REVIEW

INTERVIEW

Ben Lacy joins the diverse list of winning songwriters, fingerstyle masters and popular guitar legends sponsored by Breedlove Guitars.

Breedlove Guitars’ Show Report from Winter NAMM, 2008 in Anaheim, California features Ben Lacy and Jay Roberts playing at the Breedlove booth. In March, following a gig at The Summit,Ben toured the Bend, Oregon factory to personally select the materials that will go into his custom Ben Lacy Breedlove Guitar.

The February 2007 issue of Guitar Player Magazine named Ben as one of the Top 100 Unsung Guitar Heros.
 

Guitar Player TV now features video footage of Ben performing Cheap Sunglasses, Layer Cake and No-Name Groove.
 

Ben has a 2-page article in 20th Century Guitar’s August 2006 issue. Following is an excerpt:

"About once a decade, a new guitar talent comes along that knocks this writer out. It was like that when I first saw and heard Michael Hedges. So musical, so unique. Same with Stanley Jordan.

Four years ago, I met the newest killer guitarist at a California NAMM Show. My first encounter with Ben Lacy was literally thrilling. He was incorporating multiple techniques into a truly unique musical blend. There were chords with bass lines. There was the melody and horn lines. All done simultaneously and above all, there was a rhythmic sense few have attained. A constant groooooove that propelled the music. And was I blown away when he added the drum solos, ON GUITAR STRINGS?

Ben Lacy has done what few guitarists have done in history. Not just digest the styles of the past. Ben has raised the bar a notch. Maybe two."
 

Mentioned in the November 2004 issue of Guitar Player Magazine

The November 2004 issue of 20th Century Guitar Magazine reviews the Longbeach Jazz Fest performance. A CD review is forthcoming in the magazine.


Richmond Register
April 3, 2003
Nationally Known Guitarist Comes to Berea
  It was a sweltering Nashville night, but the mosquitos weren’t the only thing buzzing. Drawn by the largest nusical trade show in America, 50 of the world’s best musicians took the stage last summer at the Ryman Auditorium for an all-star tribute to Chet Atkins.
  One musical legend after another playined on into the night - people like Vassar Clements, Junior Brown, Kenny Burrell, Phil Keaggy, Victor Wooten and Seymour Duncan.
  A young guitarist virtuoso named Ben Lacy took his turn center stage. Minutes into his performance, a hush fell over the auditorium for the first time that night. Thousands of awestruck conventioneers held their breath as they watched him glide effortlessly from Led Zeppelin to Stevie Wonder to Van Morrison, not just playing the guitar parts, but playing all the parts at the same time. He snapped and slapped bass grooves, stabbing inspired chord voicings, thumping staccato drumbeats and playing sassy solo lines simultaneously. This was not just a circus trick. It was pure inspiration crafted with super-human precision.
  Applauding wildly, the crowd jumped to its feet with one of the few standing ovations of the night. The review simply read, “Show stopper, jaw dropper.”
  Madison Countians can enjoy this guitar wizard performing free Saturday for the Coffee Conspiracy on Chestnut Street in Berea.
 

Downbeat
March 2003
  Guitarist Ben Lacy is a true multitasking machine. The title of his CD One Track Mind indicates that Lacy performed the bulk of these works in one take. To mere mortals it might seem that there’s a twosome going at it. Lacy’s impressive technique is built upon complex slapping, hammer-ons, and rhythmically devised chord progressions.
 

Music Inc.
September 2002

Pictured at the 2002 NAMM show. “Brian Moore president Patrick Cumming with guitarists extraordinaire Jay Roberts and Ben Lacy.”

JazzReview.com
October 2002
Al Di and his Group are Highlight of 3rd Annual Midwest Guitar Show
  The Saturday evening concert would feature two prominent virtuosos of the guitar in performance for the convention audience. The first act was a solo venture with newcomer Ben Lacy, a guitarist who seemingly has redefined the two-handed contrapuntal solo style of guitar performance which Stanley Jordan and Tuck Andress brought to attention almost two decades earlier. This was a fitting introduction to the World Sinfonia group because Al Di Meola produced the first release of the highly innovative Jordan, which shows his flair for not only performing but producing great music as well. Lacy bedazzled the audience with full band arrangements of Stevie Wonder’s “I Wish” and “Sir Duke,” along with “Tax Man” by the Beatles, original compositions and a rousing encore of the eastern laced “Kasmir” of Led Zeppelin. The screaming crowd was very warm after witnessing such a powerful musician and really enjoyed the choice of material he performed. Somehow, I got the feeling he would be back later in the evening.

Ben on stage with legendary guitarist Al Di Meola at the Great Midwest Guitar Show in St. Louis

  At the final encore Di Meola announced that he was going to do something he hadn’t planned to do - a duet with Ben Lacy. The duo would perform an impromptu version of “Spain” which was a staple of the Return to Forever set list. Di Meola joked that, “With Ben’s (Lacy’s) 3 parts and my part, we should make a pretty good quartet!” The crowd roared even before Lacy’s amp was plugged up and ready to go. Starting with a percussive rhythm pulse and chordal sequences, Lacy set the tune up for Al to play the head and the duo exchanged soloing back and forth using rhythmic burst and legato melodies, chock full of searing breakneck shred soloing which complimented each other very well. The melodic output of Di Meola is as incredible as his chops and guitar playing expertise. Al’s ability to combine lush chords, rapid right hand picking with long-flowing legato lines, is a treat for the senses. The audience response was fever pitched and the two dragons showed the conventioneers and the others in the audience why the Sheldon picked such fiery, unique artists for the Guitar show. After the fret burning fireworks, a reception was given upstairs where Al was signing his CD. Al Di was gracious and very interested in the fans’ comments about the performance and the new music. While Al greeted fans, a harp guitarist named Tom Shinness from Nashville performed for the gathering. A great wind down to a great show at the midnight hour. The day’s events were full of excitement and energy. Thanks to the Sheldon and the artistry of Al Di Meola and Ben Lacy, the Saturday night in St. Louis was a night to remember for a long time to come! Bravo! Fine.


Music Inc.
October 2002
Kustom Donates Amps to Nashville School
  Kustom donated 12 of its amplifiers to the Nashville Public School system, where they will benefit the guitar program at the Nashville School of the Arts.
  The amps were used onstage and backstage at Muriel Anderson’s 25th All Star Guitar Nigh in Nashville, held July 19 [2002]. Pictured above is one of the event’s standout performers, Ben Lacy.

Modulus Guitars
August 2000
Ben Lacy’s Quiet Revolution
  If you haven’t heard Ben Lacy’s music yet, you will. If his is an unfamiliar name to you, it soon won’t be. This soft-spoken musician is probably the most exciting thing to happen to guitar-playing that we’ve heard in the last 10 years. Among the din and more of the Nashville NAMM Show a few years back, Ben quietly walked into the Modulus booth and asked if it was OK for him to try one of our guitars. Knowing Nashville houses some of the finest players found anywhere, and also knowing they are often about as unassuming as your average accountant, we said “sure.” What happened next, no one was prepared for.
And the (One-Man) Band Played On
  Ben began to play Led Zeppelin’s Kashmir. Not just the guitar part. All the parts. Every one of them. At the same time. With the kind of eas and style you’d expect from a 3-handed piano player. But this wasn’t a circus trick, or a magic act. It was pure inspiration. Slowly, over 100 people had gathered, silently, to hear a musical master softly amaze.
  Ben makes his way from his home in Kentucky down to our booth in Nashville each year to say hi and play some of the most technically amazing and emotionally moving solo guitar we’ve ever heard.