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Topic: An All Steel Guitar Band |
Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
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Posted 3 Nov 2013 9:49 am |
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During the twenties and thirties there were many novelty bands going around concentrating on one instrument, so you had All Banjo bands, All Mandolin bands, All Ukulele bands, etc.
Some of them were stretching the point a bit, because they had instruments made specially for the band. For instance, an All-Banjo band would have a bass banjo, which you would never find anywhere else. And an All-Ukulele band would have a bass ukulele, but since an ukulele is basically a small guitar, what's the difference between a big ukulele and a guitar? Again, what's the difference between a big mandolin and an archtop guitar, other than the number of strings?
But the steel guitar is a lot more versatile. Everyone knows that you can replace the silky strings in the background of any vocal with a steel guitar to better effect. You can strum chords on a steel guitar. You can obviously play lead. You can play bass too if you have enough lower strings.
So why not an entire band made up of just steel guitars?
A good place to try this out would be at a steel guitar festival. |
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Ray Montee
From:
Portland, Oregon (deceased)
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Posted 3 Nov 2013 10:24 am Altho' it's getting a little gray and fuzzy.................
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I can still recall the earliest days of my playing the Hawaiian steel guitar.......
when we'd have a dozen or more students in a semi-circle around the instructor while learning to play "Hickory, Dickory Dock" or "The Merry Go Round"......
That was once per week and then every two weeks, we'd have an orchestra practice where everyone on one side of the large room would be strumming rhythm and the others picking out the melody. This would switch back and forth so everyone got to play.
These orchestra practices usually had about sixty to seventy students on site. |
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Jim Cohen
From:
Philadelphia, PA
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Herb Steiner
From:
Briarcliff TX 78669, pop. 2,064
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Posted 3 Nov 2013 10:43 am
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Hal Rugg told me that he once put together a group for a steel show that was 17 pedal steels and a bass.
But he got fired - too much bass.
_________________
My rig: Infinity and Telonics.
Son, we live in a world with walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with steel guitars. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinberg? |
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Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
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Posted 4 Nov 2013 11:10 am Re: Altho' it's getting a little gray and fuzzy.............
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| Ray Montee wrote: |
| ...These orchestra practices usually had about sixty to seventy students on site. |
I would love to hear a recording of one of those sessions. 
Did every one of them have an amplifier? I have visions of extension cords all across the room and the lights dimming as seventy amplifiers boom into action.  |
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