New Member / Lap Steel Question

Charles Welhausen · From: Ingram, Texas

Hello everyone, my name is Charles and I am new to the board. I've been playing rhythm guitar in a two man 'band' with a lap steel player for
several years. This exposure to the steel has made me really respect and want to learn the instrument.

We're playing on a 6 string tuned to Open E at the moment, but I'd like to get an 8 string to do some work in C6 (also so I can practice along with the Cindy Cashdollar
videos I bought).

Most of the 8 strings I've found on-line are
vintage / collector items and a bit cost
prohibitive. I have found some 8 strings made by Morrell at a reasonable price:
http://www.elderly.com/new_instruments/items/JMP8-TRED.htm

Does anyone have any experience with these instruments? Would they be suitable for someone in my position or would I be better off looking elsewhere? Just looking for opinions.. I won't hold you to anything

Thanks, and glad to be on the board!

Andy Sandoval · From: Bakersfield, California, USA

Hi Charles. I ran across this thread and thought you might be interested.

Loni Specter · From: West Hills, CA, USA

Welcome aboard! I had that same model Morrel, and I found that the lipstick pickup is weak on the outside strings. It's a 6 string pickup. For the money you can do better. Look for a used Morrell cheap and stick an afermarket 8 string pickup on it if you're handy.
I make steels myself, but they cost a bit more and custom built. Search the forum for alternate builders and go to "Brad's Page of Steels" for a good list of manufacturers.
Good luck.,
Loni www.lapdancerguitars.com

Charles Welhausen · From: Ingram, Texas

Thanks, that is great information and a good thread. I will keep shopping.

Charles Davidson · From: Phenix City Alabama, USA

Charles,Welcome from Alabama.

Keith Cordell · From: San Diego

You also might want to email Mark Vinbury, he sells kits that you can finish yourself and get them cheap. They are really nice guitars.

Alan Brookes · From: Brummy living in Southern California

Get away from the E major tuning. You won't make any progress unless you look at C6 and E9. I was stuck with E major tuning for 30 yrs., because I came to it via the blues and bottleneck guitar, but the only slide guitar that uses a major chord is Dobro G tuning.

A good friend of mine, who is a jazz guitarist, pointed out to me that in jazz they very rarely played a major chord, but they used "substitute" chords, which were mainly 6th and 9ths. It seems to work in jazz, and as soon as you tune to C6 and run that steel up the fingerboard you won't need an explanation.

Looking for a lap steel ? It's just strings stretched over a pickup. You can build one yourself in a weekend from the spares box. If you don't have an 8-string pickup just get two 6-string pickups and stagger them, then mix the two.

Many people use a regular solid guitar with riser nut and bridge. The only disadvantage is the long scale.

Charlie McDonald · From: out of the blue

I have to recommend you look up Dynalap by Mark Vinbury. It's more than strings stretched on a board; nice post-deco styling reminiscent of Nationals, but done in warm woods. Six- or eight-string, very enjoyable to play, and great tone for my money.

Keith Cordell · From: San Diego

Don't sweat the tuning so much; I've been at using open D for 2 years after playing around in C6 and a few others, and it works fine unless you are playing jazz or western swing type country. E9 comes in at 10 strings, and mostly for pedal. Lots of great lap steel players rarely stray from open D or open G, and have made great music doing it.

Mark Eaton · Posted 31 May 2006 6:51 am

"Lots of great lap steel players rarely stray from open D or open G, and have made great music doing it."

Like for example, Jerry Douglas. And his electric lap steel playing sounds nothing like bluegrass, in case you are wondering if G tuning is only for bluegrass.

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Mark

Charles Welhausen · From: Ingram, Texas

Thanks everyone for the advice.

Well it turns out that the Carter Starter pedal steel I ordered, and thought was lost, has -finally- come in the mail. I will remember these lap steel suggestions when it comes time to get something more portable down the road.

Keith Cordell · From: San Diego

Nope, I was referring to David Lindley, or Ben Harper, or almost any Sacred non-pedaler...

Mark Eaton · Posted 31 May 2006 3:03 pm

I wasn't trying to "put words in your mouth" Keith, I was just utilizing your quote to point out that JerryD plays killer lap steel, but spends most of his time in his favorite dobro tunings: G and D. I wish I had an extra lap steel around so that I could learn to become competent on C6, but there's only so many instruments in this house, and just so much money.

I was a bit puzzled by Alan's declaration that you'll never make any progress until you play C6 and E9 (or wouldn't E13 be more in keeping with this topic, say in the case of 8-string lap steel?) Whether it's Lindley, Harper, Douglas, or whomever - there are some guys that absolutely kick butt on lap steel in G and D. But I also agree with Alan that C6 is something that everyone should at least take a shot at.

I'm still saving toward an MSA SuperSlide, with a goal of going to the Texas show next March and picking it up from Reece when I get there.

Do most of the sacred non-pedalers use D and G?

I know that Darick Campbell has been using on his 8 string a variation of standard guitar tuning.

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Mark

[This message was edited by Mark Eaton on 31 May 2006 at 04:07 PM.]

[This message was edited by Mark Eaton on 31 May 2006 at 11:13 PM.]

Steinar Gregertsen · From: Arendal, Norway, R.I.P.

Greg Leisz does most of his lap steel work in E and G, yet his work with Bill Frisell goes way beyond the standard blues/rock/bluegrass vocabulary.

In my experience a 6-string tuned to E (or D, in my case) brings out other qualities in my playing than the "6th" tunings,- I would say a major tuned 6-string is the perfect 'partner' for a C6 (or any other "sophisticated" tuning) tuned 8-string.

Steinar

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"Play to express, not to impress"
www.gregertsen.com
Southern Moon Northern Lights

[This message was edited by Steinar Gregertsen on 31 May 2006 at 04:36 PM.]

Keith Cordell · From: San Diego

I'd love to find out what he is using now. The tuning in his DVD is as follows:
B*E*B*E*G#*B*C#*E. It plays with a lot of the same patterns that you get with open E. And it is an awesome rock tuning... tons of fun.

Mark Eaton · Posted 31 May 2006 3:45 pm

Darick told me the tuning the last time I saw the Campbells, which was last fall, but I didn't have a pen and paper and didn't write it down immediately - which of course was a mistake...

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Mark

Alan Brookes · From: Brummy living in Southern California

If Charles has just bought a Carter Starter he's going to be taken up with E9 tuning for a while. They come set up for E9 tuning.

Get yourself half a dozen Artisans: they sell for about $80 with stand from Musician's Friend. The latest batch are much better than the earlier ones. Then tune each one to a different tuning. After a while you'll find a set up you like and at that stage you can invest in better equipment. Yes, 8-string is much better than 6. I always wonder why with the E9 tuning they put those two re-entrant strings on the make it a 10-string. Among my collection I have a 10-string pedal steel, but I never seem to use the top 2 strings.

Hill Phillips · From: Alma Arkansas USA

I Like My morrell

Travis Bernhardt · From: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Really slinging the opinions there, eh, Alan? Myself, I wouldn't worry about not making "any progress" unless I picked the right tuning. Just follow your own ear and do what you need to do to get the sounds you want. Also, eight strings are not, in my opinion, "much better" than six--just different. Different tunings and instruments bring out different kinds of playing, I find, and six string instruments and tunings are perfectly valid.

Oh, and rather than redecorating your music room with six new lap steels in order to learn new tunings you might consider, oh, I don't know, retuning your guitar!?

Just some more opinions to chew on...

-Travis

Mark Eaton · Posted 1 Jun 2006 9:33 am

I'm not so lazy myself that I can't retune to try different tunings, but the problem is that for example, the string gauges in open G are a lot different than the gauges for C6th.

I figure I'll wait for the "big guns" if I can get that SuperSlide early next year, and tune it Reece's extended C6 on the 9-12 string option neck.

At this point, I have my hands (and feet) full as a beginner on E9th with the GFI S-10 Ultra I bought a few months ago.

------------------
Mark

Travis Bernhardt · From: Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Having to change strings means not being able to switch back and forth at will, but it probably also means you have to stick with something until you've given it a good run.

Okay, buy one extra guitar, then.

-Travis

basilh · From: United Kingdom

The Real tunings for western swing, Hawaiian and the likes, are all available with the SAME gauges.
E6th, E13th, C6th, A6th, B11, D9 and F#9. (Of course using the 'E' as the top note.)

Those ACOUSTIC resonator tunings Like G and D are not the best for Lap and Console Steel Guitar IMHO.
(Unless of course you want to play Blues or Rock styles, then it is most definitely 6 string 'Open' style tunings.)

BUT, in your initial post you indicated :-

Mark Eaton · Posted 1 Jun 2006 11:33 am

Not to veer off on a tangent, but "let me say this about that":

Basil, I don't pretend to know 1/100th of what you know regarding the Hawaiian aspect of lap steel playing, but when I started taking lap steel lessons as a 10 year old in the Bay Area in 1964, about every other piece of sheet music and/or tab they gave us was a Hawaiian song. The tuning they had us use was "Hawaiian A" or "Low Bass A." I don't believe this was any less a "Real" tuning than any of the others.

By 1964, Jerry Byrd had already made C6th well-known, and hindsight being 20/20, I wish I knew about it as a kid instead of trying to dink around with it in middle age.

In my 20's I fell in love with bluegrass, and got my first dobro. I'm pretty comfortable with G, and less so with D, but I sure like the sound of it.

So several years ago, when I got back into playing everything on a regular basis, I restrung and retuned my old Supro to G, because I don't feel like I'm fumbling around trying to find the right notes.

That said, as written earlier, I want to develop some competence on C6th.

I have seen dobro master Rob Ickes play everything from pure bluegrass, to the Allman Brothers "Midnight Rider," to the gypsy jazz of Django Reinhardt, to the pop/jazz of Herbie Hancock's "Watermelon Man" in open G tuning. He knows his fretboard so well, that it doesn't seem to phase him in the least.

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Mark

Willis Vanderberg · From: Petoskey Mi

Maybe the open E tuning is outdated and antiquated but then so am I.
A lot of us old timers learned any way we could. My instructor was Roy Wiggins by way of Eddy Arnolds 78 rpm records.As I was familiar with the six string flat top guitar it was natural to tune it to E.
If you learn the fret board it really doesn't matter. If you don't learn the fret board no tuning in the world can save you.
Of course this is my biased opinion after fifty six years of lap-pedal steel. It is still the most beautiful instrument in the world
In the right hands of course.

Old Bud

Bill Leff · From: Santa Cruz, CA, USA

Baz said:

"The Real tunings for western swing, Hawaiian and the likes, are all available with the SAME gauges.
E6th, E13th, C6th, A6th, B11, D9 and F#9. (Of course using the 'E' as the top note.)"

I don't know about them being the Real tunings, but I agree 100% with this statement about the multiple tunings being available with the same strings. They may not be the optimal guages for some of these tunings, but they do work.

Try it!

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