Such styles were popular in much of Western Europe, with notable guitarists including Antoine de Lhoyer, Fernando Sor, and Dionisio Aguado.
Through the 19th century, the classical guitar would find prominence in chamber music ensembles, used for melodic accompaniment, as well as being used in solo composures.
Through the later 19th century, Steel Strings began to appear, particularly by Martin Guitars, and by the 1880s the Piedmont Blues style was emerging in the rural south.
Through the 1920s, the emergence of early jazz and swing guitar styles appear with virtuosos Eddie Lang and Lonnie Johnson, the latter with a heavy blues influence.
At the same time, The Delmore Brothers would pioneer flatpicking guitar through rapid-picking melodic solos which would greatly influence many future guitarists in bluegrass, early rock and roll, and country music.
This style would be the foundation for many future guitarists including Chet Atkins, Scotty Moore, Doc Watson, and Earl Hooker, though many used two fingers rather than just the index as Travis had done.
To create lead guitar lines, guitarists use scales, modes, arpeggios, licks, and riffs that are performed using a variety of techniques.
Some guitarists occasionally use skills that combine technique and showmanship, such as playing the guitar behind their head or picking with the front teeth.
In a blues context, as well as others, guitarists sometimes create leads that use call and response-style riffs that they embellish with string bending, vibrato, and slides.
Jazz guitarists integrate the basic building blocks of scales and arpeggio patterns into balanced rhythmic and melodic phrases that make up a cohesive solo.
However, during the bebop era, the rapid tempo and complicated chord progressions made it increasingly harder to play "by ear".
[2] Jazz guitar players tend to improvise around chord/scale relationships, rather than reworking the melody, possibly due to their familiarity with chords resulting from their comping role.