Good day, my lieges,

Today will be my first post on instrument history! Maybe not as interesting as the other posts, but important and helpful nonetheless.

Off to the Post!

This week's topic is: Guitars

Guitars -A brief History

The guitar (though most people think it descended from the lute as the guitar is part of that family) descended from the Spanish instrument called guitarra latina (also referenced as guitarra ladina.). The guitarra latina is either a descendant (though not a direct one) of the gittern, an instrument that was prominent throughout the early 13 to the late 15th centuries, is a Roman instrument called the fidicula, which was introduced to Spain and rechristened as guitarra latina, or, as written in an 1855 book, was a vigola and then a vihuela de mano before becoming the guitarra latina.

The early guitar (gl), had 4 strings and was tuned C-F-A-D' similar to the tuning of the lute and its Spanish counterpart, the vihuela. In the late 16th century, the fifth set of strings was added along with the tuning pegs being changed so that they faced the rear of the instrument, rather than the side.
By the end of the 18th century, tied frets made out of catgut (sheep, goat and sometimes cattle intestines) were replaced with ivory and metal, the sixth (and last) set of strings was added (though even now there are guitars with more or less, take the bass guitar, usually it only has four strings), strings were now usually single instead of doubled or tripled up, and the strings were tuned the modern E-A-D-G-B-E'.

Once the 1800s had rolled around, lyre-shaped guitars and modern guitars started to enter the picture. Tuning pegs had started to shift once again from the lute-like wood pegs to metal screws. Guitars began to get broader and shallower and fingerboards got longer and higher. Thanks to a certain Antonio de Torres Jurado, the classical guitar as we know it was invented.

Classical and Acoustic guitars, however, were too quiet for the 1900 music scene. So 2 guitar lovers, Musician
George Beauchamp and electrical engineer Adolf Rickenbacker set off to create the first electrically amplified
guitar. With the help of George's love of Hawaiian guitars, and Adolf's company -Rickenbacker International
Corporation, later known as Rickenbacker Electro Stringed Instrument Company- Electric guitars were out on
shelves by the summer of 1932, and hence, embarked on its path to fame.

And the rest my dears, is history,

(or not)

Hope you enjoyed my first ever Music History post,

Before you go, test your knowledge on guitars by doing a quick crossword. Both your knowledge from this article and whatever previous knowledge you had will be needed. If you finish, comment to say you did and include a pdf of your completed crossword.