Les Paul (6/9/ 1915 – 8/12/2009) is without question the pioneer of the electric guitar among other inventions. Additionally, Les Paul became a popular American recording artist with jazz, country, and blues styling.
Born on June 9th, 1915, Lester Polsfus was born in Waukesha, Wisconsin to a German family. As a youngster his parents unfortunately divorced and was one of the reasons that Lester had preferred a shortened stage name of "Les Paul". As a child, Les showed a huge interest in music and began playing the harmonica with fervor at the age of eight. He next moved on to try and play the banjo, which in later years he had improved upon. At the time, however, Les Paul moved on to learning and focusing on the guitar. Again, at this time there was nothing called an electric guitar, and Les practiced on various types of classic and/or acoustic parlor type guitars. Remembering his early harmonica days, Les Paul invented the modern harmonica holder which allowed him to continue to play his guitar while being able to add the harmonica into the mix. Mr. Paul always had a great way of looking outside of the box and creating new things.
Les Paul has always shown an interest in layering of different instruments, which is a common them to many of his inventions. Throughout his teens, Les played with various country acts including Rube Tronson's Texas Cowboys. Finally, before finishing his school for good, Les dropped out to join the Wolverton's Radio Band.
While playing in various musical acts, he began to get very interested in jazz music, especially the sound of Django Reinhardt, whom he later befriended and maintained a close relationship until Reinhardt's death. In 1937 Les Paul was performing with a musical treo in NY with Chet Atkin's older half brother Jim Atkins. At the time, the only amplified electric instruments were acoustic-electric guitars which Paul disliked greatly.
At this point Les Paul began experimenting with solid body construction called "the log", which was a rudimentary piece of simply wood with various pickup and string variations which helped Les Paul refine his designs.
In 1940 while experimenting with various types of wiring, Paul electrocuted himself pretty seriously. This required a period of 2 year recovery which caused him to leave NY completely. In 1948 an even more serious injury caused by a car accident severely shattered his right elbow. This arm was required for Paul to strum his guitar. His doctors told him they could never restore movement to this arm. Paul asked them to set his elbow and arm at an angle which would allow him to cradle and strum his guitar. Talk about dedication! It took him almost 2 years to recover from this.
After showing Gibson guitar company many of his solidbody guitar sample logs, they eventually decided that they were interested in producing the guitar under Paul's guidance and specifications. After showing Les the final product he was so impressed that he signed an exclusive contract of endorsement which prevented him from ever performing in public with anything other than a Gibson guitar. Gibson was very concerned at the time that they were going to be left out of the solid body guitar market which Leo Fender and Rickenbacker were pioneering at the same time.
Today, the Les Paul has had hundreds of models and artist adjustments and remains one of the best selling guitar in the world for both novice and professional players alike. Gibson also makes a more affordable version of their famed Les Paul standard under the Epiphone name.
Les Paul has also been credited with creating advanced to multitrack- recording. As noted above, Les Paul has always been interested in layering sounds and in thee early 1940's he made recordings using 8 overdubs which showcased his new recording technique. Rather than using magnetic tapes, the audio parts were actually recorded on acetate disks. This technology developed into reel-to-reel recorders.
Les Paul continued to perform and record music and enjoyed a long life as a living legend who pioneered many areas of modern music. Paul died on August 12, 2009 from pneumonia complications in NY. He has a permanent place in history as well as the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for his many contributions noted above.
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