I've been playing guitar for a while, but for quite a long time I've been neglecting the instrument and I just couldn't be bovvered to sink my teeth into it like I used to do. I thought it might've been anhedonia or something, but I think I've stumbled upon the real reason, and it's because I find the guitar to be quite a lonely instrument.
Outside of an accompanied/band environment, the only guitar songs that sound good to me are country, blues, and folk tunes that are oft depressing, and classical, spanish/flamenco tunes that are fairly technical. With a guitar, it seems like the primary way you can accompany yourself is if you're playing some morose singer-songwriter style song.
I guess what I'm really driving at this: what are your favourite unaccompanied songs involving the guitar, and what other genres or artists have unaccompanied guitars?
None of it is Van Halen level of taxing to play, but they are all pleasant tunes, and if you are mid-level all well within your ability to work out how to play just by listening to them a few times.
The guitar is a bastard instrument. Most instruments are essentially monophonic. A piano is truly polyphonic, allowing a player to voice any chord within their span and play true legato phrases using the damper pedal. The guitar is sort of polyphonic, but with a lot of constraints and caveats.
The art of solo guitar is essentially a sleight-of-hand, creating the illusion of bass, melody and accompaniment. This is ferociously difficult, but it represents the true soul of the instrument.
Playing in this way requires you to abandon the crutches of the singer-songwriters, the easy six-string chords, the reliance on tablature and memorised patterns. It requires you to truly learn the fretboard and to have the theoretical knowledge to create rich arrangements around the constraints of your instrument.
A degree of loneliness and vulnerability is inherent to solo performance. You are inescapably alone on stage. That doesn't mean that solo performance has to be morose, however.
