Jeffrey "Jeff" Young is an American guitarist. He graduated from Musicians Institute in 1985, and is best known for his time with the thrash metal band Megadeth, appearing on the 1988 album So Far, So Good... So What!. In addition to his subsequent music projects, he served as an author in Guitar for the Practicing Musician.
Newly hired Megadeth's guitarist Jay Reynolds had commissioned guitar teacher Young to play all of his solos on the new album, transcribe the previous Megadeth releases, and teach him everything in time for the pending tours. Reynolds was one of Youngs guitar students. However, after witnessing Young decipher previous guitarist Chris Poland's solos from Peace Sells... but Who's Buying? note-for-note in less than 30 minutes, frontman Dave Mustaine decided instead to hire Young. Young joined the band with only two weeks left in the recording schedule and contributed half of the guitar solos and multiple electric and acoustic rhythm parts to the album. Jeff's career with Megadeth was spent recording and touring in support of their 1988 platinum selling album, So Far, So Good... So What! His first performance with the band appeared in as a member of Megadeth.
Following his time in Megadeth, Jeff wrote the cult-classic Fingerprints column in Guitar for the Practicing Musician magazine. He also began intensive study of the blues with legendary guitarist, Steve Hunter. For a portion of the 1990s, Jeff stepped away from his career to deal with the untimely deaths of first his father and later his mother while immersing himself in the further study of classical, flamenco, gypsy jazz and other world music varieties In 1998, he resurfaced with new Brazilian musical partner, Badi Assad. Together, the duo crafted exotic soundscapes for Verve/PolyGram records collaboration entitled, Badi Assad's Chameleon. The album, climbed to the top of the worldmusic charts in Germany & Holland also topping JAZZIZ magazine's Readers Poll: "Best Brazilian Albums of the Year." Opening concerts for renowned artists including Joe Cocker and Cassandra Wilson, as well as performances on 1999's Lilith Fair and Farm Aid 2000, Jeff's association with the Assad family also spawned songwriting collaborations with guitar luminary Sergio Assad and two pieces on Badi's Verde album. In 2003, the track "Waves" from Chameleon was featured in the Michael and Kirk Douglas film It Runs in the Family, as well as on the movie's soundtrack.
Young is the host of the Internet radio show Music Without Boundaries. Jeff's new project is a modern funk, rock, soul duo/band, Jeff Young & Sherri. The duo's first single, a re-imagining of The Rolling Stones, "Wild Horses" to be released September 2013. A Stageit impromptu performance video garnered 2,000 plays in two days on YouTube.
