Telecaster History

If you could read the story of any electric guitar ever made, Telecaster history would be one of the most fascinating. This classic guitar has made its indelible mark on the country and rock music worlds, and it continues to be one of the most recognizable of electric instruments. The following article is dedicated to the incredible tale of the Telecaster's history.

From its inception, the Telecaster was designed to be something altogether different. However, the Tele's evolution from its earliest concept to the instrument we know today has a variety of interesting twists and turns.

The guitar was an instrument that was originally designed to use the acoustic properties of its own body to project sound. Acoustic dreadnought and parlor guitars used in folk music operated like this for many years, but they proved to be too quiet to cut through the mix when guitarists began playing with other musicians in small groups. Arch top guitars were initially designed to address this issue, but when arch tops were amplified, their hollow bodies were very prone to feedback. There was still not a reliable solution that would ensure that the guitar could be heard without feeding back, so guitar luthiers began to experiment with solid body guitars.

Leo Fender was not the first luthier to make a foray into the world of the solid body electric guitar. Many smaller guitar manufacturers had been producing such guitars since the early 1940s, but Fender was the first to mass-produce an affordable solid body electric guitar. In 1950, the Fender Broadcaster (as the Telecaster was originally known) hit the market. The Broadcaster had two pickups and a bright, treble sound that instantly became popular with country guitar players. Shortly after its introduction, the Broadcaster was renamed the Telecaster in an effort to associate this new instrument with another new and exciting medium – television. The tele in Telecaster alludes to the earliest black and white televisions that began appearing in American homes in the early 1950s.

There would be no Telecaster history to talk about if guitar players didn't love the way these instruments sounded. Since discerning musicians first heard this guitar, it has filled a niche in the range of the overall electric guitar sonic spectrum that no other guitar has filled. The traditional Telecaster is a very simple instrument consisting of a bolt on neck attached to a solid body guitar with two single coil pickups, a three-way selector, one volume and one tone knob. Cutting, punchy, crisp, shiny and bright, the Telecaster lays sole claim to the higher frequency tones produced by electric guitars. Never thin and shrill, the Tele can be as bright as you want it to be while still retaining a musical, appealing tone. Some players affectionately refer to the Telecaster sound by saying it can "rip your head off". From Keith Richards to Jimmy Page to Danny Gatton to Steve Cropper, some of the most swaggering guitar players in history have turned to the Telecaster to give their sound the perfect edge and attitude.

While the traditional Telecaster with two single coil pickups is still the line's standard-bearer, there have been some very interesting variations to the Telecaster over the years. In 1972, Fender released the Telecaster Deluxe, a guitar that was essentially a Telecaster with two humbucker pickups instead of two single coil pickups. The warm, heavy sound that drove rock and roll music in the early 1970s made popular by bands like Black Sabbath, Cream,and The Allman Brothers utilized the fat, bassy sound of humbucker pickups. Gibson's Les Paul was the "go to" guitar for this kind of sound, and the Telecaster Deluxe was Fender's attempt to lure some of that market away from the Les Paul. The guitar community never really embraced the Deluxe at the time, and the line was discontinued in 1981. In 2004, Fender re-released the guitar and called it the Fender '72 Telecaster Deluxe.

Another interesting variation of the Telecaster was the Telecaster Custom. Also released in 1972, this guitar was designed as the best of both worlds option for guitar players. The neck pickup was a humbucker to give players the option of a fat, warm tone while the bridge pickup remained a single coil so the guitar could still create those rip your head off bright tones that made the Telecaster famous in the first place. The fate of the Tele Custom was almost identical to that of the Tele Deluxe. They were both discontinued in 1981 only to be re-released in 2004.

As the electric guitar enters the 21st century, the cream is beginning to rise to the surface in many ways. Guitar players who are concerned about their tone and appreciate the history of the electric guitar are gravitating to the classics en masse. And guitar manufacturers are taking notice. In addition to the re-release of the Telecaster Deluxe and the Custom, Fender continues to make exciting and high-quality versions of the original Telecaster for new generations of guitar players. As long as there is good music being made, more and more chapters will fill the story of the Telecaster history.

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