Legendary pickup maker Abigail Ybarra is one of the most iconic individuals to ever be associated with electric guitar pickups, and is widely recognized as something of a “pickup god” for the work she carried out over her 50-plus-year career at Fender.
Indeed, after joining the Fender Custom Shop in 1956, Ybarra began hand-winding and hand-building pickups for the firm two years later.
Abigail Ybarra retired in 2013 after a decorated 50-plus-year career. Then she came out of retirement to help former Fender Master Builder Carloz Lopez create the Castedosa ABI – a guitar named after her – and more recently built the pickups that can be found in John Frusciante’s recently unveiled $20k signature Stratocaster.