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Artist
Phil Keaggy
12+ albums
guitarchristianacousticinstrumentalrock
about
Phil Keaggy (born March 23, 1951) is a Christian guitarist, songwriter, and singer. Raised in a small farmhouse in Hubbard, Ohio with nine brothers and sisters, Keaggy began playing guitar at age ten on a Sears Silvertone guitar, despite missing half of the middle finger on his right hand due to an accident at age 4 involving a water pump. He is frequently listed as one of the top fingerstyle guitarists by Guitar Player Magazine readers' polls, but he is equally at home on electric guitar. Keaggy is noted for crowd-pleasing solo live performances where he makes extensive use of recording live layers of loops to accompany himself. To do this he uses only an acoustic guitar but is able to create electric sounds. Keaggy began performing professionally in the late 60s with drummer John Sferra. The two friends, with the addition of bassist Dan Pecchio, formed Glass Harp in 1968. A major turning point for the trio was winning an Ohio area's "Battle of the Bands." One of event's judges happened to be an associate of the celebrated producer Lewis Merenstein, who was alerted about the hot young threesome. At the time, Merenstein was fresh from producing albums for many successful artists including The Spencer Davis Group, Turley Richards and Van Morrison's Moondance (Merenstein produced Astral Weeks as well) and had just been voted Producer of the Year by Rolling Stone. Merenstein was persuaded to fly down from New York to see what the fuss was all about. Upon hearing the band
