The Evolution of the Electric Guitar

[Paul Blair]

The electric guitar came into existence mainly because the desire to
have "louder music" was in the forefront of the mind of many of the
guitar makers. It was the 1920's when dance music became more popular.
Although different from what dance music is today, it was the height
of the flapper girls and the club scene and everyone wanted their
music loud but weren't sure how to do it. The concert settings were
becoming larger as well and even musicians wanted louder and more
powerful instruments. You could see the guitars changing in style with
new technology to get the larger sounds but no one had yet thought to
amplify the guitar itself.
Before the innovation happened though you can trace the need for
electric guitars back well before the 20th century. Around 1800 the
Spanish style 6-string guitar was introduced which was already louder
than previously made guitars. It was the 1850's that the guitar body
was reinforced and the guitar began to have a flattop design to it. In
1890, Orville Gibson came out with a carved body guitar that made it
even louder and set standards for the future arch top guitar.
Then you got to the 1920's when the needs intensified. With big band
music and commercial radio, everyone was trying to think of the next
great guitar invention. Some companies decided to go with larger sizes
and metal bodies, but the true modern guitar inventors started to
focus on electricity to make their guitars louder. John Dopyera went
one better and designed a steel body guitar with a resonator amplifier
that was similar to what you could find with banjos at the time. It
was built into the top of the guitar.
Then in 1923 Lloyd Loar, an engineer who worked with Adolph
Rickenbacker, developed a pickup that sensed the vibrations in the
soundboard of many different string instruments. Rickenbacker is
sometimes said to be the one that really was behind the manufacturing
of the electric guitar, because he equipped it with tungsten pickups
but it really is up to debate as to which was the actual first
electric guitar. The guitars that he incorporated these into were
unsuccessful though. Then in 1931 George Beauchamp created an
electromagnetic pickup which created a field which amplified the
strings movements and vibrations. It was a simple invention that
included a current passing through a coil of wire wrapped around a
magnet. It was known as the "Frying Pan" guitar. This was the first
commercial electric guitar that was useable by the common player.
By the late 30's, there were many other guitar makers jumping into the
electric guitar game, many of which came out with new technology.
However, there were trouble with distortions, feedback and overtones
for the most part. It was famed guitarist and inventor Les Paul who
was the first to work on the sound difficulties that were facing most
inventors. It was in 1940 that Les Paul mounted the strings and
pickups on a solid block of pine to stop some of the body vibrations.
Along with his guitar made of one piece of wood and no sound holes,
this electric guitar may not have been anything great to look at, but
it certainly paved the way for some of the most famous electric
guitars in the world.