This amounts to an impedance buffering pre-amplifier on-board the instrument to lower the output impedance of the bass's pickup circuit, increasing low-end output, and overall frequency response (more lows and highs). The 1970s saw the founding of Music Man Instruments, owned by Leo Fender, which produced the StingRay, the first widely-produced bass with active (powered) electronics. The instrument is also referred to as an "electric bass guitar", "electronic bass", or simply "bass".
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The term "electric bass" began replacing "Fender bass" in the late 1960s, however, as evidenced by the title of Carol Kaye's popular bass instructional book in 1969 ( How to Play the Electric Bass) and the use of the term "electric bass" by U.S. In the 1950s and 1960s, the term "Fender bass" was widely used to describe the bass guitar, due to Fender's early dominance in the market for mass-produced bass guitars. Pickup shapes on electric basses are often referred to as "P" or "J" pickups in reference to the visual and electrical differences between the Precision Bass and Jazz Bass pickups.įender also began production of the Mustang Bass a 30" scale length instrument used by bassists such as Tina Weymouth of Talking Heads ("P" and "J" basses have a scale length of 34", a design echoed on most current production electric basses of all makes). The Jazz Bass' neck was narrower at the nut than the Precision bass (1½" versus 1¾").Īnother visual difference that set the Jazz Bass apart from the Precision is its "offset-waist" body. This was soon changed to the familiar configuration of a volume control for each pickup, and a single, passive tone control. The earliest production basses had a 'stacked' volume and tone control for each pickup. The Jazz Bass (often referred to as a "J-bass") featured two single-coil pickups, one close to the bridge and one in the Precision bass' split coil pickup position, and was designed by Leo Fender to be an easier bass for a guitarist to play than the existing Precision Bass, due to the narrower nut (noted later). With the explosion of the popularity of rock music in the 1960s many more manufacturers began making bass guitars.įirst introduced in 1960, The Fender Jazz Bass was known as the Deluxe Bass and was meant to accompany the Jazzmaster guitar. Gibson basses also tended to be smaller, sleeker instruments Gibson did not produce a 34" scale bass until 1963 with the release of the Thunderbird, which was also the first Gibson bass to utilize dual-humbucking pickups in a more traditional position, about halfway between the neck and bridge.Ī small number of other companies such as Rickenbacker, Danelectro and Höfner also began manufacturing bass guitars during the 1950s. The EB-3, introduced in 1961, also had a "mini-humbucker" at the bridge position. Whereas Fender basses had pickups mounted in positions in between the base of the neck and the top of the bridge, many of Gibson's early basses featured one humbucking pickup mounted directly against the neck pocket. As with Fender's designs, Gibson relied heavily upon an existing guitar design for this bass the EB-0 was very similar to a Gibson SG in appearance (although the earliest examples have a slab-sided body shape closer to that of the double-cutaway Les Paul Special).
The Precision Bass (or "P-bass") evolved from a simple, uncontoured 'slab' body design similar to that of a Telecaster with a single coil pickup, to a contoured body design with beveled edges for comfort and a single four-pole "split coil pickup."įollowing Fender's lead, Gibson released the violin-shaped EB-1 Bass in 1953, followed by the more conventional-looking EB-0 Bass in 1959. His Fender Precision Bass, introduced in 1951, became a widely copied industry standard.
In the 1950s, Leo Fender developed the first mass-produced electric bass. However, Tutmarc's inventions never caught the public imagination, and little further development of the instrument took place until the 1950s. The change to a "guitar" form made the instrument easier to hold and transport, and the addition of guitar-style frets enabled bassists to play in tune more easily and made the new electric bass easier to learn. The 1935 sales catalogue for Tutmarc's company, Audiovox, featured his "electronic bass fiddle," a four stringed, solid bodied, fretted electric bass guitar with a 30 ½" scale length. In the 1930s, inventor Paul Tutmarc from Seattle, Washington, developed the first guitar-style electric bass instrument that was fretted and designed to be held and played horizontally.
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