John Petrucci

John Peter Petrucci (born July 12, 1967) is an American guitarist and a founding member of the progressive metal band Dream Theater. He produced all of Dream Theater's albums from Metropolis Pt. 2: Scenes from a Memory (1999), often co-producing alongside drummer Mike Portnoy before Portnoy's departure between 2010 and 2023, and has been the sole producer since A Dramatic Turn of Events (2011). Petrucci has also released two solo albums: Suspended Animation (2005) and Terminal Velocity (2020).

John Peter Petrucci was born on July 12, 1967, in Kings Park, New York, to an Italian American family. He picked up the guitar at around the age of eight because his older sister was allowed to go to bed later to practice the organ. However, he decided to quit the guitar when his attempts to stay up late were unsuccessful. He picked up the guitar again at the age of 12. He became addicted and consumed when he discovered guitar as his passion, committing to practicing guitar six hours a day. At the suggestion of a high school teacher, he began practicing using a metronome, which he has said is the greatest piece of musical advice he ever received. He would also go from house to house having jam sessions with very many different local musicians, an experience which helped him develop immensely as a guitar player. His early influences were bands like Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, AC/DC, and later developed an interest in progressive rock and heavy metal, exemplified by Rush, Yes, Iron Maiden, Dixie Dregs and Metallica. His other influences as a guitarist include Jimmy Page, Brian May, Eddie Van Halen, Yngwie Malmsteen, Allan Holdsworth, Alex Lifeson, Randy Rhoads, Mike Stern, Joe Satriani, Stevie Ray Vaughan and David Gilmour.

Eventually, his childhood friend and future Dream Theater keyboardist Kevin Moore invited Petrucci to join his cover band. Petrucci attended Berklee College of Music in Boston with childhood friend John Myung (bass), where they met future bandmate Mike Portnoy (drums). While in Berklee they often covered two of their biggest influences, Iron Maiden and Rush. These three, in addition to Kevin Moore, formed the band Majesty. Because there was already another band with the same name, the group later became Dream Theater.

While Petrucci is most commonly associated with Dream Theater, he is also in the project band Liquid Tension Experiment, and has appeared as a guest on records by other artists, such as the Age of Impact album by the Explorer's Club.

Petrucci has released a guitar instructional video, Rock Discipline, which covers warm-up exercises, exercises to avoid injury while playing, alternate picking, sweep picking, chords and other techniques for developing one's guitar playing. Petrucci also has a book named "Guitar World presents John Petrucci's Wild Stringdom", which was compiled from columns he wrote for Guitar World magazine under that title.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.