The History of the Guitar

The Roots of the Guitar

Jan 1, 1200

The guitar has been around for thousands of years, in all differnet shapes and sizes......the first guitars were presumed to be in the 6th century. (501-600 CE)' http://www.wellington-guitar-lessons.com/history-of-the-classical-guitar.html

Guitars In the Baroque Period

Mar 1, 1770

There were 2 distinct changes made to the guitars in the Baroque Period. and those changes were instead of having double strings, the strings were single stranded and instead of 5 pairs of doble strings, there guitar had 6 single strings. http://www.guitarandlute.com/gtrhstry.html

String Fabric Was Changed

Mar 1, 1780

In the 1780s, the string's materials were changed from gut to cheap bass strings. the base strings were metal that was wrapped around stings of silk. then, they also had to change the fret material to metal too. Otherwise the material would get ruined on the neck of the guitar. http://www.maestros-of-the-guitar.com/

Size of the Guitar

Mar 1, 1785

In addition to changing the materials, the size of the guitar had to be changes so it would fit the mterials properly. the neck of the guitar got longer and thicker, to fit the strings. The sound hole and body got bigger so that was there would be more sound produced. This was the way people came up with the classical guitar. http://www.michaelmurrayguitar.com/Buying a Guitar2.htm

Guitar Bracing

Mar 1, 1850

Guitars were made with an X- brace inside the body so it would be sturdier and more durable. http://www.musicfolk.com/docs/Features/Feature_Bracing.htm

Truss Rods

Jan 1, 1921

Truss rods are put into the gutar nack to prevent the breaking and bending of the guitar neck. If you have someone playing it all the time, its gonna get worn down and thats when the truss rod can come in useful because it can straighten the neck of the guitar back out http://nativeground.com/articles/103.html

Electric Guitar

Mar 1, 1946

Electric guitar have no hole, so they needed another way to produce sound out of them. thats when they came up with the amp so they could plug it into the electric guitar to hear the sound. The amp works like a speaker in ways. http://www.guitaristsource.com/guitars/electric_Guitar.shtml

Pedals and Whammy Bars

Mar 5, 1960

In the 1960's, different textures and sounds were needed to make different styles of music. Pedals became more popular because using different pedals or stepping on the pedal at certain times. this created variety in what an electric guitar can do. Whammy bars did the same thing by changing the sound when you push it down. http://www.ehow.com/about_6296015_brief-history-electric-guitar.html

Acoustic - Electric Guitars

Mar 5, 1970

Eventually, the electric and acoustic guitar merged together to make a guitar that is part of both. These types of guitars usually look like an acoustic guitar but have a plug in for an amp to make it have the sound of an electric guitar. but if you unplug it, the guitar goes back to being an acoustic. http://www.takamine.com/history/acoustic_electric

Digital Guitars

Mar 5, 2013

Digital guitars were recently made. They have no strings and the sound hole is actually an ipad looking screen. This could be something that rockstars use on the road, but it also could be another invention for a video game like Rockband. http://www.business-opportunities.biz/2010/04/26/cool-invention-misa-digital-guitar/