Give Adolph Rickenbacker (1887–1976) credit for this global marvel of the radio. In the depths of the 1930s Great Depression, the Swiss-born businessman and his partner George Beauchamp devised the electric guitar in California.
The potent new instrument gave rise to a distinctively American art form that eventually dominated pop music culture worldwide.
It was dubbed rock ‘n’ roll.
According to Nicholas Toth, an emeritus professor of anthropology and cognitive science at Indiana University, electric guitars “were affordable, they were loud, and they were relatively easy to learn.
The electric guitar’s output went beyond just volume and tone. It allowed artists to release all of their emotions and let audiences to experience the joy, agony, ecstasy, or despair of an artist directly into their own souls.
In the midst of his outrageous fame and fortune at the age of 25, Beatles guitarist George Harrison bemoaned the unfulfilled love in the world “while my guitar gently weeps.”
A teenage musician from New Jersey battled to find his voice in an America ripped apart by the Vietnam War. Then, on “Thunder Road,” Bruce Springsteen boasted to his tortured love interest, Mary, “I got this guitar, and I learned how to make it talk.”
