My name is Jeremy Driscoll and I am an electric neoclassical guitar player influenced and inspired by Yngwie Malmsteen and Dan Mumm.

I have loved Yngwie Malmsteen since I was 13 when a fellow high school student introduced me to his music. That student was a guitar player and once performed the opening guitar solo of a song from Steeler titled Hot on Your Heels, which was recorded by Yngwie. I was inspired by that performance; so, I got a copy of that Steeler record. I tried to play that solo, but I could never pull it off. I eventually bought the first Malmsteen release (Rising Force). I came across the tablature for a track on Rising Force called Black Star. I tried to learn that too, but I could not pull it off. I just didn’t have the skills. I would revisit that composition multiple times over the years only to discover that I just couldn’t play it, but I have always loved Yngwie’s neoclassical style and his technique. I wanted to play like him.

Sometime after the year 2000, I walked into a guitar store with no intention of buying a new guitar. However, almost immediately after entering the front door I saw a Stratocaster hanging in the back that looked unusual. On closer inspection, I recognized that it was a Malmsteen signature. I asked an employee to bring it down for me (it was hanging on the top row). As soon as I had it in my hands, I knew it was going home with me. There was no tag on it, but I knew American made Stratocasters were pricey, especially signature guitars. The employee looked up the price and discovered it was a consignment piece that was only going for $900. I said, “sold”. This was a 1998 (Second American Version) Malmsteen Stratocaster.

The scalloped frets were hard to get used to. I tried playing Black Star on it, but still didn’t have much success. I tried using the guitar for other applications like blues and rock, but it just never felt like the right guitar for that type of music due to the scalloped neck and hot sounding pickups. So, I never played the guitar as much as my other guitars.

In 2017, I took a music appreciation course in college. It was literally Music 101, just like the familiar academic slang that many people use to refer to a basic introductory course. In that course, we studied many eras of music starting with the Middle Ages up to current popular music. I learned to appreciate many forms of music and became especially fascinated with the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic eras (which are eras that contained the four composers that I have studied).

Flash forward to March 2020 at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. I became even more reclusive than ever and started playing more guitar. I was looking for a guitar project to occupy my time. At first, I decided that I would start composing new material. I considered mixing slow heavy riffs with fast guitar solos. I thought it would be an interesting blend. I thought that the neoclassical style of guitar soloing would be cool, but quickly rediscovered that I could not play that style. I hunted for instructional materials to help me with this. Thinking that learning sweep arpeggios would be a cornerstone of this style, I bought the Sweep Picking Mastery course by Dan Mumm and learned all of that. I followed it up with Classical Masterpieces for Metal Guitar by Dan Mumm. This was a good introduction to neoclassical and contained a variety of excerpts from popular classical pieces adapted for metal guitar. I learned all those excerpts. From that I moved onto Dan Mumm’s Ultimate Neo-Classical Collection and studied the four main composers in that collection.

As I considered returning to live performance, I thought that it would be good to have a second guitar. I turned 50 in 2021 and thought a new guitar would be an appropriate gift for that milestone. Despite supply chain issues, I was able to order a 2021 (Fourth American Version) Malmsteen Stratocaster in time for my birthday. I discovered that my two Stratocasters sound and feel almost identical, despite some physical differences. I am excited to have multiple copies of the same guitar as Yngwie does. Knowing that these signature guitars were designed from one of his classic Stratocasters nicknamed “Duck” due to it once having a Donald Duck decal on it, I adorned both guitars with an exact replica of that waterslide decal on the headstock. I also adorned them with the Ferrari logo and the Play Loud sticker on the back of the body like Yngwie does/did. This was a way of authenticating them even more.

I am looking forward to playing live again. I will be playing in the neoclassical style exclusively. Since it’s not a popular style of music, I need to play some shows to make a name for myself and see if people will appreciate it.