La Rosita switches into minor mode. Bm tuning.

Go to lesson 7.

[This message was edited by Bill Bosler on 03 May 2004 at 11:39 AM.]

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Steel players do it without fretting

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http://www.waikiki-islanders.com

I found Stacy Phillips' book Complete Dobro Player helpful. He has a chapter on playing in minor keys and covers some of the theory (for example, some minor key songs are based on a dorian scale while others such as Minor Swing, are based on a harmonic minor scale).

I also found Cindy Cashdollar's video Dobro Variations. In it she covers the tune Minor Swing. Even though I'd been playing the tune for a while, I picked up a couple of new ideas from the video.

[This message was edited by Gary Anwyl on 03 May 2004 at 09:35 PM.]

Hey, Ed you wouldn't happen to have a tab for "Ghost Riders in the Sky" laying around would you?

[This message was edited by Ron Bednar on 03 May 2004 at 10:35 PM.]

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If we can locate a Maj7 scale on a steel and play do re mi fa sol la ti do .... or play mary had a little lamb which is also in the Maj7 scale; Then it is no more difficult to play a minor song in a minor key as long as we know where that minor scale is found on the steel neck; And where most popular scales (aka modes) and their chords and harmonies are found on a steel is quite simple:

FOR A 6TH (or 13th) TUNED STEEL:

To play in a minor of any key, first find the key's tonic 6th chord (C6 for the key of C), then play in a 2 fret box that's formed 3 and 5 frets up from the tonic 6th chord. In other words if you want to play in Cmin, move the bar up to the 3rd fret to get Cmin7 chord and the remaining notes of Cmin7 scale will be located at the 5th fret. The entire Cmin7 scale and it's harmonies, lined up neatly in place on each of those frets, is found at the Eb6 and F6 fret.

Likewise Fmin7 chord is found at the Ab6 fret and the remaining notes of Fmin7 will be at the Bb6 fret; Ab6 and Bb6 frets form the box for Fmin7 scale.

If a song remains modal throughout the song (many if not most do), you don't really need to play anywhere else than the song's 2 frets mode box ...although more advanced musicianship will move you in and out of that box for a number of reasons too long to go into here.

On the other hand, if the song's structure is more by key changes such as the common Imin, IVmin, Vmin (or V7) ...(all of which are more commonly thought of as a I, IV, V chord change song in Imin), then you can move / modulate that 3rd and 5th fret box from Cmin to Fmin which is found 3 and 5 frets above F6 ....etc etc.

FUN songs such as those mentioned in the previous postings here are best to play around with first in minor scales and chords, for enjoyment and motivational purposes; But to learn minor key playing, more technical songs should also be played along with and studied (as well as drawing discoveries and ideas out on paper in fretboard form).

One of the better songs I can think of off hand as an easier serious study of minor song / scale structure and mental and playing exercise on Steel, is "No Ame Bolyo" on Jerry Byrd's "By Request" CD. That song can be approached by either a I, IV, V armature OR as a song that is changing modes between min7 (Dorian minor) and min7b6 (Pure Minor aka Aolean minor) with a Vmaj passage (aka turn-around) that resolves back into the minors again; ...and either approach makes perfect sense with each other.

Another great CD to just have fun playing along with and finding mode boxes in both major and minor keys ....and to hear Gregg Allman's mastery of simple but extraordinarily effective mode and scale/chord substitution thinking and voicings; ...is his "Laid Back" album / CD; Where almost every song can be played along with on Steel in one single mode fret box even though it sounds like Gregg's playing all sorts of different chords all over the place, when in fact all he is doing is using chord substitution for voicings that remain right in a single mode but with occasional lines that might go out of mode for a moment in accentuation prior to resolving right back to the same mode. By gaining some playing-along familiarity with the songs on that album, ....hearing those songs' modes and some of their phrases that depart from mode in passage, becomes quit easy and rewarding for Steel navigation and finding the REMARKABLE SIMPLICITY of modes, their boxes on Steel and substitutions therein. It's not magic, and not difficult for a reasonably motivated Picker; It's just numbers that make CMaj7 = G6 + F6; Cmin7 = Eb6 + F6; C7 = C6 + Bb6; Cmin7b6 = Ab6 + Bb6; Cdim = Gb6 + Ab6; etc etc etc. ....because each of those "substitutions" share the same identical notes; And there are 7 other substitutions for each one that allow a Player to play any of the other popular scales (aka modes) in any key by simply transposing (moving) a simple mental template up and down the neck.

Aloha,
DT~

[This message was edited by Denny Turner on 04 May 2004 at 10:44 AM.]

I hope any of this makes some sense to somebody... it does to me, at times.

... J-D.

[This message was edited by J D Sauser on 04 May 2004 at 01:38 PM.]

Irving Berlin, the famous Jewish composer of 'White Christmas' and 'Easter Parade' was once quoted as saying "Americans are suckers for minor chords, they love em"

Listen to Berlin's 'Blue Skies'... minor chord extravaganza.

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Gerald Ross
'Northwest Ann Arbor, Michigan's King Of The Hawaiian Steel Guitar'

Gerald's Fingerstyle Guitar Website

[This message was edited by Gerald Ross on 04 May 2004 at 01:59 PM.]

BTW, Irving Berlin was right, but I won't explain either!

... J-D.

[This message was edited by J D Sauser on 04 May 2004 at 01:50 PM.]

Oy vey! I have to find some minor chords on this facockda thing before Shabbos!

Achhh, never mind. Let's get some cake....

A fun and easy trick to remember when working out chord progressions, trying to steer out of the I-IV-V, is just to sub in the relative minor or major and see how it sounds.

An interesting tension can be created by throwing in a minor IV chord here and there. It sounds surprisingly jazzy and augmented over a full band playing a major IV chord.

If it helps, you can always take your familiar major tuning and just tune one string to give you the relative MINOR root note.

(i.e.) Take a [GBDGBD] "G Major" tuning and give yourself the relative minor, an E. Like: EBDGBD.

Hmm. And then you've just discoverd a 6th tuning. How funny.

Klezmer tunes are actually very interesting to play on the steel, and I suspect that anyone who would be so inclined to do it would already be familiar with the scales and harmony used in this style.

"Lullaby of the Leaves" is on the Fake Book CD. Learning to read (more like decipher, for me) these tunes from written notation in Dobro tuning is mighty handy.

How about Stacy Phillips' Klezmer medley on his "From the Inside" CD? Great stuff. The steel is perfect for those slippery "Gypsy minor" scales.

"Harlem Nocturne" is dynamite in Gm on the Dobro. Check out Stacy Phillips' version on his "Hey Mister Get the Ball" CD.

[This message was edited by Bob Stone on 07 May 2004 at 07:15 AM.]

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Most of you already know more about music theory than you realize.

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If I might add some ideas to what you said, (and hope others do too) to expand-upon the importance of what you said for some folks that might not more fully realize it:

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A fun and easy trick to remember when working out chord progressions, trying to steer out of the I-IV-V, is just to sub in the relative minor or major and see how it sounds.

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Indeed; The Amin7 2-fret fret box is the same box and identical notes to it's relative-Major C6(dom7), ...with the only difference in their chords in the box being that the signature chord for minors are on the nut end of their 2-fret boxes and the signature chord for Majors are on the bridge end of their boxes, ...BUT the remaining notes on the other end of their respective boxes are all notes of their scale too, so have the effect of tasty extensions without even having to think about it once we know the simplicity of the boxes' single template. And your next statement shows how such approaches fans out even further:

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An interesting tension can be created by throwing in a minor IV chord here and there. It sounds surprisingly jazzy and augmented over a full band playing a major IV chord.

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Throwing in a IVmin7 is the same notes as a Imin7b6 (aka pure minor / Aolean); And that b6 does indeed sound jazzy because it's pure minor and is perfectly compatible with a Imin7 which substitutes for IVMaj. If we're vamping along in the C6 box, ...when the band goes to IV we can slide up 3 frets to Cmin7 (=Eb6 ... same notes!) and VOILA we're on the extension notes fret of the IVMaj box! ...And if we slide 3 frets up from the F6 / IVMaj to get the minor you suggested, we're at the Fmin7 which is identical to Imin7b6 / pure minor which is identical to the Cmin7 except it has that pure minor b6 that sounds like we know what we're doing even though we might (and in my case probably) not ! And dog-gonnit, had we simply moved our bar down 2 frets from C6 to it's full 13th extension notes ...we would have been on the Amin7 extension voicing fret! So let's see, that makes 3 different boxes to jazz up the IV or make perfectly harmonious minors for the I / Tonic! And YIKES, ...if we can do that for the IV tone, then darn, we can do it for the "I" and V tones too. Well shootz, then we can do it for any tone! Darn, ...might this be the way that some guys can follow tones up and down the neck with chords that are so harmonious (aka in-mode) ? ! ?

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If it helps, you can always take your familiar major tuning and just tune one string to give you the relative MINOR root note.

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(i.e.) Take a [GBDGBD] "G Major" tuning and give yourself the relative minor, an E. Like: EBDGBD.

Hmm. And then you've just discoverd a 6th tuning. How funny.

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yyyyyYEPIRrrrr; And it would also be identical in some voicing to all 7 modes of it's Major parent scale / chord !

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P.S. Someday, Denny, I'm going to have enough time to print out your website, all of your posts, collate them into a binder, and then me and my steel are going to take a week off to read through them.

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Now even though that's a mighty fine and appreciated compliment to my soul (and ego darn it), ...it's darn sure glutton for punishment too! I'm not brave enough to try that! If I might suggest, printing up particular discussion chain SUBJECTS would be more fruitful by everyones' excellent contributions ...particularly Howard's; I have always treasured Merle Haggard's "being crazy to avoid going insane"!

Aloha,
DT~

[This message was edited by Denny Turner on 09 May 2004 at 05:56 PM.]

And although I've never met Maurice in person; While ordering some of his material on the phone a few years ago, he was one of the finest Gentlemen I have ever talked to.

Aloha,
DT~

[This message was edited by Denny Turner on 08 May 2004 at 09:56 AM.]

If a person finds it feeling difficult to think / play in a Maj7 box, NO PROBLEM; Most of us think and play in the 6(7) box, ...and the V6(7) box is the same as the IMaj7 box; SO, to play in Amin, the parent Maj7 is GMaj7 which is identical to and the same as the D6(7) box, ...so just play in the D6(7) box. OH YEA ...we just said in a previous message here to move the 6(7) box up 3 frets to get the min7 box ...which in this case of Amin, up 3 frets gives us the min7 box formed at the C6 and D6 frets ...which IS INDEED also the D6(7) box ! ! ! And DARN, we also just learned that not only are Imin7 and bVIIMaj7 identical in notes, but so is V7 ! WHY? Because, for instance, Dmin7 = D E F G A B C D; And CMaj7 = C D E F G A B C; And G7 = G A B C D E F G. THE VERY SAME NOTES; AND ALL IN THE VERY SAME BOX on the 6th tuned steel ! ...along with the other 4 modes of the CMaj7 scale !

DT~

[This message was edited by Denny Turner on 09 May 2004 at 10:12 PM.]