The Wah Wah Pedal

The Wah Wah Pedal

As early as 1945 the wahwah effect made up from a midshift equalization was known,Leo Fender put one in his lap steel guitar. Besides that ,some studio players found that by rotating the tone knob it gave a wahwah like sound. In 1965 Brad Plunkett of Thomas Organ Co in the USA was working on a tonecontrole and found the effect by accidence,word is when people heard this sound they all came in the lab and where astounded by it.The effect was commercialized in 1966 by Vox who called it the Vox wahwah and Thomas Organ who gave it the name Crybaby,since it sounded like a baby making noise .Since Thomas Organ/Vox forgot to get a patent on the design the secret got out and everybody started to make wahwah's,after the original design and largely made in Italy by JEN elettronica Pescara who labeled the wahwah's under various names… (Vox-Jen-Gem-Elka-Crybaby-Gretch-whatnot),after that the wahwah was also made by Thomas Organ themselves in sepulveda and Chicago USA.

Vox made wahwah's in England,but by far the most where made by other manufacturers like Jen in Italy and Colorsound in England and also by Thomas Organ in the Usa in Chicago and sepulveda ca.In February 1967 Vox/thomas organ made a promotional paper-record


Vox V848 Clyde McCoy Wah-Wah Reissue vs. Vintage Clyde McCoy

The VOX Wah-Wah Introduced in 1967, A classic piece of rock history, Vox wah-wah used by the most influential guitarists of the late 60's and early 70's, the wah-wah pedals used by many guitar player today to perform their music style and influentced by famous guitar player like jimmy hendrix, john lennon as a former of the beatles, and many other gutar player

A wah-wah pedal is type of guitar effect that alter the tone of signal to create a distinctive effect intended to simulation the human voice, The pedal sweeps the peak response of a filter up and down in frequency to create the sound

The variation in the peak response frequency of the filter resembles the change in formant frequency in the human vocal tract when saying the word "wah", making the wah-wah pedal a crude form of speech synthesizer. The traditional "wah wah" effect does not affect the guitar's volume, although many modern models offer a volume boost and distortion options.

The essential function of the wah-wah pedal is as a lead guitar booster. Frequently, lead lines do not cut through the mix of the band sufficiently, so some sort of effect is utilized to push the lead part to the front. A wah-wah inflected lead guitar part varies its timbre with the motion of the pedal, thus creating a distinct space within the sound of a band. Moreover, it mimics some of the sounds of human speech, which are typically picked up more readily by the human ear. Many people also find that use of the wah-wah pedal adds emotional expressiveness to single-note guitar lines, such as the solos on Cream's White Room, Jimi Hendrix's Voodoo Child (Slight Return), Guns 'n' Roses hit Sweet Child o' Mine, Pearl Jam's Alive, and others.

An envelope filter or envelope follower is often referred to as an Auto-wah or T-Wah.

Many bassists have also used the wah-wah effect
Keyboardists have also made use of the wah-wah effect both in the studio and during live performances
other music instruments like Trumpet, saxophone, electric pianos, electric violin, Turntable also used the wah-wah effect to producing an unusual sound.