Guitar Lifestyle reader Darren M. recently alerted me to this video of Sonny Landreth and Eric Clapton playing “Promise Land” at the 2010 Crossroads Guitar Festival in Chicago.

This is a preview of the upcoming Crossroads Guitar Festival DVD, which will be released on November 9, 2010.

I missed this when it was originally posted last December, but last year Paul Gilbert was a featured Guitar Center Sessions artist. During part of the session, he gave an interesting rhythm lesson in which he talks about taking familiar rhythms (like “Smoke on the Water” and “Purple Haze”) and using different notes with that same rhythm pattern:

During the session, he also talked about song writing, his pedal board, music theory, string skipping, and he played songs by Christina Aguilera, Muddy Waters, Aerosmith, Robin Trower, Johnny Cash, the Doobie Brothers, the Doors, and Lynyrd Skynyrd. It looks like it was a really fun session. Gilbert seems to have an unending enthusiasm for music and the guitar and that enthusiasm comes across in his lessons.

As I mentioned last week, this past Friday marked the 20th anniversary of Stevie Ray Vaughan’s tragic and untimely death. To pay tribute to SRV, the members of Double Trouble (Reese Wynans, Chris Layton, and Tommy Shannon) got together at a small club here in Nashville with a number of guitarists and played much of Stevie’s recorded catalog of music. I was able to attend the show and witnessed nearly four hours of excellent music. It was an unbelievable experience to be able to see Double Trouble play the music that has affected me so much over the years. Anthony Stauffer, from StevieSnacks.com, also attended the show and was able to record some clips, which he has posted on YouTube:

I recently received an e-mail letting me know about an upcoming guitar documentary called Electrified: The Guitar Revolution that will be showing on the Smithsonian Channel on August 15. Prior to the television airing, they are offering a streaming version of the documentary on their website, which I’ve embedded below. It’s a very interesting history of the electric guitar throughout the years.

I recently linked to a studio video of Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi playing on Herbie Hancock’s song “Space Captain” from his latest album the Imagine Project. Trucks and Tedeschi performed the song with Hancock this past week on the Late Show with David Letterman. Check out the performance below:

Earlier this week, John Mayer provided USTREAM viewers with a tour of the backstage area of the Jones Beach Amphitheater in New York. He also provides a glimpse of the upcoming John Mayer “Black Strat,” which is a replica of the well-worn black strat that he regularly plays. Interestingly, the regular production model will not be relic’d, while the Custom Shop version will be identical to the one he plays.

Check out the tour below. (Click here if you can’t see the video embedded below.)

Music retailer Sweetwater recently interviewed guitarist David Grissom during Sweetwater’s GearFest weekend. Among other things, Grissom talks about how he got started, doing session work in Nashville, his signature PRS guitar, and passing up a gig with Rod Stewart to form the band Storyville in the 90s.

Sweetwater has posted the interview to YouTube in 5 parts. The videos are embedded below:

Part 1:

Part 2:

Part 3:

Part 4:

Part 5:

Below is a video of guitar Eric Gales debuting his Two Rock signature model amplifier. Gales debuted the amplifier at a benefit for guitar maker Taku Sakashta, who was murdered outside his shop earlier this year. Although Gales has had his share of troubles, he’s definitely still got it when he straps on a guitar.

Lee Ritenour released a new album titled 6 String Theory this week. The album is a celebration of the guitar and features a number of great guest artists, including George Benson, BB King, Slash, Steve Lukather, John Scofield, Joe Bonamassa, Robert Cray, Vince Gill, Keb’ Mo’, Taj Majal, Guthrie Govan, Andy McKee, and Jonny Lang, among others. There are a total of 20 great guitarists on this album! As you might expect from the wide-ranging styles of the guest artists, the album covers many different genres, including blues, jazz, rock, and even classical thanks to a contribution by 16-year-old Shon Boublil, who won Ritenour’s Yamaha Six String Theory Guitar Competition.

The track listing for the album is as follows:

1. Lay It Down (feat. Lee Ritenour and John Scofield)
2. Am I Wrong (feat. Keb’ Mo’ and Taj Mahal)
3. L.P. (For Les Paul) (feat. Joey DeFrancesco, Pat Martino, and Lee Ritenour)
4. Give Me One Reason (feat. Joe Bonamassa and Robert Cray)
5. “68″ (feat. Neal Schon, Slash, and Steve Lukather)
6. In Your Dreams (feat. Lee Ritenour, Neal Schon, and Steve Lukather)
7. My One and Only Love (feat. George Benson)
8. Moon River (feat. George Benson)
9. Why I Sing the Blues (feat. Keb’ Mo’, B.B. King, Vince Gill, Lee Ritenour, and Jonny Lang)
10. Daddy Longlicks (feat. Joe Robinson)
11. Shape of My Heart (feat. Lee Ritenour, Steve Lukather, and Andy McKee)
12. Drifting (feat. Andy McKee)
13. Freeway Jam (feat. Lee Ritenour, Mike Stern, and Tomoyasu Hotei)
14. Fives (feat. Guthrie Govan and Tal Wilkenfeld)
15. Caprices, Op. 20, No. 2 and 7 (feat. Shon Boublil)

Below is a preview of the album:

Below is a video of Eric Johnson playing Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song” with Ian Thornley of Big Wreck and Paul Langlois and Bobby Baker of the Tragically Hip. In all the videos I’ve seen of EJ, I’ve never seen him playing a Zeppelin tune. He seems a little out of place in this environment. What do you think?