Five of the most iconic guitar solos of all time – and the stories behind them

An incredible guitar solo can make a good song unforgettable. Guitar solos embody the emotional climax of a song, whether they’re minutes-long technical shredding or a simple line that sticks in listeners’ minds. 

Here are five of the greatest guitar solos of all time, and the stories behind them. 

Sweet Child O’Mine – Guns ‘n Roses 

The riff for “Sweet Child of Mine” started off as a joke, as GNR guitarist Slash played what he considered a “circus melody” at his bandmates for laughs. Lead vocalist Axl Rose wrote the lyrics to the song the next day. 

The solo for “Sweet Child” is built around the  Eb minor scale with a few major 7ths thrown in, before getting more aggressive in the second half of the solo as the tension builds. 

Learn how to play “Sweet Child O’Mine”.

Free Bird – Lynyrd Skynyrd 

A guitar solo that inspired many heckles, “Free Bird”’s guitar solo clocks in at 143 bars, an extra-long solo. Guitarist Allen Collins recorded both guitar parts. “He was bad. He was super bad! He was bad-to-the-bone bad,” Gary Rossington told Guitar World about the recording. “When we put the solo together, we liked the sound of the two guitars, and I could’ve gone out and played it with him. But the way he was doin’ it, he was just so hot! He just did it once and did it again and it was done.”

Learn how to play “Free Bird” with this lesson. 

Stairway to Heaven – Led Zeppelin 

Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page used a “magical guitar” – a telecaster, not his signature Les Paul – to play the solo for “Stairway to Heaven”. He told a magazine in 2021 that he played the same telecaster he used on the band’s first album, which Jeff Beck had given him when he played in The Yardbirds. 

His flowing solo on “Stairway” was ad-libbed in the studio during recording. “It’s not a laboured solo, it’s not something that’s worked out, written down and read, it’s more like a stream of consciousness,” Page said. 

You can study Page’s signature style with this course. 

Hotel California – The Eagles 

This “guitar solo” is more of a guitar duet, as Don Felder and Joe Walsh trade licks before doing harmonized licks together. Both guitars are playing arpeggios of every chord, with one guitar playing one note lower down in the chord. 

Walsh said in an interview that he and Felder worked out who would play when during the solo, but the solos were not planned. “They were spontaneous playing off of each other,” Walsh said.  “We were really good at that, and the rest of the song was kind of planned out, we put those descending lines on because that was the first set of overdubs”.

Eruption – Van Halen 

One of the most mind-bending solos of all time, “Eruption” was only meant to be a warm up, not a recorded song. Guitarist Eddie Van Halen said he arrived at the recording studio one day and started practicing his guitar, when the band’s producer heard it and asked him to record it. 

“So I took one pass at it and they put it on the record,” Van Halen said.  “I didn’t even play it right. There’s a mistake at the top end of it. To this day, whenever I hear it, I always think, ‘Man, I could’ve played it better.”

Learn Eddie Van Halen’s signature style with this course.