The Guitar

The first guitar was called the four-coarse guitar. It was called the four-course guitar because it only had four strings. It also had a strange tuning rather than the usual D-G-B-E tuning it was tuned to C-F-A-D which is a tone lower. Later, in the sixteenth century the five course guitar. Although the five-course is basically a four-course with an extra string, that string (low E) becomes very important in today’s style of playing.

The guitar is present until the 15th century, but before then its sister instruments will begin the string instruments’ roots. Guitar-like instruments began only being used for accompanied, impromptu parts for secular music. This was seen throughout in the minstrels and troubadours that used them to travel from town to town performing. “Some of the early guitar-like st... ... middle of paper ... ...e big band era of the 1930s; the Gibson Super 400 was widely imitated. In 1952, Gibson introduced its first solid-body electric guitar, the Les Paul which became its most popular guitar to date— designed by Ted McCarty and Les Paul” (Hall).

They gave the guitarist volume, but at a price. At high volume they woul... ... middle of paper ... ...of these are essential techniques. The 1980s rock sound was dominated by bands with guitarist that used this style of playing. Where much of the guitar work in the 60s and 70s was influenced by the blues, guitar shredding in the 80s showed classical music influence in their pieces. Many of the guitarists that became popular in the 80s are considered some of the most technically proficient players ever.

The body was made of rosewood, the neck ... ... middle of paper ... ...e the same as guitars and are also amplified (Wade-Matthews). Guitars are very different instruments than they once were. They have had many changes in shape, sound, style, and how they are made. Starting out as tortoise shells with a stick and some strings, they have now developed into acoustics, spread from Europe to the rest of the world, and turned out to be the crazy shaped, cool designed electric guitars of today. Works Cited Chabot, Paul.

These guitars were made famous by the lead guitarist of KISS. The first production guitars are still out there, and are a very big and highly valuable collection item. Ibanez guitars are definitely one of the most high quality made guitars to ever own because of the universal use they have with music. “Salvador Ibanez, a luthier active in Valencia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. He had a shop in Baja San Francisco then moved it to Padre Rico.

The people of Malaga are said to have invented the first instrument recognized as the guitar (Kentor Michael 2). This early version of the guitar incorporated tied frets and gut strings that were arranged in pairs. Pairing the strings gave the instrument the ability to produce a louder, fuller sound. The Malaga’s instrument did not gain much popularity although it did appear in Juan Gil of Zamora’s publication of “Ars Musica.” The next step leading to the modern guitar was the Guitarra Moresca. The Guitarra Moresca was a four stringed instrument with tied frets, similar to the lute, that orginated from Spain in the Thirteenth Century.

The dark piece under the sound hole is called the pick guard; it prevents people from damaging the wood of the guitar. The strings of a guitar are secure with the tuning keys, where a person can adjust the strings to a desired pitch. The six strings of a guitar connect from the headstock- found on top of the guitar attached to the tuning keys, to the white bone saddle- found at the bottom. Each individual string has its own name. Starting with the thickest string, which is found closest to the thumb, (if holding the neck with the left hand) to the thinner they are: E, A, D, G, B, e. Guitars can also be custom-made for left handed people.

It became a widely copied standard in the industry. The Fender Bass Guitar was a new instrument that was easily transportable to a gig. It can be amplified to about any volume without having to worry about feedback. Elvis Presley started using the Fender Precision Bass around 1957. Following Fender in 1953, Gibson introduced the first short scale violin-shaped electric bass with an extendable end pin, which allows the instrument to be played upright or horizontally.

Some of the typical instruments used in a blues-rock band would be electric guitar, bass guitar, a drum kit, vocals, a Hammond organ and a harmonica. In the 1970s the line between hard rock and blues-rock had become so thin it was almost unnoticeable. By the early 1980s blues-rock had a falling out of the mainstream of music. But in the late 1980s early 1990s blues-rock went mainstream again thanks to bands such as Fabulous Thunderbirds and Stevie Ray Vaughn who made there way to rock stardom once again. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blues-rock) Psychedelic rock the definition of this interesting and influential genre is a style of rock music that attempts to reproduce the mind-altering experiences of many different hallucinogenic drugs.

Each string has a name. The bottom and thinnest string is the high e, next is b, then g, onto d, then A, and finally low E. Sound is made by strumming or plucking these strings while placing the fingers of the opposite hand on the frets and strings to produce different notes (Turnbull 825). The guitar is hard to trace back beyond the Renaissance period but it is known the guitar has roots in Spain. The first known guitar was small with four sets of strings; each set called a course. Later a fifth course was added.