This was 24-year-old Martin Barre, guitarist of the Jethro Tull progressive rock group in 1971, just moments before he invented that mainstay of pop musicianship which carries his name, the barre chord. Notice how in this historic photograph Barre's first finger is poised ready to slip over the fret to make that first-ever barre. Doubtless he would have moved the other fingers up a fret and discovered an easy F.

He'd started playing guitar at the age of 15, and had flute lessons two years later, giving him a good technical knowledge of music in the process, and presumably the means to argue the toss with his later employer, one-legged Tull leader and flautist Ian Anderson. Martin turned pro in 1967 at 20 with his group Kethsemane, and replaced Tull's original guitarist Mick Abrahams in 1969 in time to record the group's second LP, "Stand Up".

Martin told an interviewer in 1971, "I like King Crimson, Yes, and the American group Mountain. At the moment I find classical music excites me more than anything else: I like Dvorak, Telemann, and Vivaldi who, I suppose, were the pop composers of their time, but their music endures." Anyone remember any Jethro Tull songs?

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