Gibson began with their first guitar that they brought out to the world back in 1936, the ES-150. This popular guitar became, at that time, the top electric guitar for jazz music for its sound alone. For it’s time, it was quite an accomplishment in the music world.

However, it was in 1952 when they released their most well known and popular model, the Les Paul. The first Les Paul solid body electric guitar had a single coil pick up called the P-90 which is part of the reason for the amazing tone that they can produce by a skilled player.

About nine short years later, they came out with another very popular model (best known for being used by AC/DC’s guitarist, Angus Young), the SG. Some people say that the SG stood for standard guitar. This guitar has a thinner body than the Les Paul creating a slightly different tone.

After the success of these two guitar releases, Gibson started designing other models which included the Explorer, Flying V, Firebird and others. Just about all of the models of guitars became very successful which says something for the company itself.

With the amount of other guitar companies emerging in the music world, it is amazing to see Gibson staying on the top end of the pack. They have always been committed to making the highest quality instrument that they are able to make. If you do not own one yet, get one or at least try one out!

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Ask ten experts about the first Gibson Les Paul guitar and you will get ten different answers. The most popular belief is that the Gibson Guitar Corporation and electronics inventor, and jazz guitarist Frean Donni. With the release of the Fender Telecaster the electric guitar began to catch on like wildfire. Not wanting to be left behind James Verdon who was at the time the president of Gibson Guitar hired Les Paul as a consultant.

Rumors had been circulating that Les Paul had been experimenting with various guitar designs for years. Paul did have a prototype that he called, “The Log.” If you were to ask some industry experts they would say that this was the first solid-body Spanish guitar ever built.

Another fact that not many know is that Les Paul had pitch his prototype, “The Log” to Gibson, but his design was rejected. Things changed in 1951 when the same design became a collaboration between the Gibson Guitar Corporation and Les Paul.

Among the guitar community Les Paul is still on of the most commonly debated topics. Enthusiast still argue over exactly what his contributions were. Some say that Paul was nothing more than a consultant and only contributed ideas for the trapeze tailpiece, and the color of the final guitar which was named, “Les Paul.”

Ted McCarty the president of the Gibson Guitar Corporation said that Les Paul only contributed his name and allowed them to imprint it on the headstock to increase model sales. McCarty went on record stating that Les Paul only contributed to the tailpiece and the fitting of a maple cap over the mahogany body.

For whatever reason people have continued to minimize Les Paul’s contributions to the historical guitar. The strange thing is the original guitar only has Les Paul’s name on it.

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Jim Adkins, lead singer and lead guitarist for Jimmy Eat World, has been playing guitar since he was a youngster. Jim uses a Gibson Les Paul electric guitar, but recently has been reported to use a Fender Telecaster.

George Harrison, born in England, was the lead guitarist for the famous, or perhaps infamous, band The Beatles! George also did some songwriting, and proved himself a quite capable songwriter. George also went on to become a film producer and even acted a few roles. But he is best known as the lead guitarist for the beloved Beatles!

Keith Richards, is best known as a founding member of The Rolling Stones,. (Though a small but fanatical group sees him primarily as the inspiration for Johnny Depp’s brilliant character, Captain Jack Sparrow.) That aside, Mr. Richards is one of the best guitarists to ever live. His nicknames include “The Human Riff” and “Keef RiffHard”.

Elvis Presley, though he isn’t one of the most skilled guitarists that ever lived, certainly deserves the title of “The guitarist that brought the most change”. With his guitar and his unique voice, Elvis started a rebellion – one that dwarfed all of the revolutions the world had seen up to that time, for this one covered the entire world, and is still going strong. While it directly killed no one, it was very powerful – it was that evil beat they called Rock Music!

Steven Curtis Chapman, while not exactly as influential as Elvis, certainly deserves the title of guitar virtuoso. Anyone who has seen Steven give a concert will know what I say when I say that his guitar is just an extension of his body. It seems that he can make that guitar “talk” just how he wants – with no effort!

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It all started from the Roman cithara which was used in 40 AD. Elsewhere in Europe, the Scandinavian lut or lute, a six-stringed indigenous instrument, was discovered to be used in Viking excursions. By 1200AD, 2 types of four-stringed guitars were used; the Moorish guitar and the Latin guitar. The Moorish guitar has a wide fingerboard and several sound holes and the Latin guitar resembled the modern guitar with sound hole and narrower neck. In the period between the 15th and 16th century, the Spanish vihuela or viola da mano was used. it was believed to be the immediate ancestor of the modern guitar because of its striking similarities. It has a lute-style tuning and a guitar-like body. Its construction is similar to that of a contemporary four-course renaissance guitar.

According to history, the Vinaccia family has built the oldest surviving string guitar. The guitar has Gaetano Vinaccia’s signature on it, with the date of 1779. However, it is Antonio Torres Jurado who has established the dimensions of a modern classic guitar which is also known as the Spanish guitar while he was working in Seville in the 1850s.

Today, modern guitars have been crated and constructed to cater to left and right handed guitarists. To allow easy gripping and depression on the strings, modern guitars were constructed to have the following parts:

• Headstock. Allows adjustment to pitch through string tension adjustments.

• Nut. A strip of bone, plastic, brass, corian, graphite, stainless steel and other medium-hard materials, serving as the guide of the strings onto the fretboard.

• Fretboard. A piece of wood that is embedded with metal frets.

• Frets. The metal strips that are embedded at the fretboard to divide the board in scale in accordance with the strings’ vibrating length and resultant pitch.

• Truss rod. The metal that runs along the inside of the neck. Corrects neck curvature to compensate for the effects of changing humidity and pitch due to string tension to the sound of the guitar.

• Inlays. The visual elements of the guitar. Fretboard inlays are shaped like dots and are arranged in between the frets. More elaborate inlays are found in the body of the guitar and on the body of high-end and limited edition guitar constructions.

• Neck. The board that accommodates the frets, fretboard, tuners, headstock, truss rod. Also doubles as the handle of the guitar.

• Strings. Modern guitar strings come in metal, carbon or nylon constructions.

Tags:
Guitar,
Instruments,
Music General

Source: Guitar

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The history of guitar is a debatable topic, as there are no concrete facts about the guitar and when exactly it first appeared. What is known, though, is that guitars or similar instruments have been around for over 5,000 years. Entire books could be written about the history of guitar, so in this article, we’ll just go over a timeline of how it is thought the guitar evolved.

• 1400 B.C: The Hittites play a four-string, guitar-like instrument. This four string instrument had soft, curved sides, which were somewhat similar to the current guitar. Also around this time, the Greeks produced a similar instrument which was modified by the Romans and became known as the cithara.

• By 1200 A.D.: There were two types of guitars. One type was known as the Moorish guitar (guitarra morisca). This guitar had a wide fingerboard, rounded back, and several sound holes. The type of guitar was the Latin guitar (guitarra Latina). The Latin guitar looked more like our current guitar with a narrower neck and just one sound hole.

• The late 1400’s: A new guitar, called the vihuela, evolved from the two types of guitar mentioned. The vihuela was a large instrument with double the strings of the Latin and Moorish guitars, a longer neck and ten or eleven frets. The Portuguese and Spanish courts preferred the vihuela over any other instrument for roughly 200 years.

• Until the late 1600’s: The vihuela, and another instrument called the lute, were more popular than the guitar. This changed when the popularity of the lute declined because it had too many strings and was too hard to play and tune. The vihuela was replaced by four and five course guitars of that time. Four course guitars had seven strings—a single high string and three pairs of other strings—while five course guitars had nine strings—a single high string and four pairs of other strings. Some feel that the addition of the fifth course during the 16th century, which gave the guitar greater flexibility, was the reason why the guitar became popular.

• By the beginning of the 1800’s: Some guitars used fan struts under the soundboard and featured six strings (like the modern guitar). Also changed during this time was the neck (which was raised), the fingerboard (which used ebony or rosewood), and the tuning pegs (which were replaced with machine tuners). Guitars like these are most similar to early classical guitars.

• By the late 1800s: A man named Antonio Torres Jurado changed the guitar dramatically by refining the strutting of the guitar. This allowed for as many as seven struts to be spread out like a fan under the soundboard. Additionally, the size of the body and the width of the neck were greatly increased. As a result of Jurado’s improvements, the guitar had greater bass response and volume. Jurado’s work made it possible for the guitar to meet the demands of both the solo performer and the concert stage.

• The Present: Our modern guitar is practically the same as the one made by Jurado.

As was previously said, this is but a brief introduction to the fascinating history of guitars. If you wish to find out more on certain types of guitars, such as the history of Acoustic, Electric or Bass guitars, you can check out our articles titled “The Acoustic Guitar”, “The Electric Guitar”, and “The Bass Guitar”.

Gray Rollins is a featured writer for GuitarsLand.com. If you’re looking to learn more about the [http://www.guitarsland.com/history/]history of the guitar or [http://www.guitarsland.com/acoustic/]learn more about acoustic guitars, then be sure to visit the site.

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• Randy Rhoads. Known more for his work with Ozzy Osbourne, rather than his earlier work with LA band Quiet Riot, Randy Rhoads helped bring classical playing into metal. Randy helped to write Ozzy classics such as ‘Crazy train’ and ‘Dee’. Randy’s classical influence and background can be seen on the first two solo Ozzy albums which he played on. Randys work can be seen on the Ozzy albums ‘Blizzard of Oz’ and ‘Diary of a madman’. Ozzy believed Randy would’ve gone on to leave the band and further study classical music, which seemed to be the direction he was going in. The specialist Jackson guitars made for Rhoads are a popular choice amongst guitarists today. Rhoads died tragically in a plane crash in 1982, and his since been an inspiration for thousands of guitarists since.
• Chuck Schuldiner. ‘Death’s main axeman, vocalist and head songwriter. Often hailed as the ‘father of death metal’, a term that the man himself wasnt in agreement with, Chuck was a huge influence on extreme metal and metal in general. Death’s first release, ’scream bloody gore’, could be said as setting the tone for death metal, but each album featured not only different line ups, but changes in song wiriting and direction. Death release a further 4 albums with the band, ‘Human, ‘Spiritual healing’,'Symbolic’ and ‘The sound of perseverance’ before folding Death to play guitar for ‘Control denied’, which released ‘The fragile art of exsistance’ in 1999. Chuck Schulidner died after a long battle with cancer in 2001, which saw the metal community unite many a time to try and raise funds for his surgery.
• ‘Dimebag’ Darrell. The ‘infamous’ guitarist for Pantera and Damageplan, who could be held responsible for the current state of metal guitar playing -in a good way. Pantera was formed in 1981 as a glam metal band, but the bands first album ‘Cowboys from hell’ saw them take a much more heavier groove laden approach with the music. Their breakthrough album was 1992’s ‘A vulgar display of power’, which gave the band a whole ‘new level’ of exposure. The next album ‘Far beyond driven’ reached the top of the US charts at a time when metal wasnt considered ‘popular’. Pantera also released ‘Greater Southern Trendkill’ and ‘Re-inventing the steel’, after which Pantera split, as bassist Rex Brown and vocalist Phil Anselmo went off to do ‘Down’ and ‘Superjoint ritual’ and Dimebag and his brother and drummer Vinnie Paul created ‘Damageplan’. While playing onstage with Damageplan in Dec 2004, Dimebag was shot and died instantly. His sound is still seen in alot of bands today- ‘Lamb of god’ are an example of this.

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