley, California, confident that even though a solo acoustic performance wasn’t exactly their bag, Stricagnoli’s octopus-armed execution of familiar covers would win them over. Mission accomplished. Everyone was floored.
By now we’ve all seen some amazing percussive fingerstyle arrangements for solo acoustic, both live and on YouTube, the arena that brought the genre to the masses. It’s been nearly two decades since CandyRat Records recording artists, spearheaded by Andy McKee, blew up the internet. Akin to the Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show, McKee’s video for “Drifting” — currently at a whopping 60 million views — was the big bang that caused droves of millennials to pick up the acoustic and start slapping and tapping like McKee, Antoine Dufour, Don Ross and other heroes.
Stricagnoli was one of those kids paying very close attention. He eventually became a CandyRat cat for three solo albums, where he took modern fingerstyle to the next level by playing multiple guitars, as well as guitars with multiple necks, simultaneously. He even invented a “reversed slide neck” that can attach magnetically to any guitar. Check
