Alex Van Halen shares rare recording of a young Eddie Van Halen playing guitar to mark the late guitar great’s birthday

To mark what would have been Eddie Van Halen‘s 71st birthday on January 26, his brother and Van Halen drummer, Alex Van Halen, shared a snippet of their childhood – and Eddie’s precocious talent – on social media.

The muted clip shows a young Eddie joyously strumming an acoustic guitar, shortly before the camera pans to a grinning Alex. The heartfelt video is accompanied by a short quote from Wolfie – “‘Al, you and dad changed the world of music’ – Wolfgang Van Halen. January 26th, 1955- October 6th, 2020.”

“I’m getting ready to do this record with Lukather and a couple other people,” said Van Halen. “It should be exciting.”

In an interview with De Telegraf from March 2025, Van Halen commented, “Ed and Steve Lukather were very good friends and they often worked together. There is no one who can do this process with me as well as he can.”

Lukather later clarified his apparent involvement in what many speculated to be a new Van Halen record, stating, “I will not ever play a note on a Van Halen song!”

In more recent Van Halen news, a new compilation album of old Van Halen rehearsals with Eddie, Alex and Wolfgang has reportedly been released – and it doesn’t feature a singer.

Janelle is a staff writer at GuitarWorld.com. After a long stint in classical music, Janelle discovered the joys of playing guitar in dingy venues at the age of 13 and has never looked back. Janelle has written extensively about the intersection of music and technology, and how this is shaping the future of the music industry. She also had the pleasure of interviewing Dream Wife, K.Flay, Yīn Yīn, and Black Honey, among others. When she’s not writing, you’ll find her creating layers of delicious audio lasagna with her art-rock/psych-punk band ĠENN.