The History of Pickups and the Brands That Define It
Seymour Duncan: Aiming to Create Replicas of Vintage Pickups
While Larry DiMaggio was the first to develop high-powered, user-friendly modern-style pickups, it was Seymour Duncan who embarked on developing traditional-style pickups as reissues of vintage sounds, bringing a new trend to the replacement pickup market.
Wiring pickups on a turntable during his student days
Originally a guitarist, Seymour Duncan was a devoted user of a 1956 Telecaster.
A friend of Roy Buchanan’s, he reportedly followed Roy’s advice and strung the first string with an A string from a tenor banjo.
Around 1965, he had the opportunity to lend that Telecaster to someone, but perhaps because the borrower was used to thicker strings, when it was returned to him, the first string had dug into the bridge pickup.
Even after peeling the string away, no sound came from the bridge pickup. At a loss, Duncan used a microscope to examine the damage during his high school biology class the next day (incidentally, he reportedly got scolded by his teacher).
When he got home, he took the pickup apart to inspect the internal damage. After consulting his uncle, who worked at a chemical company, he learned that the wire used was plain enameled AWG 42. Duncan managed to get his hands on the wire, but he didn’t have a machine to wind the pickup. So, he attached a wooden block to a record turntable, set a bobbin on it, and began winding the wire.
He reportedly started by spinning it at 33 1/3 RPM, but eventually increased the speed to 78 RPM. However, the mounting couldn’t hold up, and the bobbin flew off, hitting the wall and shattering.
(Excerpt from the website)
Thus, Duncan—who had intended to wire a pickup but ended up having to make the bobbin from scratch—noticed that the bobbin was made of Vulcanite paper. He cut a corner off a friend’s Vulcanite drum case, used it as a bobbin, and created the pickup. He reportedly made it at 45 RPM. Incidentally, Larry DiMaggio also reportedly started by winding pickups on a turntable, so by coincidence, he was using a similar method for wiring.
Research on Vintage Pickups and His Experience at Fender
Later, while working on repairs and researching vintage pickups, Duncan came across an advertisement in a magazine in the 1970s seeking a repair technician for Fender.
Around 1973, he began working at the Fender Service Center that had opened in England, where he was responsible for electronics, wiring, and guitar customization and repair.
It was there that Duncan met Jeff Beck and created that famous guitar.
It was the so-called “Tele-Gib,” featuring a humbucker cutout on the front, a cracked rosewood fingerboard replaced with maple, and Gibson frets installed.
(Excerpt from the website)
After working with various artists such as Jimmy Page and Eric Clapton, Duncan returned to California and began making aftermarket parts for vintage Telecasters.
(Excerpt from the website)
The Birth of Seymour Duncan
Around 1976, he took on a job rewinding pickups for David Schecter.
While working on repairs at "Jensen Music," he finally began "pickup winding" in earnest.
While his repair experience at Jensen was a factor in his decision to start rewinding pickups, the main reason was reportedly that he couldn’t find any pickups on the market at the time that he liked.
In the same year, he founded Seymour Duncan, where he began manufacturing, repairing, and modifying pickups.
(Excerpt from the website)
Seymour Duncan’s Unwavering Passion
Duncan believed that the tone produced by vintage guitars was greatly influenced by factors such as wood, finish, and hardware.
Therefore, he aimed to create “replica pickups” that would closely resemble vintage models not only in appearance but also in sound by using the same materials and maintaining the same aesthetic as vintage instruments.
If it weren’t for Seymour Duncan’s focus on vintage replicas, there might be far fewer vintage-style pickups and parts on the market today.