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Topic: African Steel Guitar |
Lucky Oceans
From:
Fremantle, W Australia, Australia
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Posted 7 Dec 1999 2:33 am |
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| Does anyone know of any recordings of steel guitar by Africans before King Sunny Ade? |
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Michael Johnstone
From:
Sylmar,Ca. USA
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Posted 8 Dec 1999 11:19 am
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| I spent a few weeks in Lagos,Nigeria around Christmas 1979 and there was a LOT of lap steel on the radio.The music was mostly reggae/juju/highlife type stuff.Of course I heard Ade featuring Demolo Adepoju on pedal steel and I think there are several other pedal players in Nigeria. Mike Perlowin knows more about this subject so maybe he'll weigh in... -MJ- |
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Bob Stone
From:
Gainesville, FL, USA
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Posted 8 Dec 1999 1:09 pm
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Sacred Steel group the Campbell Brothers, which includes Chuck on 12-string pedal and Darick on 8-string lap, will be playing at the World Sacred Music Festival in Fez, Morocco in July, 2000. It will be interesting to see what impact their music has on Africans. Also, I would imagine their agent is trying to get them more gigs in Africa while they are over there.
Mmmmmmmm.[This message was edited by Bob Stone on 12-08-99] |
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Chris Schlotzhauer
From:
Colleyville, Tx. USA
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Posted 8 Dec 1999 2:32 pm
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| Yesterday, I was in a cab in Phoenix, AZ. (long story). The cabby was from Nigeria, and was a musician. He was telling me about juju music and how prevelant the steel guitar was in this music. I've never heard of this. Are there a lot of African steelers out there? |
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Lucky Oceans
From:
Fremantle, W Australia, Australia
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Posted 8 Dec 1999 5:04 pm
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Thanks for your input, guys. Great that some sacred steelers are going to Fez. That's a good feztival. Can I still order those CDs from you, Bob? With Credit card?
You should see if you can get Froots to put the Campbell bros. interview on the net and point some steelers to it. I'm interested in how he sets his pedals up. Back to African steelers - I'm pretty sure that their were people playing - probably acoustically before that - I just don't know how you'd hear them. |
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Brad Bechtel
From:
San Francisco, CA
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Posted 9 Dec 1999 9:18 am
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In "The Hawaiian Steel Guitar and Its Great Hawaiian Musicians" Kealoha Life tells of playing with a South African Griqua (Hottentot) named Kimo Koa, who apparently learned from Joseph Kekuku sometime after 1924. Kealoha Life spent 20 years playing and teaching steel guitar in South Africa. Apparently Jimmie Rodgers, the Singing Brakeman, toured Africa during the early 1930s with a steel guitarist. This is the only reference I could find to such a tour.
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Brad's Page of Steel:
www.well.com/~wellvis/steel.html
A web site devoted to acoustic & electric lap steel guitars
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Bob Stone
From:
Gainesville, FL, USA
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Posted 10 Dec 1999 7:28 am
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Lucky,
I have a few CDs to sell, but no way of handling credit cards. If you have to use a card, you might try Arhoolie.com. Also I believe they are having an end of the year special on the Ghent and Treadway albums for $8 each. Such a deal!
I'm scheming on how I might stow away to the Fez fest. Thanks for the suggestion on Folk Roots. What issue is the interview in? Arhoolie's PR person is out on maternity leave, so I'm not keeping up with press as well as usual.
I'll inquire to Chuck about the pedal set-up. It's not just the pedals though. His tuning is essentially the top four of E9 chromatic and the bottom eight are an E7 chord which includes two identical adjacent Es--one gets sharped by the pedals, the other flattened. He uses 7 pedals and 5 knees.
Best,
Bob
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