According to Blabbermouth.net, on Tuesday, May 1, 2012, 7,273 guitar players joined together at the "Thanks Jimi Festival" in Poland to play the Jimi Hendrix classic "Hey Joe" (see video below), breaking the record for "Largest Guitar Ensemble" set at the 2009 edition of the annual event.
The late rock legend's brother Leon Hendrix led the musicians at this year's festival, which was held on Wroclaw's Main Market Square.
All participants were registered and given IDs, with organisers approving electric, acoustic, classical and bass guitars.
May 1, 2009 saw 6,346 guitar players join together with festival founder Leszek Cichonski and Deep Purple guitarist Steve Morse at the "Thanks Jimi Festival" to play "Hey Joe" and more than tripled the standing Guinness World Record for "Largest Guitar Ensemble" of 2,052.
According to GuitarPlayer.com, Cichonski is a well-known musician and music educator in Poland and the festival was an outgrowth of one of his educational programs and has taken place - and grown - annually since 2003.
woah, what a great little cosplay festival they got going on there... we've got zappa, uli jon roth and bono playing along side a hendrix on that stage. Im sure waldo is somewhere along the audience as well.
I've been there in 2009 and it's a really cool thing. The Old Town of Wroclaw was literarily crawling with guitar players
To me, it's a great tribute to Jimi.
And yes, "Hey Joe" is a cover but they chose this one because Jimi's version is probably the most known and it's also really easy to play. Afterwards they typically do jams on songs like "Little Wing" or "Voodoo Chile".
Good on them to have broken the record again. Too bad I'm no longer in the Guinness book, oh well
