Does our focus on the past limit the appeal of Lap Steel

Fred Kinbom · Post by **Fred Kinbom** » 20 Mar 2010 6:10 am

I also want to second Mike Neer's recommendation of Don Rooke and The Henrys. The tune "The Cost of Living" is one of my favourite pieces of recorded music on a lap steel guitar.

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/is-thi ... d311788057

(Unfortunately, the sample of that tune on iTunes is too short - you will have to buy the tune or why not the whole album - it is great!

)

Fred

Bill McCloskey · Post by **Bill McCloskey** » 20 Mar 2010 6:14 am

"It gonna be hard to to convince musicians that a player is doing something new and exciting, when they know its the same ideas repackaged with a different look,sound or beat."

Mike, I'm not sure who you are talking about here. Which lap steel players do you think are repackaging the same ideas?

Chad Winn · Post by **Chad Winn** » 20 Mar 2010 6:39 am

Doug Beaumier wrote:
I'd argue that Fahey is more 'contemporary' than Joaquin Phoenix or Jerry Byrd.

...I think you mean Joaquin Murphy? Joaquin Phoenix is an actor.

How's that for comedic relief?

Mike Bagwell · Post by **Mike Bagwell** » 20 Mar 2010 7:19 am

Bill,

I'm not referring to any player, but the concept of what constitutes a modern steel guitar style. I'm also trying to explain why a musician that pays more attention to the actual notes would have a different perspective from that of a fan, who would see the artist as a whole.
I'm not really taking sides, I began as a pedal steel player at 14, I got into distorted lap steel at 17, when Jackson Brown's Running on Empty came out, with Lindley getting it done.
Reading your quotes below lead me to believe we were on the same page. I'm talking about what could be done in the future,as a concept, and how to get there,and why the things that can hold a musician back because he is possibly focused on the wrong things. Maybe we could get some guys thinking about what the general public considers modern.

Mike

You wrote.

[I don't think I would "necessarily" agree that harmonic complexity is synonymous with moving things forward.quote]

[ think moving things forward would include new compositions that take into account the unique nature of steel guitar, expanding the sonic capabilities, the incorporation of steel into different forms and genres of music (think of Slo-mo or Nation Beat), new techniques... quote][/quote]

Bill McCloskey · Post by **Bill McCloskey** » 20 Mar 2010 8:15 am

"I'm also trying to explain why a musician that pays more attention to the actual notes would have a different perspective from that of a fan, who would see the artist as a whole. "

Well Mike, I'm certainly a fan. But I've a musician since I was 6, went to Berklee School of music, played professionally for about 5 years, and have maintained my "amateur status" since I got married and had kids. So I guess that is where I was having trouble. The last two years have been spent focused on playing jazz cornet, studied with some great musicians and teachers.

Steinar Gregertsen · Post by **Steinar Gregertsen** » 20 Mar 2010 8:43 am

Bill McCloskey wrote:The last two years have been spent focused on playing jazz cornet, studied with some great musicians and teachers.

Speaking of that - does these kind of discussions occur in the trumpet (and jazz in general) community? Do they get as heated? Just curios because I wonder if it may have something to do with the lap steel still being considered a 'minority niche' instrument, and maybe we're suffering from some sort of complex that makes us extra touchy...?

Mike Bagwell · Post by **Mike Bagwell** » 20 Mar 2010 8:47 am

Bill,

I'm sorry, I'm not a very good writer. I all ready knew that you are real player, I just can't express myself well enough to make the discussion I hoped for work. If you took the "fan perspective on this particular subject" thing as a insult, I apologize.
If someone could that side for the sake of discussion, and know what they are talking about, we could learn a lot.

Mike

Bill McCloskey · Post by **Bill McCloskey** » 20 Mar 2010 9:10 am

"Speaking of that - does these kind of discussions occur in the trumpet (and jazz in general) community? Do they get as heated? "

HA!!

Trust me...it gets a lot more heated. Try bringing up Wynton Marsalis's name on a jazz or trumpet site if you want some fun. It gets much much more nasty than anything said here, believe me.

Mouthpieces, trumpets, embrasure discussions, vintage vs new, free jazz vs traditional jazz all generate heated discussions that almost come to blows. In the jazz world, free jazz vs traditional threads can go on for years. Even the definition of jazz can get everyone riled up. It is pretty intense.

Bill McCloskey · Post by **Bill McCloskey** » 20 Mar 2010 9:10 am

no worries Mike. The written word has its limitations. I obviously misunderstood what you were driving at.

Mark Eaton · Post by **Mark Eaton** » 20 Mar 2010 9:22 am

How about a respite from the turn the thread has taken and let's enjoy another example of some great contemporary lap steel playing?

The link below is to Allison Moorer singing her tune "Mockingbird" at the Transatlantic Sessions from last October. Jerry Douglas co-produces these sessions with the great Scottish (Shetland) fiddler, Sir Aly Bain.

I'm a little biased here, because Jerry is my favorite musician on this or any other planet, and I'm in love with Allison Moorer.

Jerry is obviously known more for his dobro playing, but in my opinion he brings a lot of tasty playing to the lap steel as well. He has been quoted as saying that the dobro is like using a hand saw, and the lap steel is more like a chainsaw.

It's a beautiful song sung by Allison, with an amazing band, and Jerry's solo on his Lap King Rodeo begins at 1:50.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=717nPdPz ... re=related

Steinar Gregertsen · Post by **Steinar Gregertsen** » 20 Mar 2010 9:25 am

Bill McCloskey wrote:
HA!!

Point taken

Mike Neer · Post by **Mike Neer** » 20 Mar 2010 9:42 am

Of all the players that I know of, I can really only think of a few who have created a completely new language on the steel--and they've probably faced much opposition to the direction they've taken from the more traditional players. I know this to be true in the case of Susan Alcorn, who I have deep respect and admiration for. The other player that comes to mind is Chas Smith. Yet these 2 players have the utmost respect and reverence for the traditions of the steel guitar, from the earliest Western swing to Ralph Mooney and Buddy Emmons, etc.

I just think this pretty much expresses my feeling on the whole matter. The music comes from within you. The instrument you use to express it is, of course, your choice. If someone can do it without the influence of the instrument's history, then that is terrific and could very well be interesting to witness. However, the more one plays this instrument, the more one falls in love with it and wants to know the whole story.

Steinar Gregertsen · Post by **Steinar Gregertsen** » 20 Mar 2010 9:43 am

Mark Eaton wrote:How about a respite from the turn the thread has taken and let's enjoy an example some great contemporary lap steel playing?

Don Rooke of The Henrys: "Goodbye Porkpie Hat" -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKcfW5MKVr8

Steve Cunningham w/Adam Nitti Trio: "Amazing Grace Intro/Yin & Yang" -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=242FCMS5exQ

And just to prove that Steve can swing with the best of them in a more traditional style, here's "Sweet Georgia Brown":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqHI46cuPfs

And if I may be so bold

here's one of mine, "Unfinished Business" from a lap steel seminar I held in Denmark in 2006:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGEo0TcEP5g

PS - I do NOT consider myself in the same class as Rooke and Cunningham.....

Steinar Gregertsen · Post by **Steinar Gregertsen** » 20 Mar 2010 9:47 am

Mike Neer wrote:However, the more one plays this instrument, the more one falls in love with it and wants to know the whole story.

Learning to know the whole story is great, I'm with you, but learning to play the whole story is another matter,- in my case that would take at least three more lifetimes.

Roman Sonnleitner · Post by **Roman Sonnleitner** » 20 Mar 2010 10:21 am

Mark Eaton wrote:How about a respite from the turn the thread has taken and let's enjoy an example some great contemporary lap steel playing?

Friends Of Dean Martinez (probably my all-time favorite lap steel-related band...)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXDXYlB-WbY (documentary, steel player Bill Elm talks about his music)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bXdL2Ih8Gk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sMjyTBk1zo

Nels Cline playing with Wilco
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAQ8DSsPJD0

Greg Leisz
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCfZpSEH77Y (with Harry Manx)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfWlnnyqoiM (with Bill Frisell)

David Lindley
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD6phdJxUFs

Bill McCloskey · Post by **Bill McCloskey** » 20 Mar 2010 10:24 am

Fantastic. Thanks for posting all these things.

Currently I'm in hog heaven: just got a Pod x3 live and am playing with all the shiny knobs. What fun.

Fred Kinbom · Post by **Fred Kinbom** » 20 Mar 2010 10:39 am

Here is another beautiful instrumental by Don Rooke - "Alexandria".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvfP1YBaOcY

Chris Drew · Post by **Chris Drew** » 20 Mar 2010 11:11 am

WOW, what a thread!

Such a good question and wonderfully heated debate!
Steel Guitar isn't limited, it's alive and well in a host of different genres!

It may be understandable that folks who could perhaps be termed "preservationists" (absolutely NO negative connotation implied!) could get defensive about such a question, as if it perhaps implies that the part they play in the world of Steel Guitar is somehow not contributing in a positive way.

This "focus on the past" is just a perception, and in no way limits the appeal of Steel Guitar as an instrument in general (or at least for me!), it's just that perhaps on this great forum we are more aware of this due to being (thank God) exposed to such a rich heritage and seemingly bottomless fount of knowledge, experience and opinion regarding our favourite and most expressive of musical instruments.

Musicians who's favoured genre is "outside" of those considered the "traditional home" of steel guitar are most unlikely to be "dissing" the instrument's history in any way.

It's all too easy for those who may take steel guitar into unfamiliar genres to be dismissed out of hand (It's just noise! etc..)
Steel guitar is, like ANY OTHER musical instrument, fundamentally a noise-making device, a tool for expression... whether we see that expression as valid is down to personal taste, irrespective of what instrument is used!

There are "contemporary" musicians who love steel guitar and these can be seen in both positive and negative ways...
Musicians who's style pays homage to or takes inspiration from the "styles-of-old" could be said to be "cliche-ridden" or could be "timeless" or "classic".
These "old" genres are still very much alive and still relevant to today.
Hell I saw a real "Mod" the other day, complete with parka, and he was all of 18 years old!!
All genres of music (irrespective of the reasons why people appreciate them) can enjoy a vibrant fan-base spanning generations.
You don't have to push any boundaries for something to appeal to a younger audience.

The fact that we appreciate the instrument's roots and value the "old masters" isn't necessarily going to influence the "percieved public popularity" of steel guitar.
If steel gets more airplay on "mainstream" radio it will happen for reasons other than that of the opinions of those who already love it.

The "average punter" - if such a thing exists, is a fickle beast who's just as likely to think "WOW, what a beautiful sound" as they are to dismiss without a second listen, regardless of how much technical prowess or musicianship is involved.

Interestingly, a couple of weeks back BBC Radio2's "record of the week" was Harper Simon's "Shooting Star", which not only contains steel guitar but also mentions steel guitar in the lyrics!
The track itself is pretty straightforward country-pop, no boundary-pushing here! Just a sign that "mainstream" can now include many genres, old and new.

Personally I didn't used to have much regard for "mainstream", but it's more varied now than it ever was... though some music will just never go there & now that the internet has revolutionised how music & knowledge spreads around it doesn't have to!

The fact that this thread has become quite "heated" is just testament to the passion we all have for our chosen instrument!

Bill Hatcher · Post by **Bill Hatcher** » 20 Mar 2010 12:29 pm

I love to try new and more involved things with the non pedal guitar.

I watched all the youtube stuff and listened to the examples posted here. I found none of it to be very "contemporary" or any cutting edge to it at all. Just playing the single melody line to a Beach Boy tune with a non pedal guitar in a band is nothing special. Been done by other instruments for years. Nice to listen to maybe, but nothing contemporary.

When you speak of contemporary music, that used to be the newest most innovative most unheard music you could find. Just hearing a non pedal guitar in a pop band does not fit that.

Don Kona Woods · Post by **Don Kona Woods** » 20 Mar 2010 12:34 pm

I found the commentary of steel player Bill Elm of Friends Of Dean Martinez intriquing and captivating.

I noticed that the Polish seem quite interested in the Friends of Dean Martinez music. So this music translates abroad.

Aloha,

Don

Steinar Gregertsen · Post by **Steinar Gregertsen** » 20 Mar 2010 12:53 pm

Bill Hatcher wrote:I found none of it to be very "contemporary" or any cutting edge to it at all. Just playing the single melody line to a Beach Boy tune with a non pedal guitar in a band is nothing special. Been done by other instruments for years.

I tend to agree with you, guess it depends on how we define "contemporary music". I believe what most people think of is the use of lap steel in a style of music where it hasn't been heard much before. Nothing revolutionary about the music itself, or the lap steel playing, but the combination may be relatively "new" and through that perhaps it is reaching some new listeners. The fact that it's been done on other instruments before doesn't take away from that, IMHO.

So perhaps there is a certain confusion about what we're actually discussing here....?

Personally I consider my own playing to be fairly simple melodic single note stuff (for the most part). Nothing new about that, isn't that how it all started some 100+ years ago?

But I've placed it in a musical landscape where I hope to create something personal, and I believe that's the best most of us can hope for..

Post by **Brad Bechtel** » 20 Mar 2010 3:00 pm

Bill Hatcher wrote:I watched all the youtube stuff and listened to the examples posted here. I found none of it to be very "contemporary" or any cutting edge to it at all.

Could you provide an example of what type of music you consider "contemporary" or "cutting edge"? Without knowing what you're referring to internally, it's hard for me to figure out what your point is, exactly.

Webster's defines "contemporary" as the following:
1 : happening, existing, living, or coming into being during the same period of time
2 a : simultaneous b : marked by characteristics of the present period : modern, current

So if none of the above fits that definition, what is "contemporary" to you?

Post by **Brad Bechtel** » 20 Mar 2010 3:13 pm

basilh wrote:I'm all for promoting the instrument, and do so extensively. Maybe the three and a half million or so people that have bought my SOLO steel Guitar albums should have bought the SOLO steel guitar albums of David Lindley or Ben Harper, or Robert Randolph, oh I nearly missed it, they haven't got any have they.

Just to make sure we're clear on this:
Basil Henriques recordings from his web site.
David Lindley recordings (and merchandise) from his web site.
Ben Harper's recordings from his web site.
Robert Randolph's recordings from his web site.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 20 Mar 2010 4:42 pm

Basil's website only lists the CDs he currently has available, and they're not all listed on that page that the link goes to. It doesn't list all the LPs he's sold over the years. It doesn't list all the LPs he's played on. Basil can back his sales figures up with royalty statements from major labels, which I've seen.

RD Bennett · Post by **RD Bennett** » 20 Mar 2010 5:15 pm

Alright, before this gets nasty again, I'll just put my two cents in. I've been pretty interested in steels of all kinds for the last year or so. I have a lifelong interest in cutting-edge rock and experimental music, and once I started considering tuning-related possibilities found in the steel that aren't quite practical on other stringed instruments, I became seriously intrigued.

This was sort of my way in, although at the current moment I'm a bit more interested in the paradoxically less flexible, more idiom-defined world of the pedal steel. But I'm still interested in finding the time to find stuff to do on this instrument that has rarely been done. In my mind, the lap / console steel has a lot more as-yet-unexplored territory in it than the pedal steel. The pedal steel has been entirely set up around a diatonic, tertian, quasi-tonal universe, and it is much more difficult to change its orientation in that regard than it is to tweak a couple strings' tunings on a lap steel and end up in much more unfamiliar harmonic turf.

At the TSGA jamboree last week, as an outsider to both the pedal and non-pedal cultures (and they *are* cultures, to be sure!), I was particularly stricken by the differences between the two separate crowds. During the sets I managed to attend, the non-pedal crowd was markedly younger, hipper, and-- much to my surprise-- seemingly even *more* musically conservative in some ways than the pedal-steel crowd.

Of course, this could have just been the sets I managed to catch upstairs, but it seemed like anything occurring after 1955-1960 was of little to no interest to the non-pedal room. I wasn't really sure what to make of this.

It should be noted that, in general, popular music is in a serious rut. Even in hip-hop / R&B, which is probably the most visibly experimental mass-market genre in the last 20 years, nothing really and truly new has happened for well over a decade (if you don't count the perennial abuse of Autotune, which is basically just the second coming of vocoding). Instead of leading the way as they historically have, the underground and independent avenues have been all too happy to ape their past achievements since the turn of the century, and I think it's safe to say that mainstream rock has been dead for at least as long as Kurt Cobain.

As a musical society, we've been going in retrospective circles since the mid-90s, that's my feeling. Something big and new is (hopefully!) coming, and it is way overdue. There's definitely an opening for truly forward-thinking steelers to help make whatever-it-is happen... who knows.