Floyd D. Rose (born 1948 [1] ) is an American musician and engineer who invented the Floyd Rose Locking Tremolo System in the late 1970s, eventually founding a company of the same name to manufacture and license his products. This double locking system was notable for its ability to stay in tune despite repeated use and wide variations in pitch. His design was later recognized on Guitar World 's "10 Most Earth Shaking Guitar Innovations." [2]
Rose was a guitarist in a rock band in the 1970s. Like many other guitarists of the time period, he frequently experienced issues with his guitars going out of tune after using the tremolo arm. In 1976, after trying several traditional techniques for keeping the guitar in tune, he began developing a locking system to keep the strings from moving freely through the nut. [3] Several improvements soon followed, including using more durable materials to lock the strings down on the nut, and the creation of a similar system of clamps to lock the strings down on the bridge. His double locking system was originally hand-made, but high demand eventually led to Rose licensing his design to Kramer Guitars for large-scale manufacturing.
In the early 1980s, Rose was playing guitar in an American hard rock band named C.O.R.E. Eventually, he and vocalist Scott Palmerton (also known as Jonathan K.) left the band in order to form Q5. They were joined by guitarist Rick Pierce, bassist Evan Sheeley and drummer Gary Thompson from another local band named TKO. In 1983, the band gained the attention of the rock band Heart's management team and recorded a seven-song demo. Later that same year, the band recorded their debut album, Steel the Light, which was re-released the following year on the Music for Nations label. [4] The band's follow-up album, When the Mirror Cracks, took a more commercial approach, but failed to achieve the level of success of their previous release. The band disbanded shortly after.
The Floyd Rose Locking Tremolo, or simply Floyd Rose, is a type of locking vibrato arm for a guitar. Floyd D. Rose invented the locking vibrato in 1976, the first of its kind, and it is now manufactured by a company of the same name. The Floyd Rose gained popularity in the 1980s through guitarists like Eddie Van Halen, Neal Schon, Brad Gillis, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, and Alex Lifeson, who used its ability to stay in tune even with extreme changes in pitch. Its tuning stability comes through the double-locking design that has been widely regarded as revolutionary; the design has been listed on Guitar World's "10 Most Earth Shaking Guitar Innovations" and Guitar Player's "101 Greatest Moments in Guitar History 1979–1983."
The baritone guitar is a guitar with a longer scale length, typically a larger body, and heavier internal bracing, so it can be tuned to a lower pitch. Gretsch, Fender, Gibson, Ibanez, ESP Guitars, PRS Guitars, Music Man, Danelectro, Schecter, Jerry Jones Guitars, Burns London and many other companies have produced electric baritone guitars since the 1960s, although always in small numbers due to low popularity. Tacoma, Santa Cruz, Taylor, Martin, Alvarez Guitars and others have made acoustic baritone guitars.
A vibrato system on a guitar is a mechanical device used to temporarily change the pitch of the strings. Instruments without a vibrato have other bridge and tailpiece systems. They add vibrato to the sound by changing the tension of the strings, typically at the bridge or tailpiece of an electric guitar using a controlling lever, which is alternately referred to as a whammy bar, vibrato bar, or incorrectly as a tremolo arm. The lever enables the player to quickly and temporarily vary the tension and sometimes length of the strings, changing the pitch to create a vibrato, portamento, or pitch bend effect.
André Olbrich is a German musician, best known as the co-founder and lead guitarist of power metal band Blind Guardian, in which he serves as one of the main composers with other founder Hansi Kürsch.
Steinberger is a series of distinctive electric guitars and bass guitars, designed and originally manufactured by Ned Steinberger. The name "Steinberger" can be used to refer to either the instruments themselves or the company that originally produced them. Although the name has been applied to a variety of instruments, it is primarily associated with a minimalist "headless" design of electric basses and guitars.
The King V is an electric guitar made by Jackson Guitars.
Floyd Rose SpeedLoader is a floating guitar bridge based on the Floyd Rose Original. In development since 1991, it was introduced to the public in 2003. This tremolo was developed in San Diego CA at AJ manufacturing by tool makers Jerry Morhman, Richard J Price, Steve Lamms, and Kerry L Stottlemyer under the direct guidance of Floyd Rose himself. With Richard J Price doing the majority of the design work and machining of the prototypes. Over 3000 hours and $150,000 were spent in developing this new ground breaking tremolo system and the first working unit on a guitar body. It inherited the locking floating bridge principle from the original version, but improved usability and diminished most of disadvantages that the Floyd Rose Original was criticized for, while adding the inconvenience of needing special-purpose strings. The Floyd Rose SpeedLoader is available in Tremolo, Fixed Bridge, and Convergent Tuning forms. However, the issues with strings became more apparent, as the specially made strings for the Speedloader were discontinued due to quality control issues. With no strings currently being manufactured, there is no way to properly string and set up any guitar with the Floyd Rose Speedloader. Customers have voiced their discontent with Floyd Rose for a lack of development of any parts that could remedy the situation.
The Jackson Soloist is an electric guitar model manufactured by Jackson Guitars that was officially produced since 1984. The design is a typical "superstrat" with differences from the Stratocaster being a: neck-thru design and often a Floyd Rose or a similar tremolo, premium woods, a deeper cutaway at the lower horn for improved access to the higher frets, and a sharper body with squared off edges.
The Jackson Dinky is a Superstrat-style double-cutaway electric guitar built by Jackson Guitars. The "Dinky" is named for its slightly smaller than normal (7/8) body size. Usually fitted with a two humbucker pickup configuration, some models also include single-coil pickups and/or just one bridge humbucker. The fretboard can be made out of ebony, rosewood and more recently maple, or rock maple, with 24 jumbo frets and is always built with a bolt-on neck. Most of the guitars have a Floyd Rose original or licensed tremolo, and a locking nut to help maintain stable tuning. Some Dinkys have hardtail, or String-Thru bridges. The Jackson Dinky is usually preferred by players of hard rock and heavy metal.
Kramer Guitars is an American manufacturer of electric guitars and basses. Kramer produced aluminum-necked electric guitars and basses in the 1970s and wooden-necked guitars catering to hard rock and heavy metal musicians in the 1980s; Kramer is currently a division of Gibson Guitar Corporation.
The Fender Performer was an electric guitar designed by John Page for rock and metal guitarists in the mid-1980s. The Performer was also available as an electric bass.
Fender Contemporary Stratocaster electric guitars were produced by Fender Japan in the 1980s.
The Ibanez Edge Tremolo is a double locking tremolo system for the electric guitar very similar in design to the original Floyd Rose. It first appeared in the Ibanez product line as of the 1986 model year; however, they have appeared on guitars with 1985 serial numbers. The Edge offers a number of improvements from the Original Floyd Rose, namely locking studs, a spring retainer on the tremolo block and a pop-in arm.
The Ibanez ZR Tremolo is a double locking tremolo system developed by Ibanez.
A bridge is a device that supports the strings on a stringed musical instrument and transmits the vibration of those strings to another structural component of the instrument—typically a soundboard, such as the top of a guitar or violin—which transfers the sound to the surrounding air. Depending on the instrument, the bridge may be made of carved wood, metal or other materials. The bridge supports the strings and holds them over the body of the instrument under tension.
The Squier Stagemaster (discontinued) is a guitar made by Squier, which normally manufactures less expensive authorized copies of Fender's more popular guitars and bass guitars. The Stagemaster is similar in appearance to a Stratocaster with a few cosmetic and functional differences, and is typically classified as a Superstrat. Generally, these differences are:
The Yamaha Corporation is a multinational corporation and conglomerate based in Japan with a wide range of products and services, predominantly musical instruments, motorcycles, power sports equipment and electronics.
Blade Guitars is a manufacturer of electric guitars and bass guitars founded by luthier Gary Levinson in 1987. Levinson had been repairing guitars since 1964 and, in 1977, during his graduate studies at the University of Basel, Switzerland, he founded Guitars by Levinson. Using the experience he gathered from his work, he decided to start Blade Guitars in 1985. By 1986, he was refining the idea of a line of guitars based on the concept he defines as "Classic Design, Creative Technology"; at this time, he was also determining the features that would characterize his range of guitars. In January 1987, a manufacturing deal was reached for the production of the guitars. Blade Guitars made their debut in October 1987, at the music show of Tokyo. Their presentation at the Frankfurt Musikmesse in 1988 signalled their European launch.
David Michael Murray is an English guitarist and songwriter, best known as a member of the British heavy metal band Iron Maiden since 1976. He joined Iron Maiden early in its history, and is the second-longest serving member of the band after founder Steve Harris. Murray and Harris are the only members of Iron Maiden to have appeared on all of the band's releases.
Q5 is an American hard rock/heavy metal band from Seattle, Washington, United States, who formed in 1983. Their first studio album, titled Steel the Light, came out in 1984. Picking up some critical praise, the outfit toured with the likes of Lita Ford and Twisted Sister. However, the group faced internal divisions that ultimately ended the project before the 1980s came to a close. In 2014, Q5 re-formed to perform at the Sweden Rock Festival, and the band members involved found that the one-off event was not enough, deciding to continue on with the revamped version of the group.