Fender Precision Bass
The Fender Precision Bass is a model of electric bass guitar manufactured by Fender since 1951. In its standard, post-1957 configuration, the Precision Bass is a solid body, four-stringed, full scale bass equipped with a single split-coil humbucking pickup and a 20-fret maple neck. It produces a characteristically "deep and full-bodied sound."
Leo Fender designed the Precision Bass prototype in 1950 for big band bassists and it was brought to market the following year. Roy Johnson of Lionel Hampton's big band was among the first bassists to use the Precision Bass in a concert setting. Music critic Leonard Feather wrote about this new development in Down Beat magazine, expressing surprise at hearing bass sounds from a guitar. Adoption by upright bass players was slow, however, and the Precision Bass did not find widespread success until the emergence of new styles of music like rock and roll and Motown, with the Precision Bass's guitar-like format allowing guitarists to easily transition to this new instrument.
The Precision Bass, as the first commercially successful electric bass, was a "landmark in the evolution of musical instruments", delivering "punch and presence while enabling a fleeter, guitar-like playability." Some historians consider the Precision Bass to have had a greater impact on popular music than Fender's widely-known Telecaster and Stratocaster electric guitars. Its companion bass amplifier, the Fender Bassman, also proved influential. Since its release, the Precision Bass has remained among the best-selling and most-imitated electric bass guitars.
Design overview
The Precision Bass uses a body shape similar to the earlier Esquire/Telecaster, but with an additional bass-side "horn", creating a double-cutaway silhouette that provided better balance considering the long, heavy neck required of a bass guitar. In its initial incarnation, the Precision Bass used squared-off edges without contouring, but rounded edges and contouring were introduced after the similarly-styled Stratocaster's release. The body was made of two pieces of matched and laminated ash, which was chosen for its appearance rather than tone. Alder would become standard on models with sunburst finishes, as alder was cheaper and easier to finish.Fender chose a 34" scale length for the Precision Bass after much trial and error. Thirty-four inches proved long enough to achieve the resonance Fender wanted but it was short enough to avoid uncomfortably-wide fret spacing. Not prioritizing the player's comfort was considered "marketing suicide" by Leo Fender. The 34" scale length would go on to become standard for "full scale" electric basses. Pre-1957 models used a headstock similar to a Telecaster, but this was later changed to bring it more in line with the Stratocaster's styling. The neck—initially made from a single piece of maple, but with rosewood later offered as a fretboard option—was bolted on rather than glued onto the body using four screws. The neck used a large "C"-shape with a 7.25" radius fretboard, which has earned vintage Precision Bass necks frequent "baseball bat" comparisons. Modern versions typically use a flatter 9.5" radius.
Pre-1957, strings were loaded through the body and over a bridge equipped with two pressed fiber saddles; post-1957, the strings were loaded at the bridge, which was later updated with four saddles made of steel. The bridge was initially equipped with a chrome cover with a foam insert to help mute the strings and prevent unwanted overtones and sustain. Players, however, often removed this cover to achieve a more cutting tone and Fender eventually stopped including them. The original model's pickguard covered much of the Precision Bass's body, including both horns. The later redesign was more Strat-like, covering less of the body but now with the bass's controls mounted directly onto it, as was a finger rest below the G string. At different times, the pickguard has been black, white, and tortoiseshell.
Pickups
The first pickups used on a Precision Bass consisted of a simple, single-coil design with four Alnico V magnet pole pieces, each placed directly below a string. Early on, a large chrome cover was placed over the pickup to provide electronic shielding. Leo Fender was dissatisfied with the pickup's hum, however, and the pole piece placement meant the pickup generated strong attack transients that were hard on speakers. Fender solved the hum problem by splitting the pickup into two separate coils, which were wired out of phase with the magnets oriented with reverse polarities. The transient problem was solved by placing pole pieces on either side of each string, rather than under them, smoothing out the attack and improving tone and gain. These pickups have remained standard in Precision Basses ever since they were introduced in 1957. Some contemporary Precision Bass models additionally use a Fender Jazz Bass bridge pickup in what is known as a "PJ" pickup configuration.Tone
Guitar World described the Precision Bass as being "all about power", with a "deep and full-bodied sound" and a "monstrous low-end rumble."History
Development
Prior to the arrival of electric basses, players relied on upright basses, which were large and cumbersome to transport and increasingly difficult to hear as popular music became louder, thanks in part to the popularity of horn sections and newly electrified guitars. At the time, many big bands were downsizing and asking guitarists to double as bass players, creating a need for a guitar-like bass to avoid players having to learn upright bass technique. Fender was not the first to explore the idea of a solidbody electric bass as a solution: Audiovox had released such a bass in 1935, but it sold poorly and most other companies pursuing the electrification of bass kept to an upright format. Leo Fender choosing to design his electric bass to be played at a horizontal angle similar to a guitar would successfully allow guitarists to easily transition to playing bass.Following the principle of "bigger for bass", Fender opted to repurpose the Esquire in a slightly larger format for the brand's new bass model. The Precision Bass shared many similarities with its guitar counterpart, including its headstock shape, non-contoured "slab" body made of ash, and bolt-on maple neck. The Precision Bass, however, used a double-cutaway design with two protruding "horns" instead of one and employed a 34" scale length. The name "Precision Bass" referenced the precision in which Fender's factory construction methods could install frets to achieve the most accurate pitch and intonation, something Fender and his engineering-oriented mind was described as being "possessed" with. Only a transparent blonde finish was available upon release.
Release
The Precision Bass was first offered for sale in October of 1951, with its trade show debut happening the following July at the 1952 NAMM Show. Fender applied for the patent for his bass guitar design in November of that year and it was granted on March 24, 1953. The Precision Bass had an initial retail price of $199.50.The Precision Bass gained little notice at first. Distributors were aghast at the new instrument and few artists showed any interest. To promote his bass, Fender traveled the country, trying to win over musicians face-to-face in nightclubs and concert halls, where he found the most interest from jazz players. Bandleader Lionel Hampton became an early champion of the Precision Bass: his bass player Roy Johnson used it extensively, later stating he had no trouble transitioning to the new bass, which he began using in performances the day he received it. Chicago's budget instrument retailer Kay Musical Instrument Company was one of the first companies to realize the potential of the Precision Bass and licensed their own models from Fender; these Kay basses were taken up by influential players like Chubby Jackson and Donald "Duck" Dunn.
As smaller, louder groups became more popular mid-decade, the Precision Bass slowly started replacing more upright basses, but players faced issues with the poor quality of amplification at the time. Fender's existing guitar amplifiers, such as the 15" speaker-equipped Fender Pro that the Precision Bass was initially paired with, proved unable to handle lower frequencies at loud volumes, forcing the company to design the first ever dedicated bass amplifier, the Bassman. The Bassman was pivotal to legitimizing the Precision Bass and became an influential amp in its own right—among guitarists even more so than bassists.
Redesigns
While Fender released several guitar designs throughout the 1950s, the company chose to maintain the Precision as their sole bass guitar model and continue making design alterations to it. In 1954/55, the bass was updated with body and forearm contouring similar to the new Stratocaster and switched to a white pickguard. Fender also began offering a two-tone sunburst finish as standard, while around the same time custom colors like Olympic White, Foam Green, and Fiesta Red became available.The Precision Bass's most significant revision came in 1957. The headstock shape and pickguard were redesigned to loosely resemble the Strat's, with the pickguard no longer covering the upper horn but now extending along the lower edge of the body to cover the control knob area. This new pickguard was made of a single layer of gold-anodized aluminum with the electronics—including a new "split-coil" humbucking pickup—mounted directly onto it. This pickguard material scratched easily though and was soon replaced with tortoiseshell plastic. Strings were now loaded through the bridge, rather than going through the body, and the bridge was upgraded to using four saddles for better intonation. These changes solidified the Precision Bass's basic design, which has remained largely unchanged since.
In 1959, a glued-on rosewood fingerboard featuring "clay"-style dot position markers replaced the one-piece maple neck. This remained standard until 1966/67, when the now-CBS-owned Fender company began to offer a separate, laminated maple fingerboard capped on a maple neck as another option. Fewer than 200 Precision Basses were sold a year in the early 1950s, but this increased to around 1,000 a year by 1959.