Yngwie Malmsteen

Yngwie Malmsteen is a Swedish guitarist, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and bandleader. Malmsteen became known for his neo-classical playing approach in heavy metal which became a growing musical style in the early 1980s.
Malmsteen was born Lars Johan Yngve Lannerbäck in Stockholm, Sweden in June 30, 1963, as the third child of a musically-inclined family. At age seven, he saw a television news report on the death of Jimi Hendrix, an event which had a profound impact on his musical path. Malmsteen has later stated that Hendrix had no musical impact on him, but on September 18, 1970 he saw a TV special of Hendrix, where he smashed and burned his guitar, and Malmsteen thought: "this is really cool". To quote his official website, "The day Jimi Hendrix died, the guitar-playing Yngwie was born".
At the age of 10 he took his mother's maiden name Malmsten as his surname, slightly changed it to Malmsteen, and Anglicised his third given name Yngve to "Yngwie". Yngwie also created his first band "Track On Earth" at the age of 10, consisting of himself and a friend from school on drums (Armin). Malmsteen was a teenager when he first encountered the music of the 19th century violin virtuoso Niccolò Paganini, whom he cites as his biggest classical music influence. Ritchie Blackmore and Uli Jon Roth are also cited as being significant influences, as is Brian May of Queen. He played featuring Denim And Leather song with Saxon during The Eagle Has Landed part II tour.

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