The Evolution of the Electric Guitar

    As a big country music fan I love listening to the guitar in my favorite songs. I have also always wanted to play guitar and because of that I decided to do a little research on how the electric guitar has evolved from the regular acoustic guitar.

    The first guitar ever created is the acoustic guitar. This guitar is one that you will commonly see around a campfire when you are having a good time with your friends. The first electric guitar was created by Adolph Rickenbacker and George Beauchamp in the 1930s. The guitar was called the "Frying Pan" because it's shape resembled a frying pan. It was created for Hawaiian music because it was super popular at the time but also because the popularity of music bands was growing which meant there was a need for larger concert venues and louder guitars. To the left is a picture of the guitar.

This is a link to a Hawaiian song played by this guitar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Luqy-W0M5eE

    The guitar has a very unique tambre. I recognize it from Hawaiian songs that I have heard in the past. It has a twangy sound and the notes are held for several beats. The guitar is also very quiet and not as loud as a more modern                                            electric guitar.

    After the "Frying Pan" was created the electric guitar underwent many changes. The Les Paul "Log" Guitar was made with maple wood to help with the feedback issues. The Bigsby-Travis Guitar because of its design boosted the versatility and appeal. In 1994 the Ibanez 7-String Guitar was created. It has seven strings, hence the name, and is one solid body. The guitar became known when the band Korn featured it in their first album release in 1994. After that the seven string guitar became very popular and was heavily manufactured. To the left is a picture of the guitar.

This is a link to a documentary about the guitar with the guitar being played in the background.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rshpkK5_6s

This guitar also has a unique tambre. The sounds of the notes are piercing and the notes are not held for long like the guitar before. It is also much louder than the other electric guitar which is another stark difference. I don't really like the changes to the sound of the guitar. I personally like the quieter and more twangy sound of the first electric guitar. Rock is not my favorite type of music because I don't like listening to the harsh sounds of the newer electric guitars.

Akutsu, K. (2025) History and evolution of the Electric Guitar: Guitar Craft Academy, Nashville. Available at: https://nashville.mi.edu/the-electric-guitar-history-and-evolution/ (Accessed: 04 March 2026).

The Evolution of the Electric Guitar (2010) Truefire. Available at: https://blog.truefire.com/inspiration/first-electric-guitar-evolution/ (Accessed: 04 March 2026).