A seven-string guitar is a guitar

Guitar

The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...

 with seven strings instead of the usual six. Some types of seven-string guitars are specific to certain cultures (i.e. the Russian

Russian guitar

The Russian guitar is a seven-string acoustic guitar that arrived in Russia toward the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, most probably as an evolution of the cittern, kobza, and torban...

 and Brazilian guitars). The standard 7-string guitar tuning is BEADGbe

Seven-string electric guitar

Electric guitar

An electric guitar is a guitar that uses the principle of direct electromagnetic induction to convert vibrations of its metal strings into electric audio signals. The signal generated by an electric guitar is too weak to drive a loudspeaker, so it is amplified before sending it to a loudspeaker...

s are particularly used in certain styles of music. Metal, Rock and Jazz seem to be the most popular styles, respectively. Rock/Metal artists such as Born of Osiris

Born of Osiris

Born of Osiris is an American progressive death metal band from Palatine, Illinois. Formed in 2003, the group has undergone a number of name changes including Your Heart Engraved, DiminisheD, and Rosecrance before finally settling with Born of Osiris in 2007, basing the name off the Egyptian deity...

, Chelsea Grin

Chelsea Grin (band)

Chelsea Grin is an American deathcore band from Salt Lake City, Utah. Formed in 2007, the group is currently signed to Artery Recordings and have released one EP and two full-length albums...

, Fear Factory

Fear Factory

Fear Factory is an American industrial metal band. Formed in 1989, they have released seven full-length albums and a number of singles and remixes. Over the course of their career they have evolved from a succession of styles, as well as steadily pioneered a combination of the styles death metal,...

, Steve Vai

Steve Vai

Steven Siro "Steve" Vai is a three time Grammy Award-winning American guitarist, songwriter and producer who has sold over 15 million albums. Steve Vai is widely known as a flamboyant guitar virtuoso....

, Scribe

Scribe

A scribe is a person who writes books or documents by hand as a profession and helps the city keep track of its records. The profession, previously found in all literate cultures in some form, lost most of its importance and status with the advent of printing...

, Dream Theater

Dream Theater

Dream Theater is an American progressive metal band formed in 1985 under the name Majesty by John Petrucci, John Myung, and Mike Portnoy while they attended Berklee College of Music in Massachusetts. They subsequently dropped out of their studies to further concentrate on the band that would...

, Trivium

Trivium (band)

Trivium is an American heavy metal band from Orlando, Florida, formed in 1999. Signed to Roadrunner Records, the band has released five studio albums, eleven singles, and twelve music videos...

, Eccentric Pendulum, Undying Inc, Korn

Korn

Korn is an American nu metal band from Bakersfield, California, formed in 1993. The current band line up includes four members: Jonathan Davis, James "Munky" Shaffer, Reginald "Fieldy" Arvizu, and Ray Luzier. The band was formed as an expansion of L.A.P.D.The band released their first demo album,...

, Deftones

Deftones

Deftones are an American alternative metal band from Sacramento, California, founded in 1988. The band consists of Chino Moreno , Stephen Carpenter , Chi Cheng , Frank Delgado , and Abe Cunningham . Currently Sergio Vega is standing in on bass while Cheng recovers from a car accident...

, Suicide Silence

Suicide Silence

Suicide Silence is an American extreme metal band from Riverside, California. The group consists of vocalist Mitch Lucker, guitarists Chris Garza and Mark Heylmun, drummer Alex Lopez and bassist Dan Kenny. Formed in 2002, the band has released three full-length studio albums, one EP and seven music...

, Behemoth

Behemoth (band)

Behemoth is a Polish blackened death metal band from Gdańsk, formed in 1991. They are considered to have played an important role in establishing the Polish extreme metal underground, alongside bands such as Vader, Decapitated, Vesania and Hate....

, Periphery

Periphery (band)

Periphery is an American metal band from Bethesda, Maryland , formed in 2005.- Formation and lineup changes :Periphery was formed by guitarist Misha Mansoor in 2005...

, Nevermore

Nevermore

Nevermore is an American heavy metal band from Seattle, Washington. Formed in 1991, they are known to incorporate elements from styles such as thrash, power, progressive, and neo-classical metal into their songs, and also makes use of acoustic guitars and a wide range of vocal styles.-Early years...

, TesseracT

Tesseract

In geometry, the tesseract, also called an 8-cell or regular octachoron or cubic prism, is the four-dimensional analog of the cube. The tesseract is to the cube as the cube is to the square. Just as the surface of the cube consists of 6 square faces, the hypersurface of the tesseract consists of 8...

, Textures

Textures (band)

Textures is a metal band from the Netherlands, formed in 2001. Textures' lineup revolves around founding members Jochem Jacobs, Stef Broks, Bart Hennephof, and bassist Remko Tielemans who joined in 2007...

 and Mucc

Mucc

is a Japanese visual kei rock band formed in 1997. Named after a character from the Japanese children's TV show Hirake! Ponkikki, the band is also known by the nickname 69 since "six nine" can be pronounced "muku" in Japanese...

 have all experimented with seven-string guitars over the years on different albums. Jazz artists such as: George Van Eps, Bucky Pizzarelli, Howard Alden, Ron Eschete, Chance Russell, and Lenny Breau also use 7-strings.

Extra strings are usually added to extend the bass range of the modern 6-string guitar. These strings are commonly added in two different ways. The first and most common construction is to increase the width of the fingerboard such that the extra string (or strings) may be stopped by the left hand. The second method is to leave the fingerboard unchanged such that the extra bass strings lie next to the existing bass strings and free of the fingerboard in the same fashion in which the archlute and theorbo are constructed. Such unfrettable bass strings were historically known as diapasons or bourdons.

History

In the Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

 period, the guitar was generally strung with four pairs of strings, termed courses. Each string in a course was tuned to the same pitch. By the baroque

Baroque

The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...

 period it had five courses and used a variety of tunings, some of the tunings re-entrant. During the eighteenth century six courses became common and the modern practice of using six single strings became the standard practice after 1800. These developments illustrate an ongoing desire on behalf of players to increase the range of the instrument. Seven-string guitars arose from such a desire and have been in use for over 150 years. French guitarist Napoleon Coste

Napoléon Coste

Claude Antoine Jean Georges Napoléon Coste was a French guitarist and composer.-Biography:Napoléon Coste was born in Amondans , France, near Besançon. He was first taught the guitar by his mother, an accomplished player. As a teenager he became a teacher of the instrument and appeared in many...

 (1805–1883) composed works with a seven-string guitar specifically in mind. The Italian guitarist Mario Maccaferri (b 1899) was a celebrated advocate of Bass strings(diapasons or bourdons).
In Mexico a guitarra séptima or guitarra sétima with fourteen strings, strung in seven double courses has been used for an even longer time and descriptions of it date back to 1776 (Antonio Vargas).
This makes the history of the seven-string guitar more than 230 years old.

The Russian guitar

Main article: Russian guitar

Russian guitar

The Russian guitar is a seven-string acoustic guitar that arrived in Russia toward the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, most probably as an evolution of the cittern, kobza, and torban...

The Russian guitar, a seven-string acoustic guitar tuned to the Open G tuning

Open G tuning

Open G tuning is a tuning for guitar, such that the open strings play a G major chord with no fingering or capo.The standard Open G tuning is D-G-D-G-B-D. Note that this leaves the D as the bottom of the chord, creating an inversion. To rectify this problem, some guitar players will remove the low...

, (DGBDGbd) arrived in the beginning of the 19th century in Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

, most probably as a development of the cittern

Cittern

The cittern or cither is a stringed instrument dating from the Renaissance. Modern scholars debate its exact history, but it is generally accepted that it is descended from the Medieval Citole, or Cytole. It looks much like the modern-day flat-back mandolin and the modern Irish bouzouki and cittern...

, the kobza

Kobza

The kobza is a Ukrainian folk music instrument of the lute family , a relative of the Central European mandora...

 and the torban

Torban

The torban is a Ukrainian musical instrument that combines the features of the Baroque Lute with those of the psaltery. The Тorban differs from the more common European Bass lute known as the Theorbo in that it had additional short treble strings strung along the treble side of the soundboard. It...

. It is known in Russia as the semistrunnaya gitara (семиструнная гитара) or affectionately as the semistrunka (семиструнка).

Its invention is attributed to Andrei Sychra

Andrei Sychra

Andrei Osipovich Sychra was a Russian guitarist, composer and teacher, of Czech ancestry...

, who also wrote a method for the guitar, as well as over one thousand compositions, seventy-five of which were republished in the 1840s by Stellovsky, and then again in the 1880s by Gutheil

Gutheil

Gutheil is a German and Jewish surname of:* Marie Gutheil-Schoder, née Schoder , German soprano, wife of Gustav Gutheil* Emil Arthur Gutheil , Polish-American psychiatrist , German jurist...

. Some of these were published again in the Soviet Union

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 in 1926.

This type of guitar has been called a 'Russian guitar,' as it has been primarily played in Russia and later the Soviet Union.

The Russian version of the seven-string guitar has been used by professionals, because of its great flexibility and its sound, but has also been popular with amateurs for accompaniment (especially Russian bards

Bard (Soviet Union)

The term bard came to be used in the Soviet Union in the early 1960s, and continues to be used in Russia today, to refer to singer-songwriters who wrote songs outside the Soviet establishment, similarly to beatnik folk singers of the United States...

) due to the relative simplicity of some basic chords and the ease of playing alternating bass lines.

The Russian guitar is traditionally played without a pick, using fingers for either strumming or picking.
The earliest music published for a seven-string guitar was in St. Petersburg, Russia, on 15 December 1798. The school was owned by Ignác František Held (1766, Třebechovice pod Orebem

Trebechovice pod Orebem

Třebechovice pod Orebem is a town in the Hradec Králové Region of the Czech Republic. It has ca. 5,600 inhabitants.-External links:* *...

, Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

 – 1816, Brest-Litovsk, Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

).

Alternate tunings include:

• G-C-E-G-C-E-G ("Big guitar")
• F-A#-D-F-A#-D-F (1/3rd guitar)
• E-A-B-D-G-B-D
• E-G-B-D-G-B-D
• C-G-B-D-G-B-D
• D-G-C-D-G-A#-D
• B-F#-B-E-A-D-f#
• A-E-A-D-G-B-E

The Brazilian guitar

The Brazilian seven-string guitar is an acoustic guitar used primarily in choro

Choro

Choro , traditionally called chorinho , is a Brazilian popular music instrumental style. Its origins are in 19th century Rio de Janeiro. In spite of the name, the style often has a fast and happy rhythm, characterized by virtuosity, improvisation, subtile modulations and full of syncopation and...

 and samba

Samba

Samba is a Brazilian dance and musical genre originating in Bahia and with its roots in Brazil and Africa via the West African slave trade and African religious traditions. It is recognized around the world as a symbol of Brazil and the Brazilian Carnival...

. It was introduced to Brazil in the early 20th century as a steel string guitar. The style of "baixaria" counterpoint and accompaniment technique was developed throughout the 20th century, especially by Dino 7 Cordas

Dino 7 Cordas

Horondino José da Silva , best known as Dino Sete Cordas , was a Brazilian guitar player renowned as the greatest influence in seven-string guitar, a musical instrument in which he developed his own language and techniques, and one of the greatest choro instrumentalists ever.He developed the...

 and Raphael Rabello. In the early 1980s, guitarist Luiz Otavio Braga had a nylon string version made, and this has become the norm for most contemporary choro musicians such as Yamandu Costa

Yamandú Costa

Yamandu Costa , sometimes misspelled Yamandú, is a Brazilian guitarist and composer. His main instrument is the violão de 7 cordas, the Brazilian seven-stringed nylon guitar....

.

The Brazilian seven-string guitar is typically tuned like a classical guitar, but with an additional C below the low E as follows: C-E-A-D-G-b-e; although some musicians tune the C down to a B resulting in B-E-A-D-G-b-e.

In addition to playing choro, seven-string guitarists are utilizing the instrument's extended range to play classical repertoire, often leading to new arrangements of known pieces.

Electric guitar

Hollowbody and semi-hollow electric guitars

In the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, the jazz guitarist George Van Eps

George Van Eps

George Van Eps was an American swing and Mainstream jazz guitarist noted both for his recordings as a leader, and for his work as a session musician. He was also the author of instructional books that explored his approach to guitar-based harmony...

 had a seven-string guitar built for him by Epiphone Guitars in the late 1930s and a signature Gretsch

Gretsch

The Gretsch Company was founded in 1883 by Friedrich Gretsch, a twenty-seven year old German immigrant recently arrived in the US. Friedrich Gretsch manufactured banjos, tambourines, and drums, until his death in 1895. His son, Fred, moved operations to Brooklyn, New York in 1916...

 seven-string in the late 60s and early 70s. The Van Eps signature guitar may be the first regular-production seven-string electric guitar.

Several others began using seven-string guitars after Van Eps, including Bucky Pizzarelli

Bucky Pizzarelli

John Paul "Bucky" Pizzarelli is an American Jazz guitarist and banjoist, and the father of jazz guitarist John Pizzarelli and upright bassist Martin Pizzarelli. Pizzarelli has also worked for NBC as a staffman for Dick Cavett and also ABC with Bobby Rosengarden in...

, Howard Alden

Howard Alden

Howard Alden is an American jazz guitarist born in Newport Beach, California. He has recorded a long series of albums for Concord Records. His performances were dubbed over Sean Penn as 'Emmet Ray' in the 1999 Woody Allen film Sweet and Lowdown...

, Ron Eschete, Chance Russell, Lenny Breau

Lenny Breau

Leonard Harold "Lenny" Breau was a musician, guitar player, and music educator. He was known for blending many styles of music including: jazz, country, classical and flamenco guitar...

, and John Pizzarelli

John Pizzarelli

John Paul Pizzarelli, Jr. is an American jazz guitarist, vocalist, songwriter and bandleader. He has had a lengthy career as a recording artist, performing for a variety of labels that include Telarc Records, RCA Records and Chesky Records, among others...

, son of jazz legend Bucky Pizzarelli.

The first seven-string guitars were built in the "hollowbody" or "semi-hollow" archtop styles, where the guitar has a central resonating chamber, or a central block with resonant chambers on the sides. This gave the guitar the dark woodiness, breath, and richness that is associated with traditional "jazz" tone, but made it too prone to feedback to be practical for rock guitar playing.

Solidbody electric guitars

The first solidbody seven-string electric guitar was possibly an instrument conceived by Lenny Breau

Lenny Breau

Leonard Harold "Lenny" Breau was a musician, guitar player, and music educator. He was known for blending many styles of music including: jazz, country, classical and flamenco guitar...

 and built by the Californian luthier Kirk Sand in 1982. This instrument featured a high A string and was debuted at the 1983 NAMM convention. The first major company to experiment with the idea of a solidbody seven-string guitar was Fender

Fender

Fender Musical Instruments Corporation, commonly referred to as simply Fender, of Scottsdale, Arizona is a manufacturer of stringed instruments and amplifiers, such as solid-body electric guitars, including the Stratocaster and the Telecaster...

, who in 1987 signed an agreement with Alex Gregory to produce a Stratocaster-style guitar that also featured a high A string. A small number of prototypes were made, however the unit was never put into production.

The first mass-produced seven-string was the Ibanez

Ibanez

is a Japanese guitar brand owned by Hoshino Gakki. Based in Nagoya, Aichi, Japan, Hoshino Gakki were one of the first Japanese musical instrument companies to gain a significant foothold in import guitar sales in the United States and Europe, as well as the first brand of guitars to mass produce...

 UV7 played by Steve Vai

Steve Vai

Steven Siro "Steve" Vai is a three time Grammy Award-winning American guitarist, songwriter and producer who has sold over 15 million albums. Steve Vai is widely known as a flamboyant guitar virtuoso....

 and Reb Beach. Vai was drawn to the idea for much of the same reasons seven-string classical and jazz players were - the extended range the additional string offered. After initial experimentation with a high A, a low B was added as the high A proved to be too prone to breaking. Vai began touring with Whitesnake

Whitesnake

Whitesnake are an English rock band, founded in 1978 by David Coverdale after his departure from his previous band, Deep Purple. The band's early material has been compared by critics to Deep Purple, but by the mid 1980s they had moved to a more commercial hard rock style...

 with a seven-string prototype, and then used the guitars for his 1990 release Passion and Warfare

Passion and Warfare

Passion and Warfare is a 1990 instrumental album from guitarist Steve Vai. It has been certified Gold by the RIAA. It was written based on a series of dream sequences that Vai had when he was younger, and in the guitar music book of the album, Vai sums it up as 'Jimi Hendrix meets Jesus Christ at a...

.

The seven-string guitar became more prominent when the band Korn

Korn

Korn is an American nu metal band from Bakersfield, California, formed in 1993. The current band line up includes four members: Jonathan Davis, James "Munky" Shaffer, Reginald "Fieldy" Arvizu, and Ray Luzier. The band was formed as an expansion of L.A.P.D.The band released their first demo album,...

 featured Ibanez Universe guitars on their 1994 debut album

Korn (album)

Korn is the self-titled debut album by American nu metal band Korn, released on October 4, 1994, through Immortal/Epic Records. Before recording the album, the band played several gigs in an attempt to promote themselves. They were approached by Immortal/Epic Records after a performance at...

, capitalizing on the massive low end produced by the seventh string (typically a low A). This period marked a highwater point in the popularity of the seven-string guitar, as manufacturers jumped on the seven string bandwagon that they had previously steered clear of including such "traditional" brands as Fender subsidiary Squier

Squier

Squier is a musical instrument brand name owned by the Fender Musical Instruments Corporation.-History:Fender, under the ownership of CBS, acquired the Squier brand name in 1965 when it bought a USA based string making firm , but it lay dormant for many years...

 and Gibson

Gibson Guitar Corporation

The Gibson Guitar Corporation, formerly of Kalamazoo, Michigan and currently of Nashville, Tennessee, manufactures guitars and other instruments which sell under a variety of brand names...

 subsidiary Epiphone

Epiphone

The Epiphone Company is a musical instrument manufacturer founded in 1873 by Anastasios Stathopoulos. Epiphone was bought by Chicago Musical Instrument Company, which also owned Gibson Guitar Corporation, in 1957. Epiphone was Gibson's main rival in the archtop market...

, and manufacturers who had been producing sevens expanded their offerings. The trend eventually passed, but many guitarists were introduced to the extended range offered by a seven-string guitar during this period who might not have otherwise been. This was somewhat offset by a growing stigma that a seven-string guitar was a "nu metal

Nu metal

Nu metal is a subgenre of heavy metal. It is a fusion genre which combines elements of heavy metal with other genres, including grunge and hip hop...

" instrument, fit only for heavy riffing. This was ironic as Korn guitarists Munky

James Shaffer

James Christian 'Munky' Shaffer is the guitarist for the nu metal band Korn . According to Korn's video "Who Then Now?", The nickname 'Munky' is a reference to his feet which resemble monkey's hands when spread...

 and Head remember being told in their early days that the seven-string guitar couldn't be used for riffing, as it was a guitar for technical guitar players.

In the 1990s, several other heavy metal guitarists began using seven-string instruments (notably John Petrucci

John Petrucci

John Peter Petrucci is an American guitarist and songwriter best known as a founding member of the progressive metal band Dream Theater. Along with his former bandmate Mike Portnoy, he has produced all Dream Theater albums since their 1999 release, Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory...

, Trey Azagthoth

Trey Azagthoth

Trey Azagthoth is an American musician best known as founder and guitarist of the Florida death metal band Morbid Angel. Azagthoth began playing at the age of 16...

, and Erik Rutan

Erik Rutan

Erik Rutan is an American heavy metal musician from New Jersey. He currently leads Hate Eternal on lead vocals and guitar and has also spent time with Morbid Angel and Ripping Corpse...

), seeing the possibility for detuned riffing while preserving the full upper range of the guitar for solos. However, the seven-string guitar failed to really catch on at this phase in its development, and the Universe model was discontinued briefly in 1995; notable users of the Universe also include Korn

Korn

Korn is an American nu metal band from Bakersfield, California, formed in 1993. The current band line up includes four members: Jonathan Davis, James "Munky" Shaffer, Reginald "Fieldy" Arvizu, and Ray Luzier. The band was formed as an expansion of L.A.P.D.The band released their first demo album,...

. Matt Bellamy from Muse

Muse (band)

Muse are an English alternative rock band from Teignmouth, Devon, formed in 1994. The band consists of school friends Matthew Bellamy , Christopher Wolstenholme and Dominic Howard...

 uses a custom red Manson seven-string to play just one song, "Citizen Erased", with a AADDGBE tuning (the song was originally recorded on a detuned six-string). Dino Cazares

Dino Cazares

Dino Cazares, born in El Centro, California, is a Mexican-American musician and the guitarist for Los Angeles-based industrial metal group Fear Factory. He also plays in the metal bands Divine Heresy and Asesino.-Biography:...

 uses custom seven-string Ibanez guitars; Christian Olde Wolbers

Christian Olde Wolbers

Christian Olde Wolbers , is the guitarist of the metal band Arkaea. He is the former bassist and guitarist of the industrial metal band Fear Factory, and is now in Beowülf.-Biography:...

 has his own signature Jackson

Jackson Guitars

__FORCETOC__Jackson is a renowned brand of electric guitar that bears the name of its founder, Grover Jackson.-Early years:Grover Jackson obtained ownership in Charvel's Guitar Repair of Glendora, California in the 1970s with a promise to bolster Charvel's business...

 seven-string guitar, Jeff Loomis

Jeff Loomis

Jeff Loomis is an American musician, best known for his role as lead guitarist in the progressive metal band Nevermore.-Early days:...

 has a signature model made by Schecter

Schecter Guitar Research

Schecter Guitar Research, commonly known as simply as Schecter, is a US guitar manufacturer. The company was founded in 1976 by David Schecter and originally produced only replacement parts for existing guitars from manufacturers such as Fender and Gibson...

 and Stephen Carpenter

Stephen Carpenter

Stephen Carpenter is an American musician known as the co-founder and lead guitarist of the alternative metal band Deftones. His guitar technique makes use of both ringing open strings and dissonant chord voicings, as well as stock power chords in polyrhythms...

 has several of his own models released by ESP

ESP Guitars

, located in North Hollywood, California, is an American-based, Japanese-owned manufacturer of electric guitars and basses.- History :In 1975, Hisatake Shibuya opened a shop called Electric Sound Products in Tokyo. It provided custom replacement parts for guitars. In 1976, ESP gained a reputation...

.

Other seven-string guitars

In the early 2000s, Roger McGuinn

Roger McGuinn

James Roger McGuinn is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. He is best known for being the lead singer and lead guitarist on many of The Byrds' records...

 (renowned for his skills on the twelve-string guitar and for his long association with The Byrds

The Byrds

The Byrds were an American rock band, formed in Los Angeles, California in 1964. The band underwent multiple line-up changes throughout its existence, with frontman Roger McGuinn remaining the sole consistent member until the group disbanded in 1973...

) worked with C. F. Martin & Company

C. F. Martin & Company

C.F. Martin & Company is a US guitar manufacturer established in 1833 by Christian Frederick Martin. Martin is highly regarded for its steel-string guitars, and is a leading mass manufacturer of flattop acoustics with models that retail for thousands of dollars and vintage instruments that often...

 to develop a seven-string folk guitar. McGuinn's guitar (currently being marketed by Martin) is tuned the same as a standard folk guitar with steel strings, but the third (G) string is augmented with a high octave string. Many of McGuinn's notable guitar solos utilize the G string of the twelve-string guitar to perform the main melody, and therefore the Martin seven-string guitar was designed to achieve this extended range playing without the need for doubling all six of the guitar's strings. In 2008 experimental luthier Yuri Landman

Yuri Landman

Yuri Landman is a Dutch experimental luthier who has made several experimental electric string instruments for a list of artists including Lee Ranaldo of Sonic Youth, Liars, Jad Fair of Half Japanese and Liam Finn...

 built the Springtime

Springtime (guitar)

The Springtime is an experimental electric guitar with seven strings and three outputs. The instrument was created in 2008 by Dutch luthier Yuri Landman for guitar player Laura-Mary Carter of Blood Red Shoes.-Technical information:...

, a 3-way stereo seven string guitar for Blood Red Shoes

Blood Red Shoes

Blood Red Shoes are an indie rock duo from Brighton, England. They have released two full-length albums, Box of Secrets and Fire Like This, plus a slew of early singles on limited 7" vinyl pressings.-Formation:...

.

In 2010, Inox Guitars has created a mix of the Brazilian Viola caipira and the Russian semistrunka (семиструнка)

Russian guitar

The Russian guitar is a seven-string acoustic guitar that arrived in Russia toward the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, most probably as an evolution of the cittern, kobza, and torban...

. This instrument has 2 bass strings (as the 6th and 7th strings of the semistrunka) and five treble courses (as the Viola caipira) and it is used in open tuning (GDGDGBD) as a slide guitar.

The Mexican guitarra séptima

There is a guitar of seven courses with double string guitar, totalizing 14 strings, known as Guitarra séptima

Guitarra séptima

The guitarra séptima or guitarra sétima is a Mexican guitar with thirteen strings, strung in seven courses, six being double. This guitar is smaller than a six-string guitar and also has less resonance. It had popularity in 19th century...

.

Notable users

• Matthew Bellamy
  Matthew Bellamy
  Matthew James Bellamy is an English musician, singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, best known as the lead vocalist, lead guitarist, pianist, and main songwriter of the alternative rock band Muse.-Early life:...
  
  
• Heri Joensen
• Terji Skibenæs
• Kaoru (musician)
• Chris Broderick
  Chris Broderick
  Christopher Broderick is the virtuoso guitarist of the American thrash metal band Megadeth. He currently resides in Sherman Oaks, California...
  
  
• Unearth
  Unearth
  Unearth is an American metalcore band from Winthrop, Massachusetts. Formed in 1998, the group has released five studio albums. Their fourth record, The March was released on October 14, 2008 meeting with high positive reception by many...
  
  
• Dino Cazares
  Dino Cazares
  Dino Cazares, born in El Centro, California, is a Mexican-American musician and the guitarist for Los Angeles-based industrial metal group Fear Factory. He also plays in the metal bands Divine Heresy and Asesino.-Biography:...
  
  
• Corey Beaulieu
• Dino 7 Cordas
  Dino 7 Cordas
  Horondino José da Silva , best known as Dino Sete Cordas , was a Brazilian guitar player renowned as the greatest influence in seven-string guitar, a musical instrument in which he developed his own language and techniques, and one of the greatest choro instrumentalists ever.He developed the...
  
  
• Jeff Loomis
  Jeff Loomis
  Jeff Loomis is an American musician, best known for his role as lead guitarist in the progressive metal band Nevermore.-Early days:...
  
  
• Davide Tiso
  Davide Tiso
  Davide Tiso is a guitarist, composer and multi-instrumentalist. He originates from Padova, in Italy, but currently resides in Berkeley, California. He is a member of extreme metal band Ephel Duath, a band he started in 1998...
  
  
• John Petrucci
  John Petrucci
  John Peter Petrucci is an American guitarist and songwriter best known as a founding member of the progressive metal band Dream Theater. Along with his former bandmate Mike Portnoy, he has produced all Dream Theater albums since their 1999 release, Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory...
  
  
• Brad Delson
  Brad Delson
  Bradford Phillip "Brad" Delson is an American guitarist, best known as the lead guitarist and one of the founding members of the Grammy Award winning rock band Linkin Park. He is also the A&R Representative for Machine Shop Recordings....
  
  
• Chris Storey
• Steve Vai
  Steve Vai
  Steven Siro "Steve" Vai is a three time Grammy Award-winning American guitarist, songwriter and producer who has sold over 15 million albums. Steve Vai is widely known as a flamboyant guitar virtuoso....
  
  
• Devin Townsend
  Devin Townsend
  Devin Garret Townsend is a Canadian musician and record producer. He was the founder, songwriter, vocalist, and guitarist in extreme metal band Strapping Young Lad from 1994 to 2007 and has had an extensive career as a solo artist....
  
  
• Marc Rizzo
  Marc Rizzo
  Marc Rizzo is the lead guitarist of American metal band Soulfly and formerly of Ill Niño. He has featured on four Soulfly albums to date: Prophecy, Dark Ages, Conquer, and Omen. He has also released three solo instrumental albums; Colossal Myopia, The Ultimate Devotion, and Legionnaire...
  
  
• Mårten Hagström
  Mårten Hagström
  Mårten Hagström, , is the rhythm guitarist for the Swedish experimental metal band Meshuggah. He joined the band after the release of their first album, which allowed Jens Kidman to focus on his vocal performances. He is known for his strong and complex rhythm guitar playing...
  
   (now mainly uses 8 string)
• George Van Eps
  George Van Eps
  George Van Eps was an American swing and Mainstream jazz guitarist noted both for his recordings as a leader, and for his work as a session musician. He was also the author of instructional books that explored his approach to guitar-based harmony...
  
  
• Howard Alden
  Howard Alden
  Howard Alden is an American jazz guitarist born in Newport Beach, California. He has recorded a long series of albums for Concord Records. His performances were dubbed over Sean Penn as 'Emmet Ray' in the 1999 Woody Allen film Sweet and Lowdown...
  
  
• Buddy Jones
  Buddy Jones
  Buddy Jones was an American Western swing musician who recorded in the 1930s and 1940s.-Life:He was born in Asheville, North Carolina. In 1935 he made his first recordings for Decca Records...
  
  
• Alan Aldo
• Stephen Carpenter
  Stephen Carpenter
  Stephen Carpenter is an American musician known as the co-founder and lead guitarist of the alternative metal band Deftones. His guitar technique makes use of both ringing open strings and dissonant chord voicings, as well as stock power chords in polyrhythms...
  
   (Used an 8 string to record Diamond Eyes
  Diamond Eyes
  Diamond Eyes is the sixth album by American Alternative metal band Deftones, released worldwide on May 4, 2010 through Warner Bros. and Reprise Records...
  
  )
• Juan Hernandez
  Juan Hernández
  Juan Bautista Hernández Pérez is a retired boxer from Cuba, who won the golden medal in the Bantamweight division at age seventeen at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow...
  
  
• Ben Daniel
• Trey Azagthoth
  Trey Azagthoth
  Trey Azagthoth is an American musician best known as founder and guitarist of the Florida death metal band Morbid Angel. Azagthoth began playing at the age of 16...
  
  
• Crossfade
  Crossfade (band)
  -Studio albums:-Singles:...
  
   (Vocalist/guitarist Ed Sloan uses 7s exclusively; even when guitarist Les Hall
  Les Hall
  Les Hall is an American composer, producer, multi-instrumentalist, and songwriter from Columbia, South Carolina, best known for his involvement in Crossfade and 70 Volt Parade, Trey Anastasio's backup band after the demise of Phish...
  
   is using a six-string in Dropped D tuning)
• Fredrik Thordendal
  Fredrik Thordendal
  Fredrik Thordendal is the lead guitarist and a founding member of the Swedish experimental metal band Meshuggah.He, along with Meshuggah's rhythm guitarist Mårten Hagström were rated #35 by Guitar World in the top 100 greatest heavy metal guitarists of all-time.-Musical career:Under the name...
  
   (now mainly uses 8 string)
• Christian Olde Wolbers
  Christian Olde Wolbers
  Christian Olde Wolbers , is the guitarist of the metal band Arkaea. He is the former bassist and guitarist of the industrial metal band Fear Factory, and is now in Beowülf.-Biography:...
  
  
• Brian Welch
  Brian Welch
  Brian Phillip Welch , better known as Head, is an American musician best known as the former guitarist and co-founder of the nu metal band Korn...
  
   (now uses 6 string baritone guitars)
• Steve Dooremalen
• James Shaffer
  James Shaffer
  James Christian 'Munky' Shaffer is the guitarist for the nu metal band Korn . According to Korn's video "Who Then Now?", The nickname 'Munky' is a reference to his feet which resemble monkey's hands when spread...
  
  
• Matt Heafy
  Matt Heafy
  Matthew Kiichi "Matt" Heafy is a Japanese-American musician, best known as the lead vocalist and lead guitarist for the American Metal band Trivium. Heafy is also the vocalist for the band Capharnaum, along with Trivium's former producer Jason Suecof.-Biography:Heafy is Japanese from his mother...
  
  
• Tosin Abasi
  Tosin Abasi
  Tosin Abasi is a Washington DC based virtuoso guitarist who is best known for playing in the instrumental progressive metal band Animals As Leaders. Before Animals as Leaders was formed, he was the guitarist for the technical metalcore band Reflux...
  
   (now uses 8 string)
• Noel Mendez
• Nickelback
  Nickelback
  Nickelback is a Canadian rock band from Hanna, Alberta. Since 1995 the band has included guitarist and lead vocalist Chad Kroeger, guitarist and back-up vocalist Ryan Peake and bassist Mike Kroeger.. The band's current drummer and percussionist is Daniel Adair who has been with the band since 2005....
  
   (on Burn It to the Ground
  Burn It to the Ground
  "Burn It to the Ground" is the fourth U.S. single released off of Canadian rock band Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse.- Promotional use :...
  
  )
• Nigel Gavin
  Nigel Gavin
  Nigel Gavin is a New Zealand based musician and composer, best known as a guitar player. In addition to being a highly regarded solo artist and session musician, Nigel has been a member of bands such as popular New Zealand jazz quartett The Nairobi Trio, Robert Fripp's The League of Crafty...
  
  
• Miya (Mucc
  Mucc
  is a Japanese visual kei rock band formed in 1997. Named after a character from the Japanese children's TV show Hirake! Ponkikki, the band is also known by the nickname 69 since "six nine" can be pronounced "muku" in Japanese...
  
  )
• Dale Gilburt
• Rusty Cooley
  Rusty Cooley
  Rusty Cooley is a guitarist from Houston, Texas known for his highly refined guitar technique.-Early life:Rusty received his first equipment on his fifteenth birthday. From that day on Cooley immersed himself in music, practicing upwards of 4 hours a day...
  
  
• JB Brubaker ( August Burns Red
  August Burns Red
  August Burns Red is an American metal band, from Manheim, Pennsylvania. Formed in 2003, the group began their first performances while a majority of the members were attending their senior year of high school, and soon began playing shows around Lancaster, before being signed to CI Records, and...
  
   )
• Wayde Cooper
• Jean-Robert Royer
• Nick Woodward
  Nick Woodward
  Nick Woodward, nicknamed "Quik" Nick is a former NASCAR driver. He was a part-time fixture in the sport from 2001-2003. Woodward still races on the short tracks of the Eastern coast.-Craftsman Truck Series:...
  
  
• Raphael Rabello
• Zachary Costilla
• Nergal
  Adam Darski
  Adam Michał Darski also known by his stage name Nergal and previously Holocausto, is a Polish musician and television personality, best known for being the frontman for blackened death metal band Behemoth.- Biography :...
  
  
• Seth
  Patryk Dominik Sztyber
  Patryk Dominik Sztyber , stage name Seth, is a Polish heavy metal musician. He is the rhythm, lead and acoustic guitarist and also backing vocalist in Behemoth...
  
  
• Dave Felton
• Wes Borland
  Wes Borland
  Wesley Louden Borland is an American musician and artist, best known as the guitarist for the band Limp Bizkit. He has been in several other bands as well including: Black Light Burns, The Damning Well, Goatslayer, Big Dumb Face, and Combichrist...
  
   (he has since switched to using 6 string guitars exclusively)
• Reece Fullwood
• Jani Liimatainen
  Jani Liimatainen
  Jani Allan Kristian Liimatainen is the former guitar player and one of the founding members of the power metal band Sonata Arctica....
  
  
• Elias Viljanen
  Elias Viljanen
  Elias 'E.Vil' Viljanen is a Finnish musician, known for being the guitarist for Sonata Arctica since 2007. Viljanen joined Sonata Arctica in spring 2007 in order to replace Jani Liimatainen, who left the band in August 2007 to fulfill his civil duties in Finland...
  
  
• Misha Mansoor
• Angelus Valentine
• Alex Gregory
• Jesse Ketive
• Aaron Bagby

See also

• Russian guitar
  Russian guitar
  The Russian guitar is a seven-string acoustic guitar that arrived in Russia toward the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, most probably as an evolution of the cittern, kobza, and torban...
  
  
• Eight-string guitar
• Ten-string guitar
  Ten-string guitar
  There are many varieties of ten-string guitar, including:* Both electric and acoustic guitars.* Instruments used principally for classical, folk and popular music.* Both coursed and uncoursed instruments.-Ten-stringed harp guitars:...
  
  
• Harp guitar
  Harp guitar
  ]The harp guitar is a stringed instrument with a history of well over two centuries. While there are several unrelated historical stringed instruments that have appropriated the name “harp-guitar” over the centuries, the term today is understood as the accepted vernacular to refer to a particular...
  
  
• List of artists who use seven-string guitars

External links

• Abdallah Harati, 7 Strings Brazilian Guitar Player
• A Professor String article on 7-string sets and beyond
• Photogallery of Seven-string guitars and more
• Brazilian Luthier João Batista's 7-string guitars
• An article on playing guitar Russian style
• Online chord generator specifically for seven string guitars.
• New Orleans Luthier Jimmy Foster's 7-string guitars
• 7 string metal body resonator, harp guitar Custom built for Jeff Martin from the Tea Party
• Gretsch Van Eps signature 7-string guitars