The Guitar Wars competition – a kind of “American Idol” for local guitarslingers – got underway on Tuesday (November 24) with some mighty firey fretwork at Tess’ Lark Tavern in Albany.

Q103 DJ Mrozek emceed the procedings, and there was no foolin’ around as contestants lined up for their three minutes on stage to strut their six-string skills. A panel of judges for the event included solo performer and Lark Tavern open-mic host MotherJudge, classical and bluegrass guitar player and teacher Sten Isachsen, jazz guitarist and teacher George Muscatello and yours truly (Greg Haymes of Nippertown.com).

And in the end, three stellar axmen were selected to move on to the grand final round of competition:

Albie Von Schaaf: who plays in the Black Fuel and These Are The Hits
Rob Guerin: the only acoustic guitarist of Tuesday’s round
Chuck Valentine: who plays in Road to Galway

You can hear two of the finalists playing around Nippertown this weekend. These Are the Hits featuring Albie Van Schaaf will be in the spotlight at Tess’ Lark Tavern tonight (Wednesday, November 24), while Chuck Valentine and his band Road to Galway will be at Revolution Hall in Troy on Friday (November 28), sharing the stage with Hair of the Dog.

There are two more nights of preliminary competition slated for Tuesday, December 1 at Savannah’s in Albany and Wednesday, December 2 at the Bayou Cafe in Albany. Registration is still open, so sign up today to enter.

The three finalists selected on Tuesday as well as the top three guitarists from each of the first round competitions next week will face off in the finals at Revolution Hall in Troy on Thursday, December 10.