Les Paul would have been 96 today...
...and I saw the interactive "Doodle" Google has on their website today and it reminded me how much we owe that man for modern music. Maybe some of you might not know how much...
He helped perfect the solid body guitar. Previous electric attempts were hollow bodied and yes, they played the note, but he desired a way to change and sustain the tone of the note as well. Flanging? Les Paul invented that, too.
He invented the multi-track recording process, first using acetate (wax) discs to accomplish this. Then, after the Germans invented tape recording he modified a tape machine to record sound-on-sound for Bing Crosby.
Les Paul approached Gibson with an idea for a guitar but they didn't take him up on it until Leo Fender had come out with his version of a solid body guitar (what would become the Telecaster)...he then helped develop and style the Gibson Les Paul, a guitar you can still get today.
Also, if you listen to Les Paul and Mary Ford recordings, they were among the first to use "close miking" - standing less than 6" away from the mic and using what's called a cardioid mike - a mic with a specific pattern that cancels out background noise. This emphasized the bass notes and created a more intimate sounding recording, as opposed to the many other recordings of the 40's that sounded like an omnidirectional mic was put into the middle of the room and everybody played into it.
On top of that, the guy could play guitar wonderfully and did so until his death in 1989 of Pneumonia
24 multitracks in the 50's (The Beatles in the 60's only had 4)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0ffdwBUL78
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=foXSXOAfB4U
