Watching his hands fly across the neck of his guitar, I was mesmerized.
David Gilmour returned to the stage in 2024 with a tour for his new album, Luck and Strange. As the guitarist and vocalist for Pink Floyd, he defined the sound of one of the greatest progressive rock bands of all time. The night that I saw him perform live, I was blown away.
Sometimes, it wasn’t just about the speed at which he played, but the feelings that he conveyed with every note. Even on those instrumental tracks without lyrics or a vocal tone that were meant to tell me what he was feeling, I could sense his emotion through the guitar. That ability, to make people feel their music, is a dream that musicians spend their whole lives looking for.
If they do find it, their talent is embodied by the instrument that they used to get there. Gilmour’s weapon of choice for that night, and for most of his musical career, was a Fender Stratocaster.
In his hands that night was an instrument not so different from mine. He inspired countless other guitarists across a myriad of genres. In the seven decades since it was designed, the Stratocaster has become ubiquitous throughout popular music.
In the 1950s, cars sported wing-like fins and headlights that poked above the hood. Black-and white photos filled the magazines, drive-in movies thrived, and rotary phones would still be dominant for the next decade. Few things, cultural or technological, have withstood the test of time since that era; and yet, the Fender Stratocaster, an instrument introduced in 1954, is still the face of electric guitars today.
In fact, Gilmour’s 1969 Fender Stratocaster became so well-known that it was dubbed the “Black Strat.” It sold for nearly 3.9 million dollars at auction, marking it as one of the most expensive guitars ever purchased. Another one of Gilmour’s Stratocasters – a 1954 guitar named the “0001” due to its serial number – sold for $1.8 million. Bob Dylan’s Stratocaster went for $965,000, and Eric Clapton’s for $959,000.
Since its first television appearance in 1957 with Buddy Holly, the Stratocaster has remained a favorite, cherished by both 21st-century indie bands and classic rock legends alike.
It wasn’t always loved, however. Despite being introduced nearly three years prior, the Strat was a relatively unknown instrument by that time. Buddy Holly, part of the then three-piece band The Crickets, is credited with rocketing the Stratocaster into the public eye. From its debut during a performance on The Ed Sullivan Show, the Stratocaster has ripped, soared, and slid through countless genres of music and the hands that play them.
ROCKY START
While the Fender Stratocaster certainly wasn’t the first electric guitar, it was a significant technological leap from the designs of the time.
Leo Fender, who founded what would become the Fender Musical Instruments Corporation, aimed to improve the small solid-body electric guitar market of his time. Fender began as a radio-repairman in his workshop and worked his way up until his guitar design would change music forever.
Up until the 1950s, guitars had been primarily large, hollow instruments. The body of an acoustic guitar acted like a reverberation chamber that amplified the vibrations when a player plucked a string, producing a louder sound. With changing music styles in the mid-20th century, however, combined with a need to play in larger halls to larger audiences, guitars began to change.
The invention of guitar pickups changed the game. They detected the vibrations from strings, registered them as electrical signals, then sent them to an amplifier or speaker that would project the sound loudly. Utilizing an electromagnet wrapped in coils of wire to detect the string movement, pickups were first installed in acoustic guitars — before Les Paul, a musician, realized that he could use the pickups alone, rather than relying on the acoustic reverberations from the guitar itself for sound.
Les Paul’s famous “log” guitar, nicknamed so because it was regarded as a piece of wood with strings and pickups attached, marked the transition from hollow-bodied guitars (ones that relied on acoustic sound) to solid-body guitars which relied primarily on pickups.
Fender was the first company to mass-produce an electric guitar, the Telecaster, in 1951. Now, the company touts it as “the guitar that started it all.” Evidently, there was room for improvement. The earliest estimates state that the Stratocaster started its life as a design in 1952, with several advancements over the Telecaster.
One of the most noticeable things about the Stratocaster is its distinctive shape. With two horns and a curved body, it was far more comfortable to hold than the angular Telecaster. As the first Fender guitar to be contoured, it had rounded cutouts that allowed it to sit in a player’s arms comfortably. With aspects like the double horns drawn from the Fender Precision Bass, it continues to inspire countless designs today – and to draw the eye of a guitarist looking for something more appealing to hold.
But the Stratocaster’s versatility is its biggest asset.
THE WORKHORSE OF GUITARS
“It’s the most utilitarian instrument of the guitars next to the Telecaster,” said Maxwell Brown, an employee at the Brothers Guitar Shop, located on East 84th Street in New York City. “They’re both very individualistic. If a Tele is your Swiss army knife, then a Strat is your first aid kit.”
The Stratocaster was designed to have three pickups, set up in three positions. One was mounted nearest to the neck, where the player would put their fingers, one was nearest to the bridge, where the strings met the guitar again, and one was in between.
Fender included a three-way selector switch to swap between them, allowing the player a multitude of tones from the get-go. Some players realized that they could balance the switch in between two positions, allowing them to harness the sound of two pickups at once. In 1977, Fender introduced a five-way switch; this switch let players mix and match the pickups, adding the choice to use the bridge and middle pickup together, or the neck and middle pickup together, in addition to any single one on its own.
“The Strats have the five-way switch, while the Tele only had three,” said Brown. “So what happens, when you’re in the two and four positions – you get either the bridge and the middle, or the neck and the middle – since they’re both running in the same circuit parallel, it actually cancels the ‘hum.’”
Effectively, the extra modes on the Stratocaster helped to eliminate background noise, usually caused by external interference picked up by the magnets on the guitar, giving it a greater edge over its predecessor.
The Stratocaster’s versatility even extends to modifications; many players customize it by swapping out the hardware. In fact, today, there are forums dedicated to helping players build Stratocasters from parts. Some players choose to swap out one or more of their pickups for a humbucker, a type of pickup which involves two magnetic coils oriented in opposite directions, further helping with that hum, while others who prefer different styles of necks for comfort are able to quickly swap them out because of Fender’s easy-to-access bolts, making repairs easier than ever.
“Strats, for the most part…it’s very hard to get new adaptations of them,” said Brown. “Not many things have changed about them that I would not call minute details. In my opinion, some of the newer professional models with extra electronics are the modern way to bring the Strat forward.”
A TIMELESS DESIGN
The Stratocaster has undoubtedly gained favor among guitar players because of the many superstars who used one throughout their career. Its ability to produce a multitude of tones, even without modification, means that it can easily adapt to all genres of music.
Since it was created, the Stratocaster has created a chain of inspiration. Buddy Guy, one of the most influential blues guitarists, began to use one as early as 1957 – and entranced by the sheer ability of the guitar, continued to use it throughout his career.
Jimi Hendrix, credited with helping to popularize the distorted guitar sound, grew up listening to blues records like Guy’s. In 1966, Hendrix bought his first Stratocaster, with which which he was able to rearrange the strings, putting them in the opposite order, so that he could flip the guitar to the other side and play left-handed. Recordings of his live performances demonstrate him using cabinets full of amplifiers hooked up to the guitar to rip into a new genre of music.
Stevie Ray Vaughan released his first album in 1983, but he had begun using a Stratocaster long before that. Many people have drawn parallels between his and Hendrix’s music and their similar fierce playing styles. While not as psychedelic as Hendrix’s, many of Vaughan’s tracks incorporate elements of that later-20th-century rock into the blues. One can hear the evidence of inspiration taken from many prior artists, as Vaughan’s discography includes several covers of other musician’s songs and reflect their influence in many of his original tracks.
The Stratocaster is not just limited to guitar virtuosos, however. Alternative and indie artists of the twentieth century still make great use of the Stratocaster’s lasting design. Wallows, a modern rock band with nearly 3 million followers and 920 million streams on their most popular song, ‘Are You Bored Yet?‘ use a Stratocaster across their discography; in many of their tracks, the guitar is the instrument. Jawny, who has over 350,000 followers and 426 million streams of his No. 1 song “Honeypie,” on Spotify – popularized by TikTok – toured the United States with a wildly colorful, custom-painted Stratocaster.
I saw one in the hands of Joe Bonamassa at his August 2024 concert in New York City. As a blues guitarist, singer, and songwriter who learned to play the guitar at age four, opened for the legendary blues musician B.B. King at age 12, and has since earned his own reputation for his incredible talent, Bonamassa owns several rare Stratocasters and still uses them to play during live performances.
These iconic musicians have become so synonymous with their guitars that Fender has produced custom models based on the ones that they used. You can buy a sunburst Stratocaster with the letters “SRV” on the pickguard, or one with a polka-dotted paint designed after Buddy Guy’s guitar – which he got to match his mother’s tastes. Also present are those like Jim Root’s Stratocaster, Nile Rodgers’ “Hitmaker” guitar, Steve Lacy’s “People Pleaser,” or David Gilmour’s “Black Strat.”
The first guitar that I bought was a Fender Stratocaster. I wanted to sound like the musicians whom I looked up to. Even though it’s been over seventy years since the Fender Stratocaster was first created, it truly is a musical instrument that you can use for anything –whether you’re a beginner, just learning to play, or a master of music pouring your heart out on stage – and it will continue to influence music for decades to come.
In the 1950s, cars sported wing-like fins and headlights that poked above the hood. Black-and white photos filled the magazines, drive-in movies thrived, and rotary phones would still be dominant for the next decade. Few things, cultural or technological, have withstood the test of time since that era; and yet, the Fender Stratocaster, an instrument introduced in 1954, is still the face of electric guitars today.