Electric Guitars

The electric guitar is younger than the acoustic and is a staple of American culture and Rock & Roll. They come in many shapes, colours, styles, and sizes, so there might be a guitar for everyone.

Electric guitars need to be amplified to be heard and to have their full effect. There are magnets, wrapped in wire, and usually dipped in wax that amplify the sound made by the vibrating strings. These are called pickups and there are many different kinds.

The two main types of pickups for the electric guitar are single coil pickups and humbuckers. There are many other types of pickups with really interesting names (like the lipstick, soapbox, etc) but I will be focusing on the two most popular.

The two most famous guitars each use one of these types of pickups. The Fender Stratocaster traditionally uses the single coil pickup and the Gibson Les Paul uses humbuckers.

This is an interesting article from the Atlantic about the brith of the electric guitar: https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2019/01/how-electric-guitar-was-born/580969/