Höfner 500/1

Hofner 500/1 Vintage '62, left-handed model

2 × Hofner 511B Humbucker

• 2 × volume
• 2 × pickup activation
• 1 × total output control (70/ 100%)

The Hofner 500/1 is an electric bass guitar model with four strings and shallow hollow body, which the German Musikinstrumenhersteller Höfner first presented in 1956.

The 500/1 was the first E -Bass model, which was manufactured by Hofner. The bass falls visually particularly through his small hollow body which is modeled in the outline of a violin. Therefore, the bass carries the official nickname violin bass. Outstanding reputation reached the 500/1 by the British musician and composer Paul McCartney, as he applies his trademark. During its time with the internationally famous pop and rock band The Beatles the Höfner 500/1 bass guitar from 1961 to 1970 McCartney was most commonly -used musical instrument. The model is manufactured by Hofner to the present day in different versions, and McCartney plays one of his copies of Beatles times until today. Due to the great popularity of the Beatles and for its typical appearance of the Höfner 500/1 is very often referred to in international parlance as a Beatle - bass or bass Beatles.

Form of construction and design

The Hofner 500/1 bass guitar is produced in substantial part by borrowed from the violin design principles. The the violin -shaped hollow body components forming frames, ceiling and floor are first custom built of several wood work pieces and then glued together and to the neck. The slightly arched ceiling of the instrument is made ​​of spruce, sides, back and neck made ​​of maple wood. To protect against impact damage and as a decoration of the body on all edges with a bright rim (English: Binding) provided from the narrow strip of plastic. In most models of the body and the back of the neck in a one-to three -color gradient ( Sunburst) are painted in shades of brown. In addition, newer versions of the 500/1 are black in all colors and "nature" (clear lacquered) available. The " natural " paint job is called a " luxury" version of the model, called the 5000/1 reserved. Hofner also offers in its current product range semi- hollow versions of the 500/1, whose body an existing solid maple wood resonance block (English: Sustain block) includes.

Although the body of the 500/1 such as an acoustic musical instrument constructed and thus a resonance body, the instrument due to the lack of sound holes is only suitable for the electrically enhanced play. The ceiling shall pay the trapezoidal tailpiece and the multi-part, consisting of ebony and metal bar the electrical system of the instrument. This consists of two electromagnetic Hofner pickups, since the 1960s in dual coil design ( humbuckers ) of the type 511b/Staple top with metal caps, as well as an attached oblique, rectangular plastic plate pearloid with the control panel. On the control panel are two knob (potentiometer) mounted with knobs for the volume of the two pickups and three two-phase slider. With two of the slider on the pickups can be individually turned on and off, and the third offers a choice between two volume levels, named "Rhythm " (70 % volume) and " Solo" (100 %). The 500/1 also has a "floating" mounted on the body pickguard ( pickguard ) also made pearloid.

The Hofner 500/1 is a model with short scale ( short scale, 30 inches). The existing rosewood fingerboard of the bass has 22 frets and has an extra zero fret and dot inlays to mark the registers. The neck construction is in three parts; the slightly angled back headstock bears left and right each have a pair of tuners on a metal support plate.

In the 1960s, Höfner produced beside this E -Bass model also includes a electric guitar model, which built on the same design principle as the 500/1 and this looks very similar - the "Violin Guitar" Höfner 459 This model had two single-coil pickups and a body whose sides and back were made of wood ANIGRE. Due to very low production numbers instruments of this type have become rarities.

The Hofner 500/1 and Paul McCartney

Paul McCartney had to electric bass changed the beginning of 1961 with the Beatles from the electric guitar after bassist Stuart Sutcliffe had left the band. Already Sutcliffe had played on a Hofner bass guitar, the archtop model Hofner 333, and occasionally leave it McCartney to play. During a guest appearance of the Beatles in Hamburg in the same year McCartney came there in a musical instrument shop in the Steinway -Haus on Virgin Rose on a copy of the Höfner 500/1 bass guitar. No bass of the brand since he could at that time make fenders, and since he left-handed liked the axisymmetric form of the " violin bass ", he lay down for the price of 287 DM (about £ 30) this Höfner model. Since left-handed basses at the beginning of the 1960s were a rarity is believed that the instrument purchased McCartney, was specially made to his order of a Hofner.

In the fall of 1963, McCartney bought a second, additional copy of the 500/1, the two pickups have a greater distance from each other. His first copy of the bass became a substitute instrument. With the increasing popularity of the Beatles got the Hofner 500/1, due to its characteristic form, the first unofficial nickname " Beatle Bass". Höfner used the fame of the Beatles and their bassist to advertise with Paul McCartney for the 500/1 in ads and brochures. The Basses are equipped with a pendant made ​​of cardboard, it printed a portrait photo and autograph McCartney, provided with the phrase " Wishing you every success with this guitar". Brian Epstein, manager of the Beatles should have in these years received as consideration for each of Höfner Violin Bass sold five British pounds ( £ 5), and McCartney was promised a new model of the 500/1.

In 1964, should be handed over to Paul McCartney Höfner by Selmer, the UK distributors for Höfner musical instruments, a third -built especially for him copy of the model with gold plated metal parts (hardware). Only in the 1990s was revealed in the British press that the instrument was indeed originally made ​​by Höfner for McCartney, he had this but never received. McCartney confirmed this revelation in public as appropriate. Since 1965, the McCartney bass should have been covered several times changed hands. In 1994, this particular instrument was auctioned by Sotheby's auction house; due to the not sure to be clarified origin of the bass of the purchase, however, was subsequently revoked. In a consumer of the British BBC broadcast from the year 1997 offered at the auction instrument was explicitly referred to as fake.

Paul McCartney's first 500/1, built in 1961, was in the late 1960s, stolen from London's Abbey Road Studios, the recording studio where the Beatles recorded the majority of their songs. The last time the document that shows McCartney with the 1961s -Bass, is a 1969 recorded for the Beatles play The Ballad of John and Yoko commercial. The instrument is missing today.

Paul McCartney played the bought by himself Höfner bass from 1963 even after the dissolution of the Beatles in 1970 and continue to use it until the present concert performances and studio recordings. In an interview with Tony Bacon, author of numerous books on the subject of guitars, McCartney praised the contingent through the hollow body light weight and ease of playing the Beatle - bass:

At the Frankfurt Musikmesse 2011 Höfner presented before a special model of the 500/1 with the label Cavern bass. The model is an exact replica of the 1961 purchased by Paul McCartney in Hamburg electric bass. Since 2012, the 500/1 offered in addition to the models manufactured in Germany by Hofner Ignition under the name B -Bass also manufactured in Indonesia model at a lower price.