Playing music not typically played on steel guitar

Mike Neer · From: NJ

Playing classic steel guitar tunes is definitely the best way to learn how to play the instrument. It's also a great way to get yourself ready to play gigs and fulfill the roles typically played by steel guitarists in Hawaiian, Western Swing and other situations. But when it's time to leave the nest and get deeper into the instrument, the best thing to do in my opinion is play music not typically played on steel.

Most of the time, steel-oriented tunes will lay out so conveniently that you can see how positions are used. This is really great for helping you see things the way steel players do. Things aren't always as simple as they seem, but that simplicity/smoothness should be one of the goals, as that is really a quality of steel playing that is so important. You've heard the expression "never let them see you sweat"--well, never let them hear you sweat.

But what happens when you are confronted with playing lines that don't lay out easily, such as in a twin guitar setting where you are playing a harmony line with a guitarist? Or what about playing bebop heads or any other number of things? The trick to really getting inside the instrument and your tuning is tackling these lines to the point where you have exhausted every possibility in trying to make the line as smooth and easy as you can. And the search is almost never over because learning the instrument always has new surprises waiting for you, especially as your technique develops.

I played guitar for the first 40 years of my life and always had an interest in jazz/fusion/rock--you know, music with lots of notes. I still tackle these types of music, mostly for my own satisfaction, but also to see if I can develop techniques even farther in case I might need them. One recent example is a tune called Where's Dixie by the The Dregs. I just love this tune and its long, fast lines. It's the kind of thing that inspires me to want to create my own music, and really it has nothing to do with steel guitar. But if we simply just keep repeating the past, nothing will ever grow and change.

Challenge yourself to play something outside of the box and work on it a few minutes every day until you start to see things open up. The little benefits you gain from doing this will pop up in your playing for the rest of your life.
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Links to streaming music, websites, YouTube: Links

Bill McCloskey · From: Nanuet, NY

Mike,

Lately I've been wondering: why don't you start writing steel music? Or commission new works?
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Shea Stevenson · From: Alabama, USA

I love Sonny Sharrock’s album Ask the Ages, he has such a great emotional vocal quality to his lines, I am new but imagined they would translate well and figured out Who Does She Hope to Be last week. I think I’m going to learn it note for note but so far I only have the melody, some chords that work with it and the first few bars of the lead. It’s very inspiring and I look so forward to having these steel guitar techniques down where I can translate jazz and classical through that lens. Olivier Messiaen wrote some for steel and I’ve always thought it would pair wonderfully with the Ondes Martenot, furthermore I’m curious how the steel would sound through the Ondes soundboards: https://www.la-voix-du-luthier.com/

Here’s Sonny:

https://youtu.be/jks0N05l4OY?si=oVilgzUJLO_xsVzq

Mark Evans · From: Colorado, USA

Mike

I dig how you musically stretch out the steel’s reach and also put out ideas for other players to consider, to ‘take a second look,’ to revise, to revisit where we’re at.

As a so-so ‘songwriter’ during its hay day (late 70’s/early 80’s) I learned to play by ear and picked up bits and pieces in small gatherings and jams. I can read tab but not so much musical notation. At my age, I can firmly say I was just lazy.

When I glommed onto slide (weissenborn around 2010), I found myself playing Spanish-style guitar less and less - exploring slide blues/folk ideas in open G, D, C and B (on the baritone)… almost exclusively solo (well, in my bed room cause, well, I was a bit shy about jamming with others on the new box.)

Recently I have fallen into a ‘collective’ (for lack of a better term) of hand drummers, percussionists, 2-3 guitarists, a couple singers and the occasional beat maker. It’s mostly Afro-middle eastern rhythms, different keys each time, free-form jamming, I guess. It’s about as far from the normal slide genre as one can get… yet what is produced is full, cohesive, adventurous, expansive and satisfying… and the spare sounds I add via my amplified weissenborns are at home as every other element. I work often in relative keys to mesh with other string players (educational!) The other players often approach me afterward, thanking me for the sonic additions which are easily differentiated from the other guitars.

I have found that I’m exploring new ways to wrest percussive tones out of the slide: small felt mallets tapped on the strings, finger-picks tapped on the sound board, percussive grouping of 3-5 notes - which often incite a following beat change from conga djembe players beside me. At home, I am refining new, short arpeggios that can be slotted into future jams. Too often, in the midst of a piece I will find myself with a silly smile on my face - reflecting those on the rest of the players.

Music is many things… but joy and excitement and connection is at its core. Since beginning on slide, I have explored a few 9th and 11th tunings, took a shot at Hawaiian styles… but my path now feels like a comfortable chair. I dig how it diverges from the norm. It may be simplistic compared to scripted steel favorites, but it generates for me what music should be: a joyful life.
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Larry Pogreba Baritone 'Weissenheimer
Lazy River mahogany standard Weiss
Lazy River ‘Tear Drop” weissenborn
2017 Richard Wilson Style 1 Weissenborn

Mike Neer · From: NJ

Brooks Montgomery · From: Idaho, USA

Good thread Mike. I love how you’re pushing the envelope. I always like hearing steel on non-typical-steel songs. One that comes to mind for me is Rob Ickes on dobro (and Andy Leftwich on mando, Dave Pomeroy on bass) on Stevie Wonder’s “Isn’t She Lovely”. Crazy song for steel, but Rob sure makes it work. Very tight for a three piece band. Very horn-like dobro playing.
https://youtu.be/h9hHI4SMdnc?feature=shared
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A banjo, like a pet monkey, seems like a good idea at first.

Frank James Pracher · From: Michigan, USA

There is a local band that plays pop tunes from the 60's to present day. They ask me to sit in on gigs from time to time. It's fun making the steel fit into songs where a traditional steel guitar sound wouldn't really be appropriate... for example if it's an 80's song I might play something that sounds like synth... if they play something funky I might add a filter pedal and play some chords.

I really enjoy it, and usually come away with some new licks/phrases that I wouldn't have come up with playing traditional steel parts.
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David Renson · From: Louisiana, USA

I've been playing electric guitar for 58 years and about 8 years ago I bought an Eharp. I quickly noticed that steel guitar really hadn't evolved much at all from it's beginning. I wanted to play whatever I wanted to play on guitar, on the Eharp. That include all of my guitar heroes and for example being able to jam along with the Allman Brothers live at the Fillmore trying to cop some of solo stylings of Dickey Betts and Duane Allman. I didn't like any of the many tunings available so about 4 years ago I took Big John Bechtel's E9/13 "most versatile" tuning, and raised the middle major 3rd up a half step and then lowered the whole tuning down to D. Now melodies and solos line up very nicely and common major and minor chords are near each other. Major and Minor 7 or 8 string arpeggios are there. The band I play eharp in does a lot of country but also some Motown,America, CSNY, Gregg Allman and others. I'm still working on some Jeff Beck,Robin Trower, Leslie West, Gary Moore but I'm not there yet. Here's my tuning. Low to high D A B D E G A B D F# or the 8 string version A D E G A B D F# The A D and F# for a D chord, the G B D for a G chord and E G B D for an Em7 all on the same line.
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MajorBacon

Jim Fogarty · From: Phila, Pa, USA

Fred Treece · From: California, USA

“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.”
-TS Eliot

I check back in to the steel guitar’s native music (if there is such a thing?) once in a while, just to see what my wanderings have done to it.

Andy Volk · From: Boston, MA

Mike, you and Steve Cunningham have taken the lap steel farther away from the instrument's cliches than any two current players I could name. And you've done this with a deep knowledge and respect for the history of the instrument. If the instrument is going to grow and thrive, it has to move behind recreating 1940s romantic Hawaiian steel and the 999th version of Sleepwalk - and I say that with love and respect for those genres.

In my own arranging, I've always gone for the music I liked first and then thought about how to translate it to steel guitar. I once read jazz described "the sound of surprise." I think it's that sense of surprise - the unexpected; the familiar reimagined - that we all long for.

Case in point of subverting expectations:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFMHveWGCa0
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Phil Grubaugh · From: California, USA

Bill McCloskey · From: Nanuet, NY

Another approach is to record the mountain of steel guitar music written in the 20's and 30's. When I was deep into the Alkire Eharp tuning, I recorded two tunes written by Eddie Alkire in 1936. They were pretty challenging pieces for me and very complicated with multiple sections . This music hasn't been heard, perhaps ever. And there is a ton of this stuff out there just waiting to be discovered.

Ka Pua o Hawaii: https://youtu.be/zAVOZ2eHhQ4?si=Chdewb5iLyt2Vi2d

On a South Sea Isle: https://youtu.be/up21nKZR3E4?si=5YCEJrwOZDJu9Bg0
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John Larson · From: Pennsyltucky, USA

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