Geoffrey Arnold Beck was born in Surrey, England, and attended Wimbledon Art College. His father was an accountant, and his mother worked in a chocolate factory. Beck sang in a church choir, attended Sutton Manor School, Sutton East County Secondary Modern School, and later on, Wimbledon College of Art.

Jeff was influenced heavily by the electric guitar at the age of 6 years young thanks to Les Paul and later Cliff Gallop, BB King, Steve Cropper, and Lonnie Mack. As his creativity grew, he learned to play on a borrowed guitar and made several attempts to build his own where he built his first instrument, using a cigar box, a picture frame for the neck, and string from a radio-controlled toy airplane.

‘”I was interested in the electric guitar even before I knew the difference between electric and acoustic. The electric guitar seemed to be a totally fascinating plank of wood with knobs and switches on it. I just had to have one.” — Jeff Beck

While still in school at Wimbledon College of Art, he played in successful acts like Screaming Lord Sutch and the Savages during 1962 when they recorded “Dracula’s Daughter”/”Come Back Baby” for Oriole Records.

n 1963, after Ian Stewart of the Rolling Stones introduced him to R&B, he formed the act Nightshift with whom he played at the 100 Club in Oxford Street, and recorded a single, “Stormy Monday” backed with “That’s My Story”, for the Piccadilly label. Beck joined the Rumbles, a Croydon band, and then in 1963 for a short period he was lead guitarist, playing Gene Vincent and Buddy Holly songs, displaying a talent for mimicking guitar styles. Later in 1963, he joined the Tridents, a band from the Chiswick area.

“They were really my scene because they were playing flat-out R&B, like Jimmy Reed stuff, and we supercharged it all up and made it really rocky. I got off on that, even though it was only twelve-bar blues.”

1964 released a single by the Fitz and Startz titled “I’m Not Running Away“, with B-side “So Sweet“.

In March 1965, Beck was recruited by the Yardbirds to succeed Eric Clapton on the recommendation of fellow session musician Jimmy Page, who had been their initial choice. The Yardbirds recorded most of their Top 40 hit songs during Beck’s short but significant 20-month tenure with the band allowing him only one full album, which became known as Roger the Engineer (titled Over Under Sideways Down in the U.S.), released in 1966. During his tenure, the band created the memorable singles “Heart Full of Soul,” “I’m a Man” and “Shapes of Things.”

In May 1966, Beck recorded an instrumental titled “Beck’s Bolero. Rather than members of the Yardbirds, he was backed by Jimmy Page on 12-string rhythm guitar, Keith Moon on drums, John Paul Jones on bass, and Nicky Hopkins on piano. In June, Page joined the Yardbirds, at first on bass and later on second lead guitar. This dual lead-guitar lineup was filmed performing an adaptation of “Train Kept A-Rollin“, titled “Stroll On“, for the 1966 Michelangelo Antonioni film Blow Up.

In 1967, Beck recorded several solo singles for pop producer Mickie Most, including “Hi Ho Silver Lining” and “Tallyman”, which also included his vocals. He then formed The Jeff Beck Group, which included Rod Stewart on vocals, Ronnie Wood on bass, Nicky Hopkins on piano, and Aynsley Dunbar on drums (replaced by Micky Waller). Also, during 1967 Pink Floyd had wanted to recruit Beck to be its guitarist after the departure of Syd Barrett but “None of us had the nerve to ask him.” The group produced two albums for Columbia Records (Epic in the United States): Truth (as Jeff Beck, August 1968) and Beck-Ola (July 1969). Truth, released five months before the first Led Zeppelin album, features “You Shook Me”, a song written by Willie Dixon and first recorded by Muddy Waters, also covered on the Led Zeppelin debut with a similar arrangement. It sold well (reaching No. 15 on the Billboard charts). Beck-Ola saw drummer Micky Waller replaced by Tony Newman, and, while well-received, was less successful both commercially and critically. By 1969, following the death of Brian Jones, Beck was approached about joining the Rolling Stones.

Beck was a dedicated vegetarian. In September 1969, he teamed with the rhythm section of Vanilla Fudge: bassist Tim Bogert and drummer Carmine Appice (when they were in England to resolve contractual issues), but when Beck fractured his skull in a car accident near Maidstone in December the plan was postponed for two-and-a-half years, during which time Bogert and Appice formed Cactus.

In 1970, when Beck had regained his health, he set about forming a band with the drummer Cozy Powell. Beck, Powell, and producer Mickie Most flew to the United States and recorded several tracks at Motown’s famed Studio A in Hitsville U.S.A. with The Funk Brothers, Motown’s in-house band, but the results remained unreleased. By April 1971 Beck had completed the line-up of this new group with guitarist/vocalist Bobby Tench, keyboard player Max Middleton, and bassist Clive Chaman. The new band performed as “The Jeff Beck Group” but had a substantially different sound from the first line-up.

Rough and Ready (October 1971), the first album they recorded, on which Beck wrote or co-wrote six of the album’s seven tracks (the exception being written by Middleton), included elements of soul, rhythm-and-blues, and jazz, foreshadowing the direction Beck’s music would take later in the decade.

A second album Jeff Beck Group (July 1972) was recorded at TMI studios in Memphis, Tennessee, with the same personnel. Beck employed Steve Cropper as producer and the album displayed a strong soul influence, five of the nine tracks being covers of songs by American artists. One, “I Got to Have a Song“, was the first of four Stevie Wonder compositions covered by Beck.

Beck then started collaborating with bassist Tim Bogert and drummer Carmine Appice, who became available following the demise of Cactus but continued touring as the Jeff Beck Group in August 1972, to fulfill contractual obligations with his promoter, with a line-up including Bogert, Appice, Max Middleton and vocalist Kim Milford. After six appearances Milford was replaced by Bobby Tench, who was flown in from the United Kingdom for the Arie Crown Theatre Chicago performance and the rest of the tour,  which concluded at the Paramount North West Theatre, Seattle. After the tour, Tench and Middleton left the band and the power trio Beck, Bogert & Appice emerged. Appice took on the role of vocalist with Bogert and Beck contributing occasionally.

They were included on the bill for Rock at The Oval in September 1972, still as “The Jeff Beck Group,” which marked the start of a tour schedule of the U.K., the Netherlands, and Germany. Another U.S. tour began in October 1972, starting at the Hollywood Sportatorium Florida and concluding on 11 November 1972 at The Warehouse, New Orleans.  In April 1973 the album Beck, Bogert & Appice was released (on Epic Records).

On 3 July 1973 Beck joined David Bowie onstage to perform “The Jean Genie”/”Love Me Do” and “Around and Around.” The show was recorded and filmed, but none of the released editions included Beck. During October 1973 Beck recorded tracks for Michael Fennelly‘s  album Lane Changer and attended sessions with Hummingbird, a band derived from The Jeff Beck Group, but did not contribute to their eponymous first album.

Early in January 1974 Beck, Bogert & Appice played at the Rainbow Theatre in London as part of a European tour. The concert was broadcast in full on the U.S. show Rock Around the World in September of the same year. This last recorded work by the band previewed material intended for a second studio album, included on the bootleg At Last Rainbow. The tracks “Blues Deluxe” and “BBA Boogie” from this concert were later included on the Jeff Beck compilation Beckology (1991).

Beck, Bogert & Appice dissolved in April 1974 before their second studio album (produced by Jimmy Miller) was finished. Their live album Beck, Bogert & Appice Live in Japan, recorded during their 1973 tour of Japan, was not released until February 1975 by Epic/Sony.

After a few months, Beck entered Underhill Studio and met with the group Upp, whom he recruited as the backing band for his appearance on the BBC TV program Guitar Workshop in August 1974. Beck produced and played on their self-titled debut album and their second album This Way Upp. In October Beck began to record instrumentals at AIR Studios with Max Middleton, bassist Phil Chen, and drummer Richard Bailey using George Martin as producer and arranger.

Beck’s solo album Blow by Blow (March 1975) was produced by George Martin aka the 5th Beatle melding jazz fusion which evolved from these sessions and showcased Beck’s technical prowess in jazz-rock. The album reached number four in the charts and is Beck’s most commercially successful release. He teamed up with Seal on the Hendrix tribute “Stone Free,” created a jazz-fusion group led by synthesizer player Jan Hammer and honored rockabilly guitarist Cliff Gallup with the album “Crazy Legs.”

Beck’s guitar work can be heard on the soundtracks of such films as Stomp the Yard, Shallow Hal, Casino, Honeymoon in Vegas, Twins, Observe and Report and Little Big League.

Beck, Bogert & Appice switched in 1975 to a mainly instrumental style, with a focus on innovative sound, and his releases spanned genres ranging from blues rock, hard rock, jazz fusion, and a blend of guitar-rock and electronica.

Beck ranked in the top five of Rolling Stone and other magazine’s list of 100 greatest guitarists. He was often called a “guitarist’s guitarist.” Rolling Stone described him as “one of the most influential lead guitarists in rock.” Beck put together a live band for a United States tour, preceded by a small and unannounced gig at The Newlands Tavern in Peckham, London. He toured through April and May 1975, mostly supporting the Mahavishnu Orchestra, retaining Max Middleton on keyboards but with a new rhythm section of bassist Wilbur Bascomb and noted session drummer Bernard “Pretty” Purdie. In a May 1975 show in Cleveland, Ohio (Music Hall), he became frustrated with an early version of a talk box he used on his arrangement of the Beatles’ “She’s a Woman”, and after breaking a string, tossed his legendary Yardbirds-era Stratocaster guitar off the stage. He did the same with the talk box and finished the show playing a Les Paul guitar without the box. During this tour he performed at Yuya Uchida’s “World Rock Festival”, playing a total of eight songs with Purdie. In addition, he performed a guitar and drum instrumental with Johnny Yoshinaga and, at the end of the festival, joined in a live jam with bassist Felix Pappalardi of Mountain and vocalist Akira “Joe” Yamanaka from the Flower Travellin’ Band. Only his set with Purdie was recorded and released.

Beck returned to the Air Studios and recorded Wired (1976), which paired ex-Mahavishnu Orchestra drummer and composer Narada Michael Walden and keyboardist Jan Hammer. The album used a jazz-rock fusion style, which sounded similar to the work of his two collaborators. To promote the album, Beck joined forces with the Jan Hammer Group, playing a show supporting Alvin Lee at The Roundhouse in May 1976, before embarking on a seven-month-long world tour. This resulted in the live album Jeff Beck with the Jan Hammer Group Live (1977).

At this point, Beck was a tax exile and took up residency in the U.S., remaining there until his return to the U.K. in the autumn of 1977. In the spring of 1978, he began rehearsing with ex-Return to Forever bassist Stanley Clarke and drummer Gerry Brown. Beck toured Japan for three weeks in November 1978 with an ad hoc group consisting of Clarke and newcomers Tony Hymas (keyboards) and Simon Phillips (drums) from Jack Bruce’s band.

Work then began on a new studio album at the Who’s Ramport Studios in London and continued sporadically throughout 1979, resulting in There & Back in June 1980. It featured three tracks composed and recorded with Jan Hammer, while five were written with Hymas. Stanley Clarke was replaced by Mo Foster on bass, both on the album and the subsequent tours. Its release was followed by extensive touring in the United States, Japan, and the United Kingdom.

In 1981 Beck made a series of historic live appearances with his Yardbirds predecessor Eric Clapton at the Amnesty International-sponsored benefit concerts dubbed The Secret Policeman’s Other Ball shows. He appeared with Clapton on “Crossroads”, “Further on up the Road”, and his arrangement of Stevie Wonder’s “Cause We’ve Ended As Lovers”. Beck also featured prominently in an all-star band finale performance of “I Shall Be Released” with Clapton, Sting, Phil Collins, Donovan and Bob Geldof. Beck’s contributions were seen and heard in the resulting album and film, both of which achieved worldwide success in 1982. Another benefit show, the ARMS Concert for multiple sclerosis featured a jam with Beck, Eric Clapton, and Jimmy Page. They performed “Tulsa Time” and “Layla”. In 1985 Beck released Flash, featuring a variety of vocalists, but most notably former bandmate Rod Stewart on a rendition of Curtis Mayfield’s “People Get Ready. The aforementioned cover song was also released as a single which went on to become a hit. A video was made for the track and the clip achieved heavy rotation on MTV. The two also played a few dates together during this time but a full tour in tandem never materialized. At Stewart’s induction to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992, Beck gave the induction speech. During this period, Beck made several guest appearances with other performers, including the movie Twins, where he played guitar with singer Nicolette Larson.

After a four-year break, he made a return to instrumental music with the album Jeff Beck’s Guitar Shop (1989), the first album to feature Beck as a fingerstyle guitarist, leaving the plectrum playing style. It was only his third album to be released in the 1980s. Much of Beck’s sparse and sporadic recording schedule was due in part to a long battle with tinnitus.

In the 1990s, Beck had a higher musical output. He contributed to Jon Bon Jovi’s solo debut album “Blaze of Glory” in 1990, playing the main solo of the album’s title song, which was also the theme song to the movie Young Guns II. The same year, he was a featured performer on Hans Zimmer’s score for the film Days of Thunder. He played lead guitar on Roger Waters’ 1992 concept album Amused to Death, and on the 1993 albums The Red Shoes by Kate Bush and Love Scenes by Beverley Craven.  He recorded the instrumental soundtrack album Frankie’s House (1992), as well as Crazy Legs (1993), a tribute album to 1950s rockabilly group Gene Vincent and the Blue Caps and their influential guitarist Cliff Gallup.

Beck rehearsed with Guns N’ Roses for their concert in Paris in 1992, but did not play in the actual concert due to ear damage caused by a Matt Sorum cymbal crash, causing Beck to become temporarily deaf. The Yardbirds were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that very year in 1992.

He accompanied Paul Rodgers of Bad Company on the album Muddy Water Blues: A Tribute to Muddy Waters in 1993. Beck’s next release was in 1999, his first foray into guitar-based electronica, Who Else!. The album also marked Beck’s first collaboration with a female musician, Jennifer Batten, in touring, writing, and recording as well as the first time he had worked with another guitarist on his own material since playing in the Yardbirds. Beck continued to work with Batten through the post-release tour of You Had It Coming in 2001.

The song “Plan B” from the 2003 release Jeff, earned Beck his fourth Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance, and was proof that the new electro-guitar style he used for the two earlier albums would continue to dominate. Beck was the opening act for B.B. King in the summer of 2003 and appeared at Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Guitar Festival in 2004. Additionally, in 2004, Beck was featured on the song “54-46 Was My Number” by Toots and the Maytals as part of the album True Love which won the Grammy Award for Best Reggae Album.’

In 2007, he accompanied Kelly Clarkson for her cover of Patty Griffin’s “Up to the Mountain“, during the Idol Gives Back episode of American Idol. The performance was recorded live and afterward, was immediately released for sale. In the same year, he appeared once again at Clapton’s Crossroads Guitar Festival, performing with Vinnie Colaiuta, Jason Rebello, and the then 21-year-old bassist Tal Wilkenfeld.

Beck announced a world tour in early 2009 and remained faithful to the same lineup of musicians as in his tour two years before, playing and recording at Ronnie Scott’s in London to a sold-out audience. Beck played on the song “Black Cloud” on the 2009 Morrissey album Years of Refusal and later that year, Harvey Goldsmith became Beck’s manager.

Beck was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on 4 April 2009, as a solo artist. The award was presented by Jimmy Page. Beck performed “Train Kept A-Rollin’” along with Page, Ronnie Wood, Joe Perry, Flea, and Metallica members James Hetfield, Robert Trujillo, Lars Ulrich, Kirk Hammett and Jason Newsted.

Beck’s album, Emotion & Commotion, was released in April 2010. It features a mixture of original songs and covers such as “Over the Rainbow” and “Nessun Dorma“. Joss Stone and Imelda May provided some of the guest vocals. Two tracks from Emotion & Commotion won Grammy Awards in 2011: “Nessun Dorma” won the Grammy Award for Best Pop Instrumental Performance, and “Hammerhead” won the Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance. Beck collaborated on “Imagine” for the 2010 Herbie Hancock album, The Imagine Project along with Seal, P!nk, India.Arie, Konono N°1, Oumou Sangare and others and received a third Grammy in 2011 for Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals for the track.

Beck’s 2010 World Tour band featured Grammy-winning musician Narada Michael Walden on drums, Rhonda Smith on bass, and Jason Rebello on keyboards. He released a live album titled Live and Exclusive from the Grammy Museum on 25 October 2010. On 9 June 2010 Beck with Imelda May’s band recorded a DVD named Rock ‘n’ Roll Party (Honoring Les Paul), of a concert at the Iridium in NYC featuring several Les Paul songs (with Ms. May doing the Mary Ford vocals).

In 2011, Beck received two honorary degrees from British universities. On 18 July 2011, he was honoured with a fellowship from University of the Arts London in recognition of his “outstanding contribution to the field of Music”.  On 21 July 2011 Beck was also presented with an honorary doctorate from University of Sussex (by Sanjeev Bhaskar, the university’s chancellor), stating the honour acknowledged “an outstanding musical career and celebrated the relationship between the university and the Brighton Institute of Modern Music (BIMM)”.

In 2013, it was announced that he would be performing on Beach Boys founder Brian Wilson’s solo album (alongside Beach Boys Al Jardine and David Marks) on Capitol Records.  On 20 June, Wilson’s website announced that the material might be split into three albums; one of new pop songs, another of mostly instrumental tracks with Beck, and another of interwoven tracks dubbed “the suite“. Beck also accompanied Wilson (along with Jardine and Marks) on an eighteen date fall 2013 tour which started in late September and ended in late October (prior to which, Beck made clear he regarded sharing the stage with Wilson as a complete honour for him).

In 2014, to mark the beginning of Jeff’s World Tour in Japan, a three-track CD titled Yosogai was released on 5 April; the album had yet to be finalized at the time of the tour. In November 2014 he accompanied Joss Stone at The Royal British Legion’s Festival of Remembrance at the Royal Albert Hall. He then released the album Loud Hailer in 2016.

On 16 April 2020, Beck released a new single, in which Beck collaborated with Johnny Depp to cover John Lennon’s song “Isolation“, explaining that this was a first record release from an ongoing musical collaboration between the two men. They had been recording music together for some time, with the track being produced the year before, but Beck explained that the decision to release it was influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns: “We weren’t expecting to release it so soon but given all the hard days and true ‘isolation’ that people are going through in these challenging times, we decided now might be the right time to let you all hear it”

Beck latest works found him on 2 June 2022, appearing in the news after Depp as both also had performed at the Royal Albert Hall in London earlier in the week. Beck and Depp’s first single from their collaborative album 18, titled “This Is a Song for Miss Hedy Lamarr”, was announced on 10 June 2022. Quickly followed days later as Beck was featured on two tracks from Ozzy Osbourne’s album released on 24 June 2022; the title track “Patient Number 9″ and “A Thousand Shades.”

Beck, a 2 time Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and 8-time Grammy winner, will be forever remembered and credited for popularising the use of audio feedback and distortion on the rock guitar. Before Beck’s arrival, guitar playing generally conformed to the “clean, bright, and jangly” sounds of early-1960s British Invasion bands or the bluesy aesthetic of 1950s African-American performers like Muddy Waters and Bo Diddley. During his short time with the Yardbirds, Beck’s experimentation with feedback, distortion, and “fuzz” tone “pushed the band into directions that would open the door for psychadelic rock while “jolt[ing] British rock forward.” While Beck was not the first rock guitarist to experiment with electronic distortion, he nonetheless helped to redefine the sound and role of the electric guitar in rock music. Beck’s work with the Yardbirds and the Jeff Beck Group’s 1968 album Truth were seminal influences on heavy metal music, which emerged in full force in the early 1970s. Identified as one of Beck’s characteristic traits to be his sense of pitch, particularly in exercising the whammy bar to create sounds ranging from “nose-diving bombs to subtle, perfectly pitched harmonic melodies. Also, during the 80s he stopped using a pick and produced a wide variety of sounds by using his thumb to pluck the strings, his ring finger on the volume knob and his little finger on the vibrato bar on his signature Fender Stat. By plucking a string and then fading in the sound of the volume knob he created a unique sound that resembled a human voice and he always used his wah wah pedal live along with his Co RAT distortion pedal.

Sadly and suddenly, Beck died from bacterial spinal meningitis at a hospital near Riverhall on 10 January 2023, at the age of 78, leaving behind his wife of 18 years, Sandra Cash and a rock and roll legacy that spanned 6 decades, sporting 14 combined band and solo studio albums to his credit from 1968 to his album from 2016 entitled, Lound Haller, including his most up-to-date released album in 2022 with Johnny Depp entitled 18, Sending love to his wife, family, musical families, and fans worldwide. Thanks for the musical legeacy, RIP.