Gibson Firebird
electric guitar
The Gibson Firebird is a particularly distinctive solid-body electric guitar manufactured by Gibson beginning in 1963.
It features several unusual features for a Gibson guitar. It has a distinctive shape as it is made with neck-through-body construction. Unusually, the center neck portion is 'stepped', or raised above the body. It features a reverse headstock with rear-mounted banjo style tuners that work with planetary gears. It also features unique, fully covered mini-humbucking pickups with metal surrounds.
History
The Gibson Guitar Corporation released several new styles during the 1950s to compete with Fender's solid-body instruments, such as the Telecaster and Stratocaster. After success with the Les Paul in the 1950s, Gibson's popularity began to wane in the 1960s. Fender's colors, shapes and multiple pickups were endorsed by notable guitarists. Gibson's guitars, most of which were hollow or semi-hollow designs, seemed old-fashioned.
The public source identifies “Gibson Firebird” as electric guitar. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Gibson, Firebird and electric.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1523022. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1963.
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This entry incorporates text from “Gibson Firebird” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.