Eddie Van Halen
Electric Guitar Solo on
Beat It

About

Eddie Van Halen's electric guitar solo on Michael Jackson's "Beat It" is one of the most famous guest solos in pop music history. Lasting roughly twenty seconds over the rock arrangement at 138 BPM, the solo packs an extraordinary amount of virtuosity into a brief space, featuring rapid-fire tapping, aggressive tremolo bar dives, and fluid legato runs that brought Van Halen's rock guitar technique into a mainstream pop context. Producer Quincy Jones recruited Van Halen specifically to add rock credibility to the track, and Van Halen rearranged the backing track's chord progression to better suit his solo. Eddie Van Halen recorded this guitar solo for free and was not credited on the album because he had a deal with his bandmates that they would never do any side gigs. This solo is regarded as one of the greatest guitar solos of all time.

Eddie Van Halen was 26 to 27 years old at the time.