The Engineering of a Jimi Hendrix Performance
The guitarist Jimi Hendrix had a unique sound which has influenced countless musicians over the decades. He achieved it through mastery not only of his instrument, but of the complex feedback relationship between amplifier, environment, and guitar — coupled with a series of effects pedals including some then-unique ones made for him. Musical commentators have pored over his work for decades, but a recent piece in IEEE Spectrum is particularly interesting as it examines things from a technical perspective.
It centers around an electrical simulation of Hendrix’s effects chain, and makes an assertion that’s obvious on consideration but not the usual take on a Hendrix performance; that in his hands it became a wave synthesizer rather than the instrument itself. Certainly for anyone with an interest in analogue audio electronics as they pertain to musical synthesis it helps in placing the influence of the different circuits on the sound, and in hearing the familiar performances in a new light.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen someone take a modelling approach to a guitar effects chain, indeed it’s obvious something missing from the work above is the guitar itself.
Header image: Gemeente Rotterdam (Stadsarchief) CC-0.
hackaday.com/2026/02/26/the-en…
