I told him to tune it to open G, like a dobro. However, if there is a chance that he would move to pedal steel later on, (especially E9th) would open E (EBEGBE, low to high) be better?

What kind of bar does he need? Round, or Stevens-type?

I would not advise the straight E tuning or a G tuning; rather have him learn to quickly change the 6 string tuning to any one of the three listed below:

E
C
A
G
E
C

E
B
G#
E
D
B

E
C#
A
F#
E
A

He should learn to tune quickly from any one of these to the other. And begin to learn their characteristic differences. He should learn to change grips as much as possible and listen for their voicings. He should try all kinds of 2 string and 3 string slants in every combination imaginable; both forward and reverse. Plus sliding the bar and learning to harmonic at all the "harmonic" frets. Both finger and palm harmonics.

He should play several songs in one tuning. Then quickly change the tuning to one of the other tunings; and try the same songs. This will program his brain to notice the pitfalls and ease of one tuning over another for given tunes.

As he does this; and practices, practices and practices, he is educating and culturing his ears and mind. And when he ever does go to pedals, he will then understand why a D-10 does what it does and why each pedal and knee lever was put on there.

And may Our precious Lord and savior be with him every step of the way,

carl

[This message was edited by C Dixon on 27 January 2003 at 07:23 PM.]

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quote:

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Steel players do it without fretting

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http://www.waikiki-islanders.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk

[This message was edited by basilh on 28 January 2003 at 01:30 AM.]

For lapsteel, I prefer to keep the top string an E note. I know there are some who use a high G or G# as the case maybe, but I still like to keep it with a more mellow note on the top. I have always felt the higher noted strings are just too tinny for my tastes (on lap steel).

The following would be my suggested changes, if it were say a triple 8.

E
C#
B
G#
F#
E
D
B

E
C
A
G
E
C#
C
A (LOW LOW A note = 10th string, 8th pedal on a D-10 PSG.)

E
C#
A
F#
E
C#
A
F#

Note: IF I were to put a high note on any of the above tunings, it would be the first one. I would make the 1st string a G#, move everything down one string and sacrifice the F# string.

For those who love Don Helms style of playing this would be a good tuning. I never cared for it personally, opting for the more mellow Jerry Byrd style of Hank Williams back up. But who am I?

Most associate Don with HW way more than they do JB.

I see that being able to change between them will do much to develop the ear, but why those?

My advise would have been to start with your first (C6) for at least a year. I'd like to know why you believe a beginner will benifit from learning three.

From years of experience and the fact that there ARE soooo many tunings, 3 things became evident to me long ago:

1. Learning to "tune" a steel has no better teacher than to chang tunings often: if one has only a single neck.

2. Those three are for the most part THE three most popular tunings ever.

3. E is the first string on all of them. This due to the fact the lap steel grew out of the Spanish guitar which had E as the first string.

It is interesting to note that there are 100+ tunings for lap steel. But most of the differences are minor, between major tunings, IE, just one string may be different. Example is C13th which is C6 with a 7th tone on the bottom. But the tuning is still basicaly C6. Another is A7th/C6th:

E
C
A
G
E
C#

Jerry Byrd invented this tuning. Many of his recordings use this tuning. He has often reached down and changed the 6th string to a C and then right back to a C#. Sometimes in the middle of a song. Note: Jerry started playing a 7 string using BOTH the C and C# (strings 6, and 7) for this very reason.

Of all the tunings ever created for lap steel, IMO there is NO greater tuning than C6. Jerry Byrd invented it and it has never been equalled for "that" tuning that could do just about everything. Such is not the case for the other two. But the other two preceeded C6 by many years. And are still quite popular; although A6th is more popular than E7th I believe.

For many many years, A Low bass tuning:

E
C#
A
E
A
E

was taught widely in many Hawaiian music schools (in their heyday in the US). This was followed by; A high bass:

E
C#
A
E
C#
A

Many players are very comfortable with this tuning because of the the major triad on the first 3 strings with the 5th on top. Many, many songs lay very well on this tuning. With this one caveat. There is NO root note on top. This has its drawbacks. Course it can be had (and is customary) by slanting 1 and 3 in a foward slant.

The E tuning solves this problem pretty well. But because the E tuning tends to cater to songs which you might say carry a "hillbilly twang", most players of the day resisted this tuning, UNLESS the 13th (6th tone) was added to it. Western swing players and players like Don Helms pioneered this almost exclusively.

Yet Noel Boggs, Herb Remington, Joaguin Murphy, et al favored A6th over E7th or even E13th; although many of them had some version of it on their multi neck steels in most cases.

But the tuning that really changed the lap steel forever IMO, was C6. One can look at it as having the best of the A6th world and the E7th world (getting the 7th with a split slant). for some like myself it is the best of all tunings if one could only have one.

In summary, of all the tunings there has ever been, I would have to tell any "newbie" to learn THESE three ALL at once. NOT learn one for a year or two and then graduate to the others. That is totaly unecessary. Changing fingering on a regular guitar (to go from one chord to another) is tantamount to my thesis here.

Most of us who go back to the 30's had NO problem in changing tunings while playing. Often changing to a different tuning between songs on a band stand. Only to come right back to the other one as soon as a given song was finished. Of course the introduction of multi neck steels helped diminish this a great deal. But even here, Maestros lik JB and Kayton Roberts will often change one or more strings to play just one tune on their multi necks. And just as quickly return the tuning for the next song.

Jerry is the fastest I have ever seen changing tunings; but there are many who can do it quite fast. And I would venture to say that most all of them did it from almost the beginning.

In fact, back in the days of widespread sheet music for "Hawaian" guitar, the tuning suggested was often printed right above the Treble cleff. So that was the first thing we looked at; and just as quickly changed our tuning accordingly.

So my belief is that A6th, E7th and of course C6th are the 3 tunings I would recommend if starting out on lap steel. This is based on the assumption that Dobro style playing is not desired.

If that is the case, it opens up an entirely different playing field in many ways, and is beyond the scope of this post.

The C# at string six is extremely handy ... It puts a lovely dominant 7 chord (strings 3,4,5,6) in a straight bar position ...

It sets up some tasty forward slant possibilities on strings 5&6 ....

It sets up the "signature JB" string 1&6 forward slant/straight bar, "Hi/Lo" run ... much more attractive than the standard octave run (in my opinion)...

Full 6 string "strums" are rare in the JB style ... so its much more appealing to have the "home position" broken into two segments ... basically A7 and Am7.

The C next to the C# in the 8 string version allows for a fat root to lower register chords ...

How'd I do Carl ...

[This message was edited by Rick Aiello on 28 January 2003 at 06:29 PM.]

YOU DA MAN!!

And 100% correct.

Page, I will add the following to the very poignant post of my dear friend Rick:

The C# on the 6th string on 6 string guitars appears at first to be out of place. And indeed some of us thought that very thing when JB came up with it. But some history here may help.

The most popular tuning ever (before C6) came a long, was of course A. Which as you know, has a C# in it. Now in the migration to C6 it becomes evident that the tunings are very close yet significantly different, in voicings. EVEN when one tunes to A6th, it rarely sounds at all like C6; by most players.

Now an interesting thing about HOW most players use a "6th" tuning. That is, the 6th (really a minor7th) sound is always there in their voicings. One of the most visible exceptions to this is Jerry Byrd.

While he will ocassionally strum (getting the 6th sounds) most of his playing avoids that very common style found almost exclusively in Western swing and jamming type of music.

In fact, to the ocassional listener JB is not playing a 6th based tuning at all. And here is why; and also gets to the "meat" of your question.

Jerry's ear is soooooo keen, that to him a minor chord two frets down from the tonic or subdominant position is NOT satisfactory when the chord calls for a 7th. In western swing they rarely EVER play a true 7th chord when the music calls for it. Rather they substitute the relative minor two frets below the major chord.

Jerry's playing is more in tune with what the music actually calls for. He will somehow end up with a voicing that is MORE 7th based than 6th (minor7th) based. He is a master at this. And to more than a few, it sounds like he is able to get ANY chord ANY where while playing C6!! Of course his slants and split slants play a very large roll in this. Also, and so subtle that it is missed by most is his mastery of blocking. I could write a thesis on this alone. Once you realize what Jerry is doing when it comes to blocking, it almost seems impossible.

But one of the things JB came up with is; getting a true 7th chord two frets down from a given major chord. UNLIKE the standard "minor substitution". Raising his 6th string to C# just fit this like a glove. thus his A7th/C6th tuning. And does it ever fit the bill.

Tunes like "Cocoanut Grove", "Panhandle Rag" and "Steel Guitar Rag" make perfect use of this tuning. And were in fact, recorded using this tuning. If you will listen closely to the 2nd and 3rd chords Jerry strums at the start of "Cocoanut Grove", you can hear this C# (the all important 3rd tone of the 7th chord) very clearly. As does in the other two tunes and countless other classics.

Now, your next question ties into the following. Why a C AND a C# right next door to each other? For the simple reason that JB (an most of us) WANT the best of both worlds. So, by using a 7 or 8 string with the C AND the C#, we have just that.

It was Jerry's idea; and he used it flawlessly. And after the initial "warp your mind" period, ya jes dont want to be without it, after once getting used to it. As he has used it for all these years.

The way it is setup is, you strum for the 7th by omitting the 2 and 7th strings. You grip and strum for the major, minor and 6th chords omitting string 6.

Again, listen to JB do this on the 1st four chords of "Cocoanut Grove". The first two are 6th sounds; the last two are true 7th chords. And it is beautiful.

Hope this little bit of history and facts helps you.

Long live Jerry Byrd, the TRUE master; and all of you,

I teach lap steel, and my choice of what tuning to teach depends on the choice of musical style my student wants to learn. If a student comes to me wanting to learn blues on lap steel, I'd probably start with E7. If the student wanted to learn "hillbilly" and came with a guitar in a Major tuning (G or A), I might teach that for several lessons, perhaps a month or six weeks. Depends on progress, what songs he wants to learn, and how quickly the students understands scales and slant bar. By that time, the student usually says, "hey, I want a useable minor chord and more opportunities for dominant 7th chords." That's when I move them to the C6/A7 tuning.

If the student comes to me with C6 already on the guitar, I start with that tuning off the bat.

Rick, could you tab out the signature JB 1-6 lick you alluded to earlier?

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Herb's Steel Guitar Pages
Texas Steel Guitar Association

Here's an example from Tiare No Tahiti (Key of F):

E   7 8  8   78 10 8 7 8  76  5
C
-
-
-
C#  7 8  8   78  9 8 7 8  76  4

------------------------------------

E   1717 1515 1313 12 10 87 6
C   1717 1616 1414 12 10 98 7
-
-
-
C#

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E   5 6  6  56 8 6 5 6  54  3
C
-
-
-
C#  5 6  6  56 8 6 5 6  44  3

------------------------------------

E  1515 1313 1212 10 87 6 5
C  1616 1414 1212 10 98 7 5
-
-
-
C#
------------------------------------

Good reverse slant practice too ...

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My Steel Shoes Site

[This message was edited by Rick Aiello on 30 January 2003 at 05:32 PM.]

To further clarify the situation, my friend is 12 years old (I think) and has been playing bass for just over a year. He plays in his dad's contemporary Christian band, which, incidentally, I plan to join in June.

I hope to help him get interested in pedal steel, and dobro, too. But this here will help me help him.

Lincoln Goertzen