Watch: The New Preston Thompson B-Bender Acoustic

You probably know the lore of the B-Bender: In our 18th issue we interviewed Gene Parsons where he described its origin story. Parsons and friend Clarence White were getting a lot of Los Angeles-area session work. "We had a session, and Clarence used to do a thing with a Telecaster where he'd chime a string and then pull it over the nut to raise it a full tone," Parsons told FJ contributor Rick Petreycik in that issue. "And he said, ' I wish I had three hands. I wanna do this in [something] other than the open position.'" Parsons was already garnering acclaim for his fabrication work and inventive streak and, from that moment, the duo started brainstorming. The StringBender (aka as a B-Bender) - a lever system activated by a pull on a guitar's strap button that raises the pitch of a string a whole tone - was soon born. Five decades later, Clarence's Tele still has that original StringBender prototype and now lives with Marty Stuart. 

What you may not know is that Parsons has installed B-Benders on acoustic guitars, too. While the physics are hard to wrap your head around, it turns out that you can emulate the magic of the pedal steel on your dreadnought, with minimal invasive surgery. 

We caught up with our friends at Preston Thompson guitars at a recent bluegrass gathering and were surprised to see that they've partnered with Parsons himself and will soon be offering B-Bender upgrades as an option on their guitars. We'll be talking to them and Parsons on a future FJ Podcast. In the meantime, here are guitarists Trey Hensley and Chris Luquette showing what the B-Bendered Thompson guitar can do.