Do you know who is John Petrucci?  

John Petrucci (born July 12, 1967) is an American guitarist best known as a founding member of the progressive metal group Dream Theater. He is also the producer (along with his bandmate Mike Portnoy) of all Dream Theater albums since their 1999 release, Scenes From A Memory.
Contents[show]
1 Biography
2 Equipment
3 Discography
4 Videography
5 See also
6 External links
[edit] Biography
John first played guitar at age 8 when he noticed his sister (who was taking organ lessons at the time) was allowed to stay up past her bed time to practice. He soon dropped it when his plan failed. At age 12, he began playing again when he was invited into the band of his friend Kevin Moore, who would later become the first keyboardist of Dream Theater. John began to practice in earnest whilst exercising physically. He was a largely self-taught guitarist who developed his skills through attempts to match the skill of his idols, who included Steve Morse, Steve Howe, Steve Vai, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Al Di Meola, Alex Lifeson, Dave Murray, and Allan Holdsworth. He has jokingly referred to his guitar idols as "the Steves and the Als".
John attended Berklee College of Music in Boston with childhood friend John Myung (bass), where they met future bandmate Mike Portnoy (drums). These three in addition to another childhood friend of Petrucci and Myung, Kevin Moore (Keyboards), formed the band Majesty, which would later become Dream Theater.
While Dream Theater is what John is most commonly associated with, he is also a part of the project band Liquid Tension Experiment and has appeared as a guest on several records by other artists such as the Age of Impact album by the Explorer's Club.
John also came out with a guitar instructional video, "Rock Discipline", which covers warm up exercises, exercises to avoid injury while playing, alternate picking, sweep picking, chords and other techniques for developing one's guitar playing. John has also a book named "Guitar World presents John Petrucci's Wild Stringdom", which was compiled from columns he wrote for Guitar World magazine, bearing that same title.
In 2001 he was invited by Joe Satriani and Steve Vai to tour with them on the popular G3 guitar tour, which exposed him to a massive number of new fans and inspired him to record a solo album. Suspended Animation was released on March 1, 2005, and made available for order from his web site. He also appeared on the 2005 and 2006 G3 tour.
Petrucci also wrote and recorded two instrumental soundtrack songs for a Sega Saturn game titled Digital Pinball: Necronomicon. Each track is roughly two minutes long and they are simply titled "Prologue" and "Epilogue". John is an avid Sega Saturn gamer, and has revealed in interviews that he never tours without one.
Dream Theater bandmate Jordan Rudess revealed in an interview that Petrucci is a practicing Catholic. John is married to Rena, and they have 3 children, SamiJo, Reny and Kiara. Rena Petrucci is also a musician and has been supported by John in concert.
[edit] Equipment
John is a devoted user of Mesa Boogie amplifiers. During his career, he has used Mark II's, Mark IV's, Dual Rectifiers, the Formula, Recto, TriAxis and Formula preamps, and 2:90 power amps. He also has a one-off custom preamp called the Nunya. More recently, John has been using the Road King heads for his dirty tones, and the Lonestar for his cleans.
Petrucci is also notable as one of relatively few users of the seven-string guitar. While he uses a conventional six-string guitar in the majority of his compositions, he began to use Ibanez seven-string guitars on three tracks of the 1994 album Awake and on songs like "A Change of Seasons", "The Glass Prison", "The Test That Stumped Them All", "Just Let Me Breathe", "Jaws of Life", "This Dying Soul" and "The Dance of Eternity". Beginning with the album "Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence", he started to experiment with lower tunings on his guitars. Much of the track "Blind Faith" from that album was tracked with a detuned Ernie Ball Silhouette six-string bass guitar, simulating a baritone guitar. (Baritone guitars feature a longer scale neck, giving far greater tuning stability at lower tunings than a standard guitar.) Lately, it seems that he has favoured these detuned six-string guitars over his seven-strings. He now has proper Ernie Ball JPM baritones but they are not comercially available as of yet.
Petrucci currently endorses Ernie Ball/MusicMan guitars and has two signature guitars on the market, a six- and a seven-string. Petrucci uses a modified DiMarzio Air Norton in the neck position and a DiMarzio D-Sonic in the bridge position. His signature Musicman guitars also have Piezo acoustic bridges (special saddles hold the strings and pick up the true acoustic vibrations of the strings). This allows John to make his electric guitar sound like an acoustic guitar. He uses this in many of Dream Theater's songs, one of the most obvious examples in the song "Hollow Years". In the past he has endorsed Ibanez guitars, and had his own signature model manufactured by the company (also known as the "JPM" model). In recording John uses whatever guitar he sees fit for any particular situation. His famous black and white Picasso Ibanez seven string guitar was sold to a collector on ebay after his endorsement ended.
In the Majesty/Early Dream Theater era, Petrucci can be seen using a B.C. Rich Assassin (strat-style guitar) through Randall Amplifiers.
[edit] Discography
Year Title Label Notes
1989 Guitar Battle Unknown Various Artists
1989 When Dream and Day Unite MCA/Mechanic First Dream Theater studio album.
1992 Images and Words Atlantic/ATCO Again with Dream Theater, introducing the new lead singer James LaBrie.
1993 Live at the Marquee WEA International First Dream Theater live album.
1994 Awake EastWest The last Dream Theater album with Kevin Moore as Keyboard player.
1995 A Change of Seasons (EP) EastWest Dream Theater EP, introducing Derek Sherinian's as new Keyboard Player.
1996 Working Man Magna Carta A Rush Tribute.
1997 Falling into Infinity Elektra Last Dream Theater album with Derek Sherinian.
1997 Dragon Attack CNR Music A Tribute to Queen
1998 Liquid Tension Experiment Magna Carta Project with Mike Portnoy, Jordan Rudess and Tony Levin
1998 Once in a LIVEtime Elektra 2CD recorded in Paris, France.
1998 Age Of Impact Magna Carta Explorer's Club
1998 Wicked Unknown Jon Finn Group
1999 Liquid Tension Experiment 2 Magna Carta Second album with Liquid Tension Experiment
1999 Metropolis Pt 2: Scenes from a Memory Elektra Jordan Rudess as new keyboard player for Dream Theater, the band's first concept album.
2000 An Evening with John Petrucci and Jordan Rudess Sound Mind Music A Live album with Keyboard Player Jordan Rudess
2001 Feeding the Wheel Magna Carta Jordan Rudess solo album, Petrucci plays guitar on it.
2001 Live Scenes From New York Elektra 3CD recorded in New York, USA.
2002 Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence Elektra Dream Theater's first studio double album.
2003 Train of Thought Elektra Dream Theater heaviest album released to date.
2004 Live at Budokan Atlantic Dream Theater 3CD/2DVD combination recorded in Tokyo, Japan.
2005 Suspended Animation Sound Mind Music First solo album.
2005 G3: Live in Tokyo Sony Plays on G3, with Guitarists Steve Vai and Joe Satriani
2005 Octavarium Atlantic Dream Theater most recent Studio Album.
2006 Score Rhino Entertainment 3CD/2DVD recorded at the Radio City Music Hall on April 1, 2006 New York, USA.
2006 Blood of the Snake - Derek Sherinian Inside Out Music Played Guitar on first track "Czar Of Steel".
2006 Loudspeaker - Marty Friedman Mascot/Avex Special Guest Guitarist