The World of Gibson Guitars. Information for Guitar Addicts.
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The World of Gibson Guitars. Information for Guitar Addicts.

By: Terry Booth

Gibson Guitars are an icon of the guitar industry. Gibson is currently a major player in both the electric guitar and acoustic guitar market. The company was originally named after Orville Gibson who made mandolins in Kalamazoo, Michigan at the end of the 19th century. Gibson used the same method to initially make the big body archtop acoustic guitars.

An early innovation of Gibson Guitars was developing the steel truss rod that runs through the guitar neck to give it support. Still a part of both acoustic and electric guitars today, the truss trod is able to be adjusted which alters the straightness of the neck.

Even today, just about every guitar has an adjustable truss-rod that runs through the neck of the guitar. This was developed by Gibson Guitars in the early days to give strength to the neck. The floating pick guard is also an innovation of Gibson.

After doing much experimenting with the amplification of the sound from the guitar in the 1930s, Gibson released the ES range of semi-acoustic guitars. The ES initials stands for "Electric Spanish". This is not a reference to the nylon string classical guitars that we know today. The term Spanish is used to separate the guitar from the Hawaiian guitars that were lap style guitars.

The cut-away shape in the guitar body was also introduced by Gibson Guitars. With the work being done at the time on the amplification of the guitar sound, this enabled the guitarist to utilize the upper end of the fretboard and still be heard. This also facilitated the advent of the lead guitarist.

Gibson's first majorly successful electric guitar was the es-175. It was also slightly different in that it had a pointed cut away. In 1950, with Fender's new Broadcaster guitar, Gibson was under pressure to produce it's first solid body guitar. This resulted in the issue of the Les Paul Standard electric guitar.

Gibson and Fender were not the only ones developing the solid body electric guitar. At the same time, development work was also being undertaken by Rickenbacker, National and Bigsby were also involved in testing.

In the 1940s and 1950s, Les Paul had his own radio program and was a very popular guitarist. He dabbled with his own inventive work on amplification and developed his own solid body guitar, called the "log". Paul took this concept to Gibson Guitars who unfortunately were not interested. It was only after 1950 when Gibson Guitars saw how popular the Fender solid body was that Gibson reapproached Les Paul looking for his assistance.

The world was ready for solid bodied guitars for a number of reasons. The construction process was much simpler and more reliable than than that of the acoustic guitar bodies. Another feature was that the acoustic body tended to alter the true sound. The solid body guitar did not do this and it had the added benefit on greatly increasing the sustain of the natural sound. The other major benefit with the new world of amplification was that the acoustic guitar bodies tended to have much more of a problem with feedback than the solid body guitars.

In response to Fender's early success in the solid body acoustic market, Gibson Guitars put out the Les Paul Standard in 1952 for the price of $210. Les Paul agreed to use, promote and have input so he signed a 5 year contract in return for %5 of sales.

Gibson Guitars like all companies appreciated the need to move with new products. In 1958, Gibson introduced the sunburst appearance of the Les Paul Standard which proved very popular. This guitar in particular is now a collector's item. 1958 was also the year, that Gibson added the extra cutaway to the body shape of the Les Paul Junior and Les Paul Standard. This would soon lead to the SG model which simply stands for Solid Guitar.

The same year Gibson Guitars also began getting radical with their body shape. They bought out the first double neck guitar. They also introduced the Flying V shape and the Explorer shape. This was a response to guitar players placing more emphasis on the look of their guitars as well as the sound and playability. Gibson Guitars were able to stamp their mark on the guitar industry for many years.

Article Source: http://articlenexus.com

Author: Terry Booth has an interest in Gibson Guitars since buying his first instrument, (a Gibson Les Paul copy) as a 10 year old. Visit Terry's website GuitarPlayersWorld.com

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