Criss Oliva
The Unrecognized Genius
'63-'93

If anybody amongst Criss' fans would like to visit Criss' grave in the future: The cemetary (Curlew Memorial Gardens, Curlew Road) is in Palm Harbor, a few miles north of Clearwater. His stone can be found not far from the main gate on the left side of the asphalt road.

"I'll be right there
I'll never leave
All I ask is
Believe"

There's hardly anything that characterizes the degree in which Criss Oliva always has been underestimated more than the fact that he was consequently ignored during his lifetime by the leading guitar magazines Guitar World and Guitar Player. Not only did neither of these magazines ever do an interview with him - even after his tragic death the editors of both magazines didn't think it was necessary to honour him posthumous as one of the most influential guitarists of this era.

Criss, like his brother Jon grown onto his instrument without any tuition, has shown astonishing skills ever since he was very young. Steve Wacholz remembers that Criss, "at the early age of 14, 15 completely blew away any other guitarist". At the age of 17 he won a contest in Tampa, leaving the others behind him at great length. He played Van Halen's 'Eruption' so amazingly well "that even Eddie Van Halen would have been surprised". The organizers of the event were left with only one option: to hand Criss the white Strat he deserved. It was an enormous disappointment to Criss that it was this guitar that was stolen from him after a clubgig in Florida.

Jon: "Criss was an extremely devoted musician. He could play his guitar for five, six, even eight hours a day. Each day that is. That was his life. More than anything else. And it's astonishing that he never cared for musical theory. He just relied on his hearing and feeling and was enormously creative at that. To me he was like Mozart. There was a divine thing about him". Their personal relationship Jon describes as "rather tight. We had our fun together, but it eventually was a younger brother/ older brother relationship, like it is between brothers in most cases. He had his buddies and I had mine. It was not like we were always around each other. Except when we were working on songs together. Then we were like twins".

Chris Caffery: "His special guitar style came from his hands mostly. It didn't matter what amp he was playing. The older and more experienced I get, the more I realize what an extremely good guitarist he was. He was perfect. He as good as never made a mistake. And if by chance one of his fingers did slide away, he had the skill to turn it into something else equally meaningful, and nobody even noticed there was any mistake for sure".

Paul O'Neill: -and he doesn't stand alone with this opinion- says that Criss "was the nicest person you can imagine. He always treated everybody as if the other could no longer be alive the next day. Each time we are in the studio I ask myself anew: What would Criss have brought in, to purify this or that song. Which songs will never be written, while his artistical input is no longer there?"

From "RockHard Legends, Savatage"

Translated By Ellen Bakvis