Overall approach to the basics?

Brian Heller · From: Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA

Hi out there,
I have to say, as a beginning I'm still having a hard time seeing how to systematically learn this thing, and to learn the basics in the way that will pay-off the most down the line. I have a music degree and guitar experience, so the theory & terminology aren't even part of it.

But, for example, I have 3-4 pieces of educational material recommended here (books/DVDs) and have met once with a teacher, and each of them teaches an entirely different way (sometimes 2 ways) to play the major scale right out of the gate. One uses pedals, another uses bar movement, another is vertical, then more horizontal, etc. Then they're harmonized and it starts over again! I can imagine they all are useful in different places are all things to know eventually...But which ones make sense to start with, in terms of learning the instrument and being useful in the next step?

The basic approaches to chords and harmony are the same-- Some focus on all pedals and knee-levers right away, others on the bar, others combine them in different ways.

Hopefully this makes some sense and you can see the problem I'm hitting here. Don't get me wrong, I'm enjoying it and making progress. The technique stuff will come, but this is more about how to approach the process of learning the whole thing.

Any advice on what direction to steer when they are all available?

Many thanks,
Brian

Bob Hoffnar · From: Austin, Tx

Th real answer is whatever works is fine. You will need to learn all that stuff when you get down to to it. Pick something and start putting the hours in. There are no shortcuts or tricks. Learn a bunch of licks by rote or analyze scale and chord forms. I'm into the scales and chord forms method myself but that doesn't work for everybody.
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Bob

Ned McIntosh · From: New South Wales, Australia

Hi Brian,

There are probably as many ways of learning this beast as there are players. You have to find a way that works for you, and your approach will necessarily be different to many of us because you already have a good grounding in music theory.

I began with almost no knowledge of musical theory and I still have most of it left! But I had a good ear. I listened to all the steel-guitar I could get my hand on and started trying to imitate the licks. I learned the basic structure of country music (the "three-chord trick") and how those chords were related to each other and could be formed on the steel. How to get from one chord to another. How to find inversions of each chord. Then little single-note runs, across the strings. Once you have this very basic stuff you can start looking for variations, or odd ways of getting along the neck, or across it. In this manner, use of pedals and levers became second-nature, and you start finding intriguing little things about the instrument which will make more sense to you because of your knowledge than they do for me. I just know they sound good and they work!

Perhaps your detailed musical knowledge is over-complicating the machine for you. Because it is a moveable-fret system, it's not like ordinary guitars. The steel has short-cuts, little hidden secrets that sometimes take years to find, usually by accident. No less a player than the late, great John Hughey has been quoted as saying every now and then he'd play something he'd never played before, by accident, and wonder where it came from.

FWIW I've had the opposite experience, where I was searching for a particular lick for weeks, with a conspicuous lack of success. I was trying to analyse it - and failing dismally. One day I came home from a really bad day at work, sat down at my old Marlen and played the entire lick without even thinking about it! I spent the next couple of minutes silently staring at the fretboard and my hands, wondering how many more secrets this machine had yet to reveal.

I would say "trust your ears". Listen to great steel players and try to understand how they played the phrases. Where did they start? What grips did they use? Did they pedal a note into place, bar-slide it, or use a lever? Does the tone of the phrase give a clue as to where on the neck they began, went to, and eventually ended? Learning their licks is a great start because it will show you the elegance and economy of great players; how they did more with less.

Once you are playing phrases and licks with ease, then you have the necessary knowledge to begin inventing ones for yourself. The steel needs to be played with feeling and emotion, not clinically from an analytical perspective. I don't think for a second that you are trying to be excessively analytical, but your musical knowledge may be obscuring the essence of the steel, the feeling an emotion the instrument can project, even with just the simplest of playing.

Well, I've rambled a bit, but we're all still learning this bewitchingly beautiful, complex, cantankerous, mellifluous marriage of precision engineering and luthiery which we call pedal-steel guitar. Don't give up, and don't be discouraged. When you're stuck, go back to something very simple and play it with all the feeling you can drag from the strings. Tone, timing, emotion. And enjoy the ride, it's a trip that never ends. Very Happy

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The steel guitar is a hard mistress. She will obsess you, bemuse and bewitch you. She will dash your hopes on what seems to be whim, only to tease you into renewing the relationship once more so she can do it to you all over again...and yet, if you somehow manage to touch her in that certain magic way, she will yield up a sound which has so much soul, raw emotion and heartfelt depth to it that she will pierce you to the very core of your being.

Bill Moore · From: Manchester, Michigan

My opinion: master the basic physical techniques first. Jeff Newman's "Right Hand Alpha" and "Pedal Steel Guitar Techniques" covers that. if you have this down, the rest will be easier to learn. Good luck.
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Bill Moore...
my steel guitar web page

Dick Sexton · From: Greenville, Ohio

I'm no one to give "How to advice", so I will not. I will suggest a couple things. First, with your musical background and musical experience, you are more prepared to answer the question then most steel players. Keep a journal and record your methods of learning the instrument, good or bad. Adjust your methods as you progress and as you learn. And "keep a journal", it will be it's own instructional method in the end. Second, some of the best and most experienced steel players and steel instructors on the planet gather here. A lot, are only an email away from you and may enjoy conversing with an experienced and learned musician. A great resource of information, of players that have come before you. Third, realize that this instrument is in it infancy, it can and will change with time. Or as its player deams necessary. Ref. posts by Mr. Zane King and Mr. Paul Franklin and others and study the many copedants being used. One thought, I could have been a Neuro Surgeon in less time, with much less effort, and fewer wives. Enjoy the journey...

Jesse Leite · From: Ontario, Canada

Hi Brian,

I have only been playing a year myself so I am very much a beginner. However, I also teach guitar in my hometown here so like you I already have a pretty decent background i music theory.

I have to second Dick Sexton's suggestion on keeping a journal. I have taken some lessons from two well known players in my area with 20+ years of gigging experience each. Between taking these lessons and lurking the forum, I have found a method that works for me and am offering my "notes" as a PDF for others to download (see my signature for E9 Fretboard Reference link). But like Dick suggested, take your own notes as you learn!

Also, a good friend on the forum here lent me Jeff Newman's "Right Hand Alpha" DVD (great for picking technique) and Winnie Winston's "Pedal Steel Guitar" method book (I love this book, lots of information and a bunch of tabbed songs for E9). I recommend both of these resources as I have learned a ton from them.

From one beginner to another Smile

Jesse
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Playing an '81 BMI SD-10 4&6 through a Peavey Delta Blues 2x10 all-tube amp.
E9 Fretboard Reference Booklet (Chords & Scales PDF)

Danny Bates · From: Fresno, CA. USA

Brian, I don't know what style of music you are into but if it's country, a systematic approach might be to start with learning the major chords. After that learn the diatonic thirds to transition between them.

I don't recommend learning a ton of licks until you get these basics down.

You said:

CrowBear Schmitt · From: Ariege, - PairO'knees, - France

Welcome to the hard part Brian : gettin' started
it's a lot to take in in 1 shot
do you a have a single or double neck steel ?
how many pedals & levers ?
if i may suggest :
get in touch & meet some steelers & get a good teacher
otherwise, get comfortable & used to sittin' behind that contraption
familiarize yourself w: pedals & levers & what they do (on fret 0 for example - there's a bunch of chords there)
then comes left hand bar control & being in tune
then the almighty right hand - have mercy !
yes, you'll have to learn to pick both : vertically & horizontally
here's a basic vertical major scale :
(this will help you improve : bar control, pick blocking, use of the 2nd string - anticipating your next move)

Start on fret 8 then go to fret 1 then 6 then 11 then 4 then 9 then 2 then 7 then 12 then 5 then 10 then 3 & back to 8
(play it 10 times)- fingers : t = thumb - i = index - m = middle
[tab]
2-----------------------8m-----/-----8m-------------------/
3------------------------------/--------------------------/
4---------------------------8i-/--8i----------------------/
5-----------------8t--8A-------/--------8At--8------------/
6----------8m--8B--------------/----------------8Bm--8----/
7-------8i---------------------/------------------------8i/
8---8t-------------------------/--------------------------/ *1t Blam ! yer in F on 1 !

& here's a horizontal major scale in G

lever D lowers strings 4 & 8 1 half tone
lever F raises strings 4 & 8 1 half tone

Kevin Hatton · From: Buffalo, N.Y.

1) Learn Harmony and Interval Theory and The Nashville Number System before anything else.
2) Learn how to tune your guitar. Get experienced help. Methods vary. Understand tempered 3rd's and 6th's.
3) Learn how to play in intonation. If you do not learn how to tune your guitar and intonate nothing else matters. Get experienced help.
4) Get the Emmons video series by Steve Palousek. They are THE only cumulative knowlegde courses out there that I know of. All the others have disjointed knowledge. If you do not learn cumulatively you will miss things.
There are people teaching out there who have NO business teaching. They do not teach progressively. If someone is teaching you licks or phrases out of context of chord movement, a song, and most important theory, get away from them.

Ron Adams · From: Texas, USA

Do yourself a big favor and go to www.musictexasstyle.com and sign up for one or two lessons from Reece Anderson

You won't be sorry.

Ron

Fred Shannon · From: Rocking "S" Ranch, Comancheria, Texas, R.I.P.

Brian, spend a couple of bucks and purchase Reece Anderson's "Missing Link" booklet. I used it with all my students and it worked wonders. Winnie Winston's book is good too.

phred
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