Why have the Boo-Wah on my U-12?

David Stilley · From: Santa Cruz, California, USA

Hi everyone,

Let me start off by apologizing if this is a redundant subject but I've tried to search this several ways and learned quite a lot of other things in the process, but I'm left with the question, "Why is this included in almost every B6 and C6 Copdent?" I play a U-12 pretty standard Newman set-up I believe. Boo-Wah is in P4 position, prime real estate to me. I should also point out now that I'm a one foot, two knees player. I use a Telonics pedal with a hat as a volume controller, moving my head from side to side. I could most efficiently use right leg Vertical as it's a movement I'm not taking advantage of. I could move one of the 4-7 to it or add something I'm not able to do by combining 2 foot pedals. I'm mostly playing "E9 style" on the steel but I want to take deeper advantage of the myriad of variations available when the instrument shifts to the B6 chord. I have found many uses for P5,p6 and P7 with combos on P5/P6 and P6/P7. The Boo-Wah pedal starts off down in the mud and digs in even deeper when you press the pedal. My logic tells me this is meant for some kind of bass picking in the middle to upper region of the neck, close intervals in the bass region get muddy real fast.

The only examples I've seen weren't very clear about why this pedal is so important that everyone has it on their 6th tuned guitars. Could I be better served by changing P4 to something else, and what am I going to find that I can't do by combining adjacent pedals or combinations of a pedal and a lever? (In other words stuff using two feet combos on pedals). If I'm going to need to change something in my Copedent as I progress with studying the B6 side of my tuning I'd rather do it now than after 2 or three years of playing with it the way it is.

I should say here also that I started out with the idea of changing my Copedent to a more personalized version but I eventually learned that guys who are much smarter and more advanced musically and skill wise have thought this stuff out much deeper than I'm even capable of understanding at this point in my steel playing. Everything that I thought of changing to make the instrument "better" actually compromised it in other ways that have yet to unfold for me musically. So tell me why I'll need P4 in the long run, and I'll quit wondering why this apparent "white elephant pedal" is right dead center in my pedal board apparently doing nothing useful to my musical vocabulary.
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GFI Ultra U-12 7+5 E9/B6, Roland Cube 80XL, Telonics FP-100 Volume pedal with TMRS remote sensor (courtesy of Dave Beaty and Telonics)

Lane Gray · From: Topeka, KS

On most C6th guitars, it's P8. In fact, even when I see it on P4, I call it P8.
I can see not caring for it on the bottom two strings, but the raise of the 9th string B (at least on your guitar) is pretty danged important.
I personally use the low A and E for some baritone guitar imitations (like the ride from Dwight's "Little Ways". It just falls right there under the bar), and my Monsterbud will have P0 dropping the 12th string B to A, and raising the 10th string G# to A.
Jeff moved it next to P5 because it often gets used in quick succession with P5, and you don't have to dance from 8 to 5.
If you only have the one foot, I'd suggest putting P5 on a knee, as that way you can hit the often-used (and pretty handy) 5&7 combination. And, with 5 on a knee (if you feel inclined to re-rod the whole guitar), you could move Boowah back to the pedal on the end and (if you have holes left in the 6th string changer) reinstate the lost P4.
Or you could put something else in there.
_________________
2 pedal steels, a lapStrat, and an 8-string Dobro (and 3 ukes)
More amps than guitars, and not many effects

David Stilley · From: Santa Cruz, California, USA

Hey I should have guessed that you'd be the first to chime up with a response. You always seem knowledgeable and ready to share it. I was just watching some of your You Tube videos this morning as I just stumbled onto them with a link, (It was nice finally meeting you after reading so many of your prolific postings).

So I'll try and feel out that 9th string change to make some sense of it. But maybe you could be more specific as to why that 9th string change is so "danged important". Is it more of a chordal alteration or chord change or mostly for melodic use picking melody in the strings surrounding string 9?
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GFI Ultra U-12 7+5 E9/B6, Roland Cube 80XL, Telonics FP-100 Volume pedal with TMRS remote sensor (courtesy of Dave Beaty and Telonics)

Lane Gray · From: Topeka, KS

It turns B6 (G#m7) into a G#7. It also turns an E chord into E augmented.
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2 pedal steels, a lapStrat, and an 8-string Dobro (and 3 ukes)
More amps than guitars, and not many effects

Ian Rae · From: Redditch, England

When I refurbished my old pull-release D10 I hadn't finalised the mechanism for the string 9 & 10 changes on the C6, so I just had P8 (which is next to my P5 in position 4) raise string 7 and P5 lower 5 and raise 9 - and that's all. I figured I would fit the other changes when I missed them, and that was a year ago. P5 and P8 together still give a useful alternate 6th chord.

I'm building a U12 at the moment with an all-pull changer and I shall include all the changes including the 12th string lower to A. Then I'll wait and see if I use them Smile

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Homebuilt keyless U12 7x5, Excel keyless U12 8x8, Williams keyless U12 7x8, Telonics rack and 15" cabs

Lane Gray · From: Topeka, KS

Most of the melodic playing on the C6 neck happens without the pedals, just bar movement. Unless you were Curly Chalker. Occasionally I'll use P5 or 6. If I'm playing double-stop stuff, I'll usually use bar slants or jump up or down a few frets to a different pair of strings.
_________________
2 pedal steels, a lapStrat, and an 8-string Dobro (and 3 ukes)
More amps than guitars, and not many effects

David Stilley · From: Santa Cruz, California, USA

Yea Lane,

I noticed that watching Buddy Emmons play jazz at the St. Louis Steel Convention I think the last time he played there and he used pedals a lot while comping chord changes, but when he launched into his solo it was ALL BAR work. Thanks for clarifying the chord change info. I'll give that a try. It was just really bugging me that it's the only pedal on my guitar that's still a complete mystery. I found one old post that showed using the pedal to play the intro to "Hot Rod Lincoln" as covered by Commander Cody & The L.P.A. and another example going back and forth with the P5 for some kind of classic turn around. But I did notice that many used to use a low C# on a C6 7 or 8 string lap tuning that was popular with some players in the heyday of lap steel. Is this related I wonder?
_________________
GFI Ultra U-12 7+5 E9/B6, Roland Cube 80XL, Telonics FP-100 Volume pedal with TMRS remote sensor (courtesy of Dave Beaty and Telonics)

chris ivey · From: california (deceased)

pedal 8 and pedal 5 on regular c6 allow great comping chords ala emmons and chalker . it fits a wide grip chord that is standard usage.
listen to nightlife for one example.

Ian Rae · From: Redditch, England

David, what you say about lap steel is interesting. I'm sure it is related as I use that P8 C# a lot on the PSG, but I don't miss the bass string lowers enough to be bothered installing them.

What Chris says is true, mind you. In the Winston book it shows how 5 & 8 next to each other is useful for jazz progressions.
_________________
Make sleeping dogs tell the truth!
Homebuilt keyless U12 7x5, Excel keyless U12 8x8, Williams keyless U12 7x8, Telonics rack and 15" cabs

Tom Gorr · From: Three Hills, Alberta

I put a bit of a hybrid boowah on my uni, next to P5. It has both of the upper B's going to C, sort of like the standard knee lever on a C6 knee cluster, and also has the lower string changes that give the boowah effect.

I use the pedal almost as much as P5 and P6, but mostly due to the B-C pulls, and not much at all with the low two strings. I'm pretty sure it is for these changes that P8 often ends up next to P5, and not for the 'boowah' "effect" at all.

David Stilley · From: Santa Cruz, California, USA

Thanks to Chris, Ian & Tom for your input on this. So I'm starting to guess that the Boo-Wah Pedal 4 or 8 as you will have it is something that's going to make more sense to me as my learning of Steel music AND music theory increases. I'm going to leave the guitar as it sits again for longer. I do have a few of things to think about here.

I'm curious why this pedal, and the effect that even before pedal steel was a popular flashy move for steel players share the same name. I always wondered, why? So what I'm asking is are those two extra low bass strings drops meant to maximize the Boo part of the Boo-Wah effect when the treble is rolled off? The feeling I'm getting tells me that's what those low bass notes are for, kind of like the Country music version of Whammy bar effects that were popular with 70's & 80's rock guitarists. Maybe that's where Jimi Hendrix got the idea to start experimenting with the vibrato bar dives. I haven't heard any of you guys comment on musically using those two low bass note drops other than Lane's mention of using those bass notes for a baritone guitar imitation effect, some players even omitting them from the pedals changes all together and maybe even adding some other pulls to further enhance the chord available if I got that right.
_________________
GFI Ultra U-12 7+5 E9/B6, Roland Cube 80XL, Telonics FP-100 Volume pedal with TMRS remote sensor (courtesy of Dave Beaty and Telonics)

Lane Gray · From: Topeka, KS

Buddy also had a pedal that was ONLY strings 9 and 10.
You could hear him use it playing a major chord with the IV in the bass, and pulling it down to 3.
_________________
2 pedal steels, a lapStrat, and an 8-string Dobro (and 3 ukes)
More amps than guitars, and not many effects

Mark van Allen · From: Watkinsville, Ga. USA

Hi, David, I would say the (originally non-pedal) Boo-Wah sound, accomplished by manually moving a tone control while playing a note or, more often, chord, and the 4/8 C6/B6 pedal are not related historically or in most player's minds, it being more the sound the guitar makes as a chord including those lower strings is dropped (from C down to A on C6) being very, well, boo-wahish.

While I'm not sure of the original genesis of that change, players like Emmons, Hughey, Wallace, and many others used a lot of fast movement between the standard 5th and 8th pedals, and at the time of Newman's original instruction both "Night Life" and the instrumental version of "Hold It" , both of which feature distinctive examples of the 8th pedal drop, were extremely popular bandstand tunes and included in many Newman Seminars, so I think that may have influenced his decision to move the pedals together and feature them so prominently on the pedal rack.
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Pete Burak · From: Portland, OR USA

You might try to find a local Instructor to show you some P8 stuff... Maybe David Phillips in SF.
Obviously it functions within the Bass spectrum, sonically.
In conjunction with P5 it gives you voicings to Be-Bop your way through typical 1-6-2-5, 3-6-2-5 progressions, etc, heard in so many Standards.
You don't need to have it.
You could change that pedal to whatever you want to try out, and always go back to the original setup if you want.
Maybe try raising all three B's to C, for a slightly different flavor that can be used in a similar context.
You mentioned Hendrix... P8 is also the Purple-Haze/Foxy-Lady chord.

Brint Hannay · From: Maryland, USA

I don't know who actually started using the term "Boo-Wah" for that pedal, but I know Jeff Newman was influential on a lot of people who took up steel through both classroom teaching and instructional materials, and in at least one of his C6th books he added "Baarrroooom!!!!" under the tab for the archetypal P8 low-string dive.

"Boo-wah" is certainly better suited for the tone control technique.

David Stilley · From: Santa Cruz, California, USA

Thank you Pete Burak! You hit the jackpot with that explanation. I don't know why that slipped by me when I was trying to evaluate the sound. I remember one day recently when I was trying to find that chord in the B6 side of the tuning but got distracted with something else as I will at times.

Thank You Mark Van Allen and Brint Hannay for the history. I always thought they were somehow connected (the Boo-Wah effect and the Boo-Wah pedal). I mean just how common was the phrase "Boo-Wah" back before my time? Just hipster musical jargon of the times I suspect.

I love the forum an all you guys, thanks!
_________________
GFI Ultra U-12 7+5 E9/B6, Roland Cube 80XL, Telonics FP-100 Volume pedal with TMRS remote sensor (courtesy of Dave Beaty and Telonics)

Tom Gorr · From: Three Hills, Alberta

I always thought the effect was the way those low frequency harmonics oscillate through those deep 'beats' as you moved the pedal from one end to the other, sort of a subharmonic wah effect...learn something new everyday.

Geez, Pete, i'm gonna have to start playing hendrix on the steel now...I suppose it beats deep purple... Laughing

b0b · From: Cloverdale, CA, USA

I think of it mostly as an I to VI<sup>7</sup> change, C to A<sup>7</sup> at the first fret. Of course, on a U-12 it only does that with your E strings lowered to D#.

I like lowering the low E (11th string) to C# on the "F" lever, to get a similar change on the "E9th side" of the tuning.
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Ian Rae · From: Redditch, England

Great idea - I'll try it.
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Make sleeping dogs tell the truth!
Homebuilt keyless U12 7x5, Excel keyless U12 8x8, Williams keyless U12 7x8, Telonics rack and 15" cabs

David Stilley · From: Santa Cruz, California, USA

Lane Gray · From: Topeka, KS

He had 9 pedals. P8 lowered 9 and 10 and raised 7, P9 lowered 9 and 10.
_________________
2 pedal steels, a lapStrat, and an 8-string Dobro (and 3 ukes)
More amps than guitars, and not many effects

Ian Rae · From: Redditch, England

What we call F is really E# and is only ever the 3 note in a C# chord* - I would have thought that low down a root would be more use.

(*excluding certain diminisheds and augmenteds)
_________________
Make sleeping dogs tell the truth!
Homebuilt keyless U12 7x5, Excel keyless U12 8x8, Williams keyless U12 7x8, Telonics rack and 15" cabs

David Stilley · From: Santa Cruz, California, USA

Yes Lane, I meant string 7 not 6. I got confused with converting my 12 string numbering system to the 10 string that Buddy plays. It seems there's several variations of Boo-Wah pedals out there. I thought it was more standardized. But I guess lots of guys experiment with changing pulls around. I haven't really got to that point yet. The only changes I'm thinking about now are having to do with my ability to make combinations with one foot only and adding a feel stop to my G lever.
_________________
GFI Ultra U-12 7+5 E9/B6, Roland Cube 80XL, Telonics FP-100 Volume pedal with TMRS remote sensor (courtesy of Dave Beaty and Telonics)

b0b · From: Cloverdale, CA, USA

Les Cargill · From: Oklahoma City, Ok, USA

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