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A solid body electric instrument is a string instrument such as a guitar, bass or violin built without its normal sound box and relying on its electric pickup system to directly receive the vibrations of the strings.

Solid body instruments are preferred in situations where acoustic feedback may otherwise be a problem, and are inherently both cheaper to build and more rugged than acoustic electric instruments.

Instruments

Solid body instruments

• Some electric guitars.
• Most bass guitars.
• Electric upright bass.
• A few electric mandolins.
• Most electric violins.
• Most electric sitars
• Electric cello.

Solid body instruments do not include:

• Semi-acoustic instruments.
• Electric pianos, even those with strings such as the electric grand piano.
• Pedal steel guitar.

Electric lap steel guitars without sounding boards are considered to be solid body instruments by some authorities, and not by others. This has a major effect on some claims of historical priority, as they predate the first models of solid body electric guitar, which may otherwise be claimed to be the first commercially successful solid body instruments. While noting this, it will be assumed that electric lap steels without sounding boards are solid body instruments for the purposes of this article.

History

Early prototypes

A solid body electric violin was proposed by Thomas Edison^{citation needed}.

Sketch of Rickenbacker "frying pan" lap steel guitar from 1934 patent application

Commercial models

The first commercially successful solid body instrument was the Rickenbacker frying pan lap steel guitar, produced from from 1931 to 1939.

The first commercially successful solid body electric guitar was the Fender Telecaster (The early Telecaster models had no model name on the head stock and are now referred to as 'No Casters") in 1950. It was followed by the Gibson Les Paul in 1952.

Impact on musical styles

Solid body instruments have particularly influenced heavy rock and surf music. Without solid body guitars, neither of these genres could have developed as they did.^{citation needed}

See also

• Semi-acoustic guitar.
• 3rd bridge guitar

External links

• The History of the Electric Solid Body Guitar.
• From Frying Pan to Flying V: The Rise of the Electric Guitar at the Smithsonian Institution's Lemelson Center site.
• The Les Paul Story at the Gibson Guitar Corporation site.

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