History of the Guitar

The modern guitar as we see performers use it today is actually the invention/combination of two different instruments, the oud and the lute. Each of these instruments has existed for more than 5,000 years. The origins of the lute are unclear but are thought to have evolved from the Arabic ud, while the first known lutes appeared in ancient Iraq around 3500 BCE.

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Today’s guitar formed its beginnings in the early 1800’s in Spain. Notably, Antonio de Torres Jurado’s classical guitars set the standards we see today in terms of body shape, string number, and tuning.

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Towards the turn of the following century steel strings were invented as an alternative to the traditional cat gut strings. Around this time Christian Frederick Martin made design enhancements on the acoustic guitar to withstand the increased tension from steel strings.

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Innovation continued and the first electric guitar was patented and introduced in 1931 by George Beauchamp and Adolph Rickenbacker but took time for it to take off. By the early 1950’s Leo Fender developed the Telecaster which paved the way for what we now see today with the infusion of electric guitars into pop culture as well as music.