Bigsby Vibrato Tailpiece

The Bigsby vibrato tailpiece (or Bigsby for short) is a type of mechanical vibrato device for electric guitar designed by Paul A. Bigsby. The device allows musicians to bend the pitch of notes or entire chords with their pick hand for various effects.

The Bigsby was the first successful design of what is now called a "whammy bar", "vibrato bar", or "tremolo arm", although vibrato is the technically correct term for the musical effect it produces. In standard usage, tremolo is a rapid fluctuation of the volume of a note, while vibrato is a fluctuation in pitch. The origin of this nonstandard usage of the term by electric guitarists is attributed to Leo Fender, who also used the term "tremolo" to refer to what is really a vibrato effect (see vibrato unit).