BIOGRAPHICAL DETAILS
Description: Guitarist, USA
Known For: In 2004 a specialist magazine
Instruments: Guitar
Music Styles: Rock, Swing
Location: OK, United States of America
Date Born: 8th July 1926
Location Born: Meridian, Oklahoma, United States of America
Date Died: 15th February 2007
Location Died: United States of America
CONTACT DETAILS
Web Site: The Stratocaster – A True Thoroughbred of Electric Guitars
Other See below:
YOUTUBE VIDEO
BIOGRAPHICAL PROFILE
Bill Carson
An American guitarist.
Bill Carson (July 8, 1926 – February 15, 2007), born in Meridian, Oklahoma, was a California Western swing guitarist for whom Leo Fender originally designed the Fender Stratocaster electric guitar in the early 1950s. Carson has documented his close relationship to the Strat in his autobiography, Bill Carson- My Life & Times with Fender Musical Instruments (co-written by Willie G. Moseley). In reference to the Stratocaster’s “Custom Contouring”, he once said, “It fits better to your body like a well tailored shirt should.”
Bill Carson was a California Western swing guitarist for whom Leo Fender originally designed the Fender Stratocaster electric guitar in the early 1950s.
Carson has documented his close relationship to the Strat in his autobiography, Bill Carson- My Life & Times with Fender Musical Instruments (co-written by Willie G. Moseley).
In reference to the Stratocaster’s “Custom Contouring”, he once said, “It fits better to your body like a well tailored shirt should.”
Bill Carson visited Leo Fender’s Fullerton factory in California. He was looking for a revolutionary, solid-bodied Telecaster electric guitar and amplifier.
The Telecaster had evolved from Fender’s Broadcaster, featured on Arthur Smith’s hit Guitar Boogie (1947).
Fender not only provided Carson with a guitar, but also employed him as a field tester. Thus did Carson get dubbed the “test pilot of the Stratocaster”, the instrument that was to become an icon in the hand of musicians such as Jim Hendrix, Buddy Holly, the Shadows and Eric Clapton.
As field tester Carson reported back on stage use of each version of Fender’s models. The features that resulted included the Stratocaster’s body contour shape.
Carson found that tucking the oblong Telecaster into his ribcage for hours every night often caused bruising. The guitars should be reshaped to fit the player’s body “like a well tailored shirt”, Carson told Fender.
The result, in 1954, was the classic “cutaway” Stratocaster, whose big, full sound was designed for use by Carson and his contemporaries in western swing.
A dominant form of the late 1940s and early 50s, and an amalgam of country music, jazz and big band dance tunes, western swing’s natural habitats were bars and honky-tonks where it was necessary to play loudly to be heard over the hubbub.
In 1957 Carson joined Fender full-time, gravitating from the assembly line to guitar supervisor and plant manager.
Bill Carson died aged 80.
LINKS:
- Fender.com
- Bill Carson Strat
- “Bill Carson: Chuck Yeager of the Stratocaster”
- The Stratocaster – A True Thoroughbred of Electric Guitars
- Guardian obituary
- Independent obituary
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia