Thank You, Les Paul

Les Paul, the virtuoso guitarist and inventor whose solid-body electric guitar and recording studio innovations changed the course of 20th-century popular music, died Thursday in White Plains. He was 94.

I cannot begin to imagine my life without electric guitar. Les Paul was arguably its inventor. In a sense, he allowed the creation of the soundtrack for my life.

Mr. Paul’s style encompassed the twang of country music, the harmonic richness of jazz and, later, the bite of rock ’n’ roll. For all his technological impact, though, he remained a down-home performer whose main goal, he often said, was to make people happy.

Thank you, Mr. Paul; you have contributed mightily to my happiness.