Bert Jansch

Guitarist-singer Bert Jansch started his career in the 1960s folk vanguard, influencing peers as stylistically far-flung as Nick Drake, Jimmy Page, and Neil Young, and later defining the pastoral, balladic sound of ’70s British folk-rock as part of the group Pentangle. His deft fretwork brought unrivaled virtuosity to British folk “on the same level as Jimi Hendrix,” as Young once praised. Like Young, Jansch’s prolificacy and affection for modern artists has helped keep him relevant (in Britain, at least), most recently by guest-starring folk acolytes Devendra Banhart, Beth Orton, and members of Espers on 2006’s hauntingly beautiful The Black Swan. 

Updated 11/29/2010