Cheap Thrills: Unlocking Musical Creativity and Exploration through Guitar Modification

Instrumental modification makes available a different set of affordances (De Souza 2017; Perks 2023a) and therefore may alter or disrupt a performer’s ‘habitual connections between action and sound’ (De Souza 2017: 106). This can prompt the development of new performance techniques, timbres, or approaches to music making that might otherwise not exist. Following the rapid expansion of commercial guitar manufacture in the second half of the twentieth century, guitar modification – as a deviation from the ‘norm’ – is more likely to be conducted in the first instance by, or at the request of, the performer themselves, in the pursuit of specific artistic goals (see Waksman 1999; 2004). This process, as well as any creative agency it may prompt or facilitate, is the focus of this chapter. By reviewing the practice of guitarists renowned for modifying their instruments in distinctive ways, as well as the author’s own approaches to composition and performance using adapted guitars, the chapter examines different modes of guitar modification and considers the extent to which they are shaping musical creativity, exploration and understanding in the twenty-first century. It further posits that, in both practical and economic terms, the guitar is unparalleled in its suitability for instrumental modification and, as such, provides a highly accessible and equitable means of musical exploration.