The electronics revolution hits everything. The guitar has existed in some form or another for longer than anyone has yet suggested in this thread. The lute comes to mind but I believe it has been shown to actually be a development along a divergent line from an even earlier common ancestor.

Whatever point in time you want to point to and say "There was the first true guitar" It's still gonna be at least a thousand years ago and probably more. Some interesting reading here: http://www.guyguitars.com/eng/handbook/BriefHistory.html

Not exactly a flash in the pan is it? But as I said, The electronics revolution hits everything. Do I see the guitar disappearing? No, but I do see it changing still more.

That said, I hope that true acoustic instruments never disappear. I for one do not want electronics to completely take over, that way lies loss of creativity for all but the technophiles. I know musicians who can't tell you where to turn a computer on but can play their favoured instrument fit to make you laugh or cry at their whim. That's the creativity I want to see live, and it doesn't need fancy, schmancy electronics to do it.

Next point, keyboards. (No flames please, this is my opinion ) A fantastic array of effects and voices, but I've still never heard one with a piano voice to rival even the humblest upright when it comes to the fullness of overtones and sympathetic string vibration etc. that you get from this relatively humble machine. That's not to say that there aren't some really good sounding synth's out there but there's just something about a real, acoustic piano...

As for me, I play brass - can barely manage a one finger tune on a keyboard and can just about tell you which end to strum a guitar... But I can play my 'bone tolerably well.

So, back to the question, are guitars on their way out? I don't think so, but with current rates of change we may be hard pressed to recognise them in 50 or a hundred years...

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