Keith Davidson
From:
Nova Scotia, Canada
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Posted 2 Jun 2010 7:55 am |
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First of all - THIS IS NOT A LESSON - I'm only a beginner (7 weeks) so I'm hardly at a level to teach anything, I'm just passing some info along. These are a few of the things I've been focusing on and find they have been very helpful in learning and getting coordinated to play pedal steel guitar.
As most new players including myself want to get some kind of sound from the guitar and be able to at least play along with a simple song as soon as possible, I've written a few very basic chords that would be used in some country songs. A simple chord sequence would be a I, IV, V, I chord progression but I've also added in the II major as well as the ii minor, iii minor, and vi minor as these are sometimes used as well. Just start off with the I, IV, V, I and then add in the minors.
I've also included some picking exercises as well that I've found to be extremely helpful to get the fingers working and to be able to find the strings. You want to ingrain any muscle memory with proper technique so the "first you get good, then you get fast" motto cannot be over emphasized.
Enough rambling, here are some basic chord groups.
Note: These chord groups work for any major "open" fret. Open means no pedals, ie the 3rd fret with no pedals would be G. To play in the key of C you would copy the same fret and pedal movements and perform them starting on fret 8 instead of fret 3 so that your V chord in C would be on the 10th fret with the A and B pedals down, etc.
Pedals:
A - raises strings 5 and 10 from B to C#
B - raises strings 3 and 6 from G# to A
Levers - just 2 for now
D - lowers strings 4 and 8 from E to Eb(D#)
F - raises strings 4 and 8 from E to F
Key of G (I, IV, V,I - G, C, D, G)
(II major - A) (ii minor - A minor) (iii minor - B minor) (vi minor - E minor)
G (I) - 3rd fret - no pedals
C (IV) - 3rd fret - A and B pedals
D (V) - 5th fret - A and B pedals
A (II) - 5th fret - no pedals
A (ii) - 3rd fret - B and C pedals
E (vi) - 3rd fret - A pedal
B (iii) - 3rd fret D lever (the lever that lowers the E strings to Eb or D#)
You can also get the major chord at whatever open position up 3 frets using the A pedal and the F lever.
Ex:
3rd fret G (open) - 6th fret G (F lever and A pedal )
8th fret C (open) - 11th fret C (F lever and A pedal)
Strings - there are 4 major string grips -
T(thumb), 1(index), 2(middle)
10, 8, 6
8, 6, 5
6, 5,4
5, 4, 3
A good practice is to get used to griping these strings and work your way across the fret board plucking the different groups. Here is a link to a good practice technique that works well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iw8pfTPRYY&feature=related
Picking strings:
Pick each string starting on the 10th string (10, 9, 8,....1 and then back 1, 2,3,....10 )with just the thumb, then next pick all the strings with just the 1st finger (index), then again with just the 3rd finger (middle).
Pick the strings in groups of 3 one at a time using T (thumb), 1 (index), 2 (middle). Doesn't sound great but is a good practice for getting the fingers moving.
Strings:
10, 9, 8 (T,1,2)
9, 8, 7 (T,1,2)...........3,2,1
Then play it back to the 10th string starting with 3, 2, 1 but with the same fingering T, 1, 2
Then do the same kind of exercise but start on strings 8, 9, 10 using 2, 1, T and then progress across the fret board the same way, 8, 9, 10, then 9,8 7 using the 2, 1, T fingering.
There are a ton of variations on this so you can later add T, 2, 1 using the 10, 8, 9 strings, etc., and then using 1, 2, T using 9, 8, 10, etc. and going across the fret board in these combinations.
I think the most important part of all of this is to do it VERY SLOWLY and develop muscle coordination and muscle memory.
If you do this slow enough to get it correct all the time you will eventually be able to play it very quickly - I still can't but I'm much better at it now than I was a few weeks ago. I practice these picking drills every single day.
Once you get it down correctly at a slow pace, add the bar in and learn to follow the strings across the fret board. You can also add in the chord changes listed above as you pick the sequences.
Change it up and add in the grips across the fret board as you are changing the chords that are listed above. Then change back and do the picking exercises and change the chord after each full trip back and forth across the fret board.
Hope this is of some help to some beginners and I hope I'm not out of line in posting this. |
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