“we must all own up that without Les Paul, generations of flash punks like us would be in jail or cleaning toilets.” Keith Richards

Music is such a major part of every day life, is it any wonder that collecting some aspect of this category reaches almost everyone. Name a household without a CD assortment or MP3 player, vinyl, tapes, sheet music, or musical instruments. Some of us have old Victrolas, radios, cassette players, tape players, or record decks when the collection is vintage. (My old radio doesn’t play old music)

Our affection for one form or another leads us to idolize the music makers, a particular genre, era or the instruments played.

Every so often an artist comes along with a lasting impact on a vast portion of the field of music and therefore creates collectibles for so many separate categories. Les Paul, a 92 year old performer, inventor, and innovator is such a person.

Every Monday night, the great guitarist carries his 92-year-old body and his 44-year-old Gibson onstage at the Iridium Jazz Club at 51st and Broadway in New York City. Still introduced as “The Wizard of Waukesha,” he does two shows – one at 8, one at 10 – in the basement nightclub.

In 1978 Les Paul and Mary Ford were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame as recognition for their achievements. He also received a Grammy Trustee Award for lifetime achievements in 1983.

In 1988 Les was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Les Paul was inducted into the National Inventors Hall Of Fame in 2005 for his development of the solid-body electric guitar.

In 2006, he was inducted into the National Broadcasters Hall of Fame. He was also named an honorary member of the Audio Engineering Society.

He is a pioneer in the development of the solid-body electric guitar which made the sound of rock and roll possible. His many recording innovations include over dubbing, delay – such as sound on sound and tape delay, phasing effects and multi-track recording.

We only need to dig out the old vinyl of recordings with then wife Mary Ford, to hear examples of his innovative styling on records like Bye Bye Blues, How High the Moon, Hummingbird, Just Because, Tennessee Waltz, The World Is Waiting for the Sunrise & Vaya Con Dios.

Les had an early start in music before he played guitar he played piano. By 13, Les was performing semi-professionally as a country-music guitarist.

At the age of 17, Les played with Rube Tronson’s Cowboys. Soon after, he dropped out of high school to join Wolverton’s Radio Band in St. Louis, then moved to Chicago. His first records were released in 1936. Unsatified with the sound of electric guitars, he was experimenting with sound in the 1930s.

Later moving to California 1n the early 40s and working with greats like Nat King Cole, The Andrew Sisters and on Bing Crosby’s radio Show.

Les hosted a 15-minute radio program, The Les Paul Show, on NBC in 1950, featuring himself, Mary Ford, and Eddie Stapleton. Several recordings of these shows survive and are prized by collectors of old time radio programs.

Les even built his own wax-cutter assembly, based on auto parts. He used the flywheel from a Cadillac for its weight and flatness. Even in these early days, he used the wax disk setup to record parts at different speeds and with delay, resulting in his signature sound with echoes and birdsong-like guitar riffs.

The Ampex company, with Bing Crosby’s backing, created the Ampex Model 200, the world’s first commercially-produced reel to reel tape recorder. Bing gave Les Paul what was only the second Model 200 to be produced and Les immediately saw its potential both for special effects, like echo, and its suitability for multi-track recording, for which he is considered the father.

Using this machine, Les developed his tape multi-track system by adding an additional recording head and extra circuitry, allowing multiple tracks to be recorded separately and asynchronously on the same tape. Paul’s invention was quickly developed by Ampex into commercially-produced two-track and three-track recorders, and these machines were the backbone of the professional recording studio, radio and TV industry in the 1950s and early 1960s.

When he later began using magnetic tape, the major change was that he could take his recording equipment on tour with him, making episodes for his 15-minute radio show in his hotel room.

When the Waukesha County Historical Society announced a preview and wine tasting event in the historical old county courthouse and jail, now run as a museum, to raise both funds and interest in the future permanent interactive exhibit of the Les Paul collection of memorabilia, we just had to attend.

We will cover the event and plans for the collection in the Friday Blog.

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Article Tags: , Ampex, Bing Crosby, guitar, Jazz, Les Paul, Mary Ford, multi-track, musician, over dub, rock, roll, sheet music

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 11th, 2008 at 2:10 am and is filed under collecting fyi, events, interviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.