Fender Precision Bass 1951

Introduced by Leo Fender in 1951, the Precision Bass was the first mass-produced, fretted electric bass guitar to gain widespread commercial success. Its fretted neck allowed musicians to play with precise intonation, fundamentally changing the rhythm section of popular music and making the acoustic upright bass obsolete in many genres.

The original 1951 Precision Bass featured a single-coil slab pickup directly mounted into the ash body. This early single-coil design had a distinctly different, punchier sound compared to the split-coil humbucking pickup that Fender introduced to the Precision Bass model in 1957.

The earliest 1951 Fender Precision Basses featured a unique "lap steel" style output jack with a cup-shaped housing. Fender also released a matching Fender Bassman amplifier shortly after to properly amplify the low frequencies of this new electric instrument.

The instrument was built with a solid ash body and a one-piece bolt-on maple neck. The choice of ash contributed to the guitar's bright, punchy tone, while the bolt-on maple neck was a hallmark of Leo Fender's early, functional manufacturing philosophy.