A ’30s Electric That Carved a Path Not Taken

Back in the early fervor of electric guitar design, builders experimented out of necessity, trying to create working instruments by any means. When studying these guitars today, their choices might seem strange, but they present many wonderful “what-ifs” or guitar-building roads not taken.

qThe instrument we have here is such a guitar: a 1933 Vivi-Tone. This exact specimen appears in Lynn Wheelwright and Nacho Baños’ The Pinecaster: Early Electric Guitars (1920-1955), which explores the “what-if” history of this period in captivating detail.

“When studying these guitars today, their choices can seem strange, but they present many wonderful ‘what-ifs’ or guitar-building roads not taken.”

Vivi-Tone was a company founded in the early 1930s with the express purpose of manufacturing electric instruments—not just guitars, but violins, cellos, mandolins, and even an electric piano. Interestingly, its co-founder and chief inventor was Lloyd Loar, who in the 1920s famously created Gibson acoustic archtops and mandolins that are prized to this day.