Electric Bass Guitar History
Hence the name, this bass guitar is a hybrid of a bass orchestral instrument and the electric guitar. We first see the upright string bass in the 17th century. These enormous instruments were among the last stringed instruments to evolve. With limited technology it was difficult to construct an orchestral instrument capable of creating and maintaining very low frequencies.
Along the same time as the electric guitar was being born, so was the electric bass. The only problem was that the technology to produce and amplify low frequencies was underdeveloped. Soon the technology would catch up and the instrument would become practical. The size of the instrument was changed from its bulky resonating body, to a solid body style guitar with piano strings. This early version of the bass guitar was still too long to be totally practical. It still had to be held in a vertical position and was unfretted. Around 1940 L.D. Heater Music co. in Portland, Oregon, first distributed the true electric bass guitar. This instrument was a compact and fully fretted instrument that could be played horizontally like the guitar. Finally the bass guitar is born.
Later the electric bass catches on with the public when Leo Fender releases the precision bass in 1951. The name comes from the fact that frets enable a higher level of "precision" in playing. Fender and other manufacturers such as Gibson and Rickenbacker, popularized the new instrument. It would then become a staple in such musical genres as rock, blues, funk, jazz, reggae, and so on.
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