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in the world. Dopyera also invented a string-gripping device on acoustic guitars, the forebear to that on all guitars today. Dopyera's later patents included resophonic additions to nearly every string instrument, continued patents for the designs of banjos and violins, including the unique Dopera
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The Dobro resonator guitar was fundamental to the evolution of bluegrass music. The design cut through all musical boundaries, however, proving equally at home in folk, rock country, blues and jazz. In 1992, Slovak blues guitarist Peter Radványi co-founded the
Dobrofestival in western Slovakia's
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to create a louder guitar. Beauchamp needed a guitar that could be heard over other instruments when played in an orchestra. Dopyera invented a guitar with three aluminum cones called resonators (similar to diaphragms inside a speaker) mounted beneath the bridge, which was much louder than the
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and continue making instruments. He was never rich, and was famous only among a small circle of people who knew he had invented the resonator/resophonic guitar. He died at the age of 94 in 1988, having registered some 40 patents.
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to manufacture the new type of "resophonic" guitar, which was sold mainly to musicians working in cinemas and jazz clubs in the USA. After several years, the three brothers left the corporation and started a new company,
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where he worked making and repairing fiddles, banjos, and other wooden string instruments. Around this time, Dopyera patented several improvements on the banjo.
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In 1932, working together with Art
Stimson, Dopyera invented a new type of guitar design later recognized to be first ever industrially produced electrified
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John
Dopyera was one of 10 siblings born at the closing of the 19th century. His father, Jozef Dopyera, was a
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instrumentalist (and, later, pioneer developer of electrically amplified instruments)
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is also noted. In 1961 they patented the Zorko bass, and then sold the design to
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still in his boyhood days in Dolná Krupá. In 1908, the
Dopyeras emigrated from
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would erupt in Europe. In the 1920s, Dopyera opened his own store in
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music company and other business interests. John elected to stay in
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and important contributions in the early development of the
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from 1962 to 1970. The
Dopyera brothers later moved to
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Slovak-American inventor and entrepreneur (1893–1988)
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Emigrants from
Austria-Hungary to the United States
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435:Colin McCubbin's pictorial history of National
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362:"Electrophonic stringed musical instrument"
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69:Learn how and when to remove this message
32:This article includes a list of general
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261:National String Instrument Corporation
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389:Hopkins, Gregg; Moore, Bill (1999).
376:"Electrophonic stringed instrument"
38:it lacks sufficient corresponding
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460:American people of Slovak descent
392:Ampeg: The Story Behind the Sound
271:Dobro means good in any language!
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485:20th-century American inventors
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229:, United States sensing a
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430:Guitar Legend Lives On
183:stringed instruments
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277:Later years
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207:Dolná Krupá
164:Ján Dopjera
120:Grants Pass
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51:introducing
449:Categories
348:References
247:vaudeville
227:California
197:Early life
34:references
304:Baby Bass
292:Bob Dylan
149:1926–1988
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175:inventor
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308:Chicago
215:violins
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323:Legacy
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219:fiddle
203:miller
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160:Slovak
126:, U.S.
124:Oregon
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312:Valco
300:Ampeg
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