Playing air guitar is a form of dance and movement in which the performer pretends to play rock or heavy metal-style electric guitar, including riffs, solos, etc. Playing an air guitar usually consists of exaggerated strumming and picking motions and is often coupled with loud singing or lip-synching. Air guitar is generally used in the imaginary simulation of loud electric guitar music.

Joe Cocker Live at Woodstock 1969 (Air Guitar)

Origins

Examples of air guitar activities occurred in the late 1970s. Robin Yeatman, a patron of the Heavy Metal club, "The Soundhouse", in London, made cardboard guitars and played them on stage. Soon many others started making their own "guitars". This soon became a trend.

The roots of air guitar go back much earlier. The father of air guitar might be Joe Cocker, who actively demonstrated an air guitar technique on stage. During the guitar solo lead-in to his live performance of "With a Little Help from My Friends" at the Woodstock Music Festival in 1969, he can be observed simulating the music with his hands, sans guitar.

Preceding that date by twelve years, Bill Reed, of The Diamonds, during a live TV performance, is seen playing the “air guitar” while doing his recitation on the song, “Words of Love.” This performance, circa 1957, has been added to YouTube from a kinescope recording.

Contests

Organized air guitar competitions are regularly held in many countries. The first on-off air guitar competitions have been organized in the early 1980s in Sweden and in the United States. Since 1996 the annual Air Guitar World Championships contest has been a part of the Oulu Music Video Festival in Oulu, Finland which currently governs Air Guitar World Championships Network of official national championship competitions. The idea of the contest was originally coined as a joke, meant only to be a side attraction for the music video festival.

In 2007 the network consisted of seventeen countries: Finland, USA, New Zealand, Canada, The Netherlands, Austria, Greece, Mexico, Norway, United Kingdom, Switzerland, France, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Japan, and Australia.

Rules have much in common with figure skating, especially using 6.0 score system. The most common set of rules are as following:

Each participant has to play air guitar on stage in two rounds, each lasting for 1 minute.
- Round 1: participant plays a selection of their own choosing. Typically the song has been edited (or a medley has been created) to fit the 60-second format.
- Round 2: participant plays a section of the song chosen by an organizer or competitor; usually the song is not announced beforehand and kept secret until the round begins, so a participant has to improvise.
Participant plays alone; backing bands, either with real or air instruments are not allowed; roadies and groupies are allowed to make up some image, but they have to leave the stage before performance.
Participant has to play air guitar (i.e. air drums, piano and other instruments are not allowed). Air guitar can be acoustic, electric or both.
Generally, there is no dress code and participant is encouraged to use any clothing and props that would add character and make the performance more interesting. However, any real musical equipment or crew (instruments, amplifiers, effect pedals, backing band members, etc) are strictly forbidden. Some events make an exception for a real guitar pick, some don't.
Jury consists of independent judges, usually B-list musicians, music critics, comedians, or other members of the media.
Judges use the same 6.0 score system as in figure skating: there are several varying criteria, each judge must give the contestant a score from 4.0 to 6.0 on each of the following:
- Technical merit—how much the performance looks like the real playing, including accurate reproduction of all fretwork, chords, solos and technical moves.
- Stage presence—a charisma of rock star, the ability to rock, lack of stage fright and power to drive thousands of listeners; involves doing guitar moves and other emotional demonstrations.
- Airness—the most subjective criterion, as "presentation" in figure skating—how much the performance was an object of art by itself, not only a simulation of playing guitar.

World

Annual world championships (full name: "The Annual Air Guitar World Championship Contest") were first held in 1996 as part of the Oulu Music Video Festival in Oulu, Finland. Participants from all over the world competed in skills of playing air guitar. The judging panel included Finnish guitarist Juha Torvinen, and prizes included a custom made 'Flying Finn' guitar and VOX BM Special amplifier donated by Queen guitarist Brian May. The ideology behind the event was that "wars would end and all the bad things would go away if everyone just played air guitar."