The Steel evolved. Why can't we?

Kenny Martin · Post by **Kenny Martin** » 14 Apr 2010 5:33 pm

Its like this.............nah.......never mind!

P.S. Taylor Swift ain't country!

Calvin Walley · Post by **Calvin Walley** » 14 Apr 2010 6:12 pm

just because a couple of stuffed shirts think something is great ...doesn't make it so !!!
if they want something more " evolved" or they want to play something classier
then hell let them join an orchestra and learn to play a flute or a french horn then they can wear a Tux to work
otherwise ...get over it.... it's a steel guitar and thats makes it country

Dennis Graves · Post by **Dennis Graves** » 14 Apr 2010 6:22 pm

I'm with you Calvin...

Ward Skinner · Post by **Ward Skinner** » 14 Apr 2010 6:49 pm

Calvin Walley wrote:just because a couple of stuffed shirts think something is great ...doesn't make it so !!![/size]

Calvin, no need to bring our bad dietary habits into this.

Now, where's the Beaver?

Joe Drivdahl · Post by **Joe Drivdahl** » 14 Apr 2010 6:50 pm

just because a couple of stuffed shirts think something is great ...doesn't make it so !!!

I'm with you too, Calvin. Just because people are educated doesn't mean they know anything about music. Have they spent 30 or 40 years studying music? No. Most of them probably have a tin ear and wouldn't know music from a jackhammer. Does your average Joe Schmo know anything about music? No. So he listens to crappy music (noise basically), because thats what everyone else is doing. He's one of these dips that sings along, and then starts up a conversation when the lead parts begins.

You guys have it backwards. Its not a matter of like/dislike because most people don't know what they are listening to anyway. They aren't musically educated enough to have an opinion. Its like asking an illiterate person to critique Hemingway. Does it really matter what he thinks? He can't read.

I don't like crappy music, not because I don't understand it, but because musically, its crap not worth spending time listening to. If a song is good, its good, if it ain't it ain't regardless of the genre its been assigned to.

At least thats how I see it (not that anybody cares what I think anyway).

Joe

PS: Bo, this is the best thread we've had in a long time. Thanks!

Scott Henderson · Post by **Scott Henderson** » 14 Apr 2010 6:57 pm

Ain't this funner than sittin in a starbucks in washington dc???? IS THIS GETTING OLD YET BECAUSE THIS THREAD IS. BUNCH OF GROWN MEN ACTING LIKE KIDS HEHEHEHE ( for those of you who still don't get it...we sound like a bunch of poloticians trying to come to terms on something like money or healthcare.)

One of my all time biggest steel guitar heros has bneen posting on here ( Thanks Mr Franklin!) and it got me to thinking. The reason he is one of my all time biggest heros, teachers, and inspirations is because of his never ending expansion of NOT STTEL GUITAR but his mind and creativity. The biggest thing paul taught me when I was a long haired out of the box thinking steel player was to never limit myself or my playing. The steel guitar has not evolved near as much as the steel guitarist and nobody has any right to criticize anyone else's ...sigh.. evolvment. ( for lack of a better term) So geez let's talk about something that would be constructive to the progress of one steel player who might benefit from this great tool.

Scott Henderson · Post by **Scott Henderson** » 14 Apr 2010 7:06 pm

Memo: This Thread
To: Jim Cohen
From: Scotty Henderson

I'm with you Walley.
Finally somebody gets me!

Sincerely
You're a hoot and Thanks for the Post

Brett Lanier · Post by **Brett Lanier** » 14 Apr 2010 7:45 pm

I agree with most of what you guys are saying, but some of it makes me think some people here have given up on getting into new music.

What do you think would of happened if the same guys who made all that great country music in the fifties and sixties never got old and made music forever in the prime of their songwriting career? I think it would change a lot, and if we heard what Merle Haggard was recording in 3010, maybe some of you guys would call it crap. If you knew it was Haggard though, and you didn't like it, you would hold your breathe. I think that's what M. Perlowin was saying with "educated". He's smart enough to know something is out of his reach for now, but I bet every time he hears a 12 tone atonal piece, he tries to like it.

Calvin Walley · Post by **Calvin Walley** » 14 Apr 2010 8:15 pm

Brett said :

What do you think would of happened if the same guys who made all that great country music in the fifties and sixties never got old and made music forever

uh.... we would still have great music today instead of this god awful noise

Joe Drivdahl · Post by **Joe Drivdahl** » 14 Apr 2010 8:18 pm

if we heard what Merle Haggard was recording in 3010, maybe some of you guys would call it crap.

Brett,
No. Your are operating from a false premise. Merle is a quality musician and song writer. He's not going to do crap. True, he's had some songs that weren't that great but even at his absolute worst he has always been better than a lot of stuff out there today, and that's not my opinion; its a musical fact.

Here is an analogy: Lets say that I am convinced that the square root of 453 = 9. Am I right? Is it a matter of opinion? Well maybe if math isn't your top subject, I could sell you on it, but that doesn't make it right. If you were to educate yourself, you'd find that I was way off, but if you don't and you don't care to discover the answer, you might be satisfied with my answer forever. Thats how I see music. Its not an opinion, it is what it is. Its mathematical, its a science, and its an art.

Are we going to continue to lower the bar until we get to the point where we consider a 3 year old banging on two pots and a pan as our equivalent of a Mozart Concerto?

Is that what music is destined to become? (there's that hyperbole again).

Joe

Brint Hannay · Post by **Brint Hannay** » 14 Apr 2010 8:23 pm

Scott H., I know you were just kidding and this response is to be taken lightly, but I didn't get what you meant for the simple reason that I live in the Washington, D.C. area, and for most of us it's just the place we live, like any other place. Not the >WASHINGTON< of popular imagination. And I don't associate Starbucks with politics. People in a Washington Starbucks are pretty much like people anywhere else. The presence of a few politicians (in the halls of privilege) doesn't pollute the whole town!

Calvin Walley · Post by **Calvin Walley** » 14 Apr 2010 8:28 pm

Joe said :

Are we going to continue to lower the bar until we get to the point where we consider a 3 year old banging on two pots and a pan as our equivalent of a Mozart Concerto?

hold on Joe , don't you know that's called "evolution
hell thats gonna be thought of as fine art one day
i'll bet folks will be trying to get the same kinda spoons and the right gage pot's and asking a bunch of questions and working hard to get that "evolved" sound

Wally Taylor · Post by **Wally Taylor** » 14 Apr 2010 8:35 pm

The black spoons sound better and the tone is in the hands....

Brett Lanier · Post by **Brett Lanier** » 14 Apr 2010 8:45 pm

Joe, I wasn't putting down anything Merle has done. It's a question. Do you think the music would change to the point that it doesn't resemble classic country? And would you like it if it didn't?

Calvin Walley · Post by **Calvin Walley** » 14 Apr 2010 8:56 pm

wouldn't you love to see some of these stuffed shirts trying to figure out 14 ways to tune a pot ?
hell i'll bet money they can come up with at least 5 ways ...now that would be evolution

Joe Drivdahl · Post by **Joe Drivdahl** » 14 Apr 2010 9:01 pm

Brett,

See thats that part you guys aren't getting. Its not about the genre of traditional country, its about quality.

Yes, I probably would buy anything Merle ever comes out with because I know it will be quality, not commercial BS.

You guys are missing the point, at least for me you are. I am not locked into any one genre, country or otherwise. I like some jazz, I like some blues, I like some rock and I like some country. Its not the genre, its the song itself. If it is musically sound I will probably like it, but if its some cheap, commercial junk being sold to the musically illiterate masses (which almost everything is today) I probably won't like it.

Merle has done some songs that at the time were on the fringe of mainstream country. Some sold, some didn't, but they were good, quality, musically sound songs, like Heaven was a Drink of Wine, and Footlights.

So yeah. Merle pays attention to the "rules" of music so regardless which direction he goes, I will probably like it.

Joe

Jim Robbins · Post by **Jim Robbins** » 14 Apr 2010 9:02 pm

This is a pretty interesting thread. It raises a lot of questions about what is musical complexity. I think Calvin made a good point early on -- if country music is so crude why is it so hard to play well. Measures of sophistication like harmonic complexity are by no means the only measures of degrees of musical 'evolution'. Mike Perlowin mentioned Wagner, & while Wagner is sometime considered a master of harmonic complexity, one of his most famous passages is the prelude to Das Rheingold - which is a a single chord held for longer than the average country single (Eb major, which works well on the C6 neck if anyone wants to try it out).

There is crude and bad country music played with 3 chords. Sorry, Calvin, but that's factually correct. I know because, unfortunately, I'm responsible for some of it. There's also great country music played with 3 chords. I'd say a lot of the difference has to do with the sensitivity of the musicians to phrasing, timing, intonation, dynamics, 'feel'. The number of chords, in my view, has nothing to do with the sophistication of the music.

Ditto with jazz or anything else, although the number of chords may vary. Harmonic sophistication doesn't mean better music, nor does the number of notes per measure. Someone in this thread mention Kenny G -- compare him to, say, Miles Davis on Kind of Blue.

As for good players playing 'down' on recordings -- it's hardly confined to steel or country music. I would expect that your average violist chunking away on a barely-moving inner part in a professional orchestra can rip through all kinds of stuff if they want to. But as pros, they play the gig. Same with funk guitarists, same, for that matter, with lots of rhythm guitarists that you hear on Nashville recordings.

On the other hand, there's no law that says pedal steel must be confined to country music, and there's plenty of good examples to the contrary. Similarly, the inability of a particular listener to hear distinctions in an unfamiliar musical style is common, but doesn't mean the differences aren't there. Finally, with respect to heads in toilets and perfume, it is probably worth observing that some of the finest perfume is made from cat excrement (aka civet oil).

Mike Schwartzman · Post by **Mike Schwartzman** » 14 Apr 2010 9:05 pm

People in a Washington Starbucks are pretty much like people anywhere else.

It looked that way to me. I stopped at one in Silver Spring earlier this evening. I ordered a coffee to go. The coffee was pretty good. No politicians in sight...just one fella in hospital scrubs, one nice lady who always seems to be there, and one fella reading a newspaper.

Joe Drivdahl · Post by **Joe Drivdahl** » 14 Apr 2010 9:06 pm

Jim,
Finally... A voice of reason. Well said.

Joe

Charles Davidson · Post by **Charles Davidson** » 14 Apr 2010 9:06 pm

Calvin PLEASE don't mention tuning

this thread is silly

enough already grown men sniping at each other over WHAT music IS or IS not.Even if you perfer Tiny TIM or Sinatra.Knock yourself out and listen to WHAT YOU LIKE.

YOU BETCHA,DYK?BC.

Calvin Walley · Post by **Calvin Walley** » 14 Apr 2010 9:33 pm

Jim

these stuffed shirts think if they put 1000 weird notes in a song that makes it more sopicated or "evolved " ..... NOTHING could be farther from the truth

Charles

aw come on, you know they are itching to tell us how smart they are and why the kid is using the wrong tuning on the pots

Charles Davidson · Post by **Charles Davidson** » 14 Apr 2010 10:23 pm

Calvin, The point I'm trying to make,there is about 200 posts and almost forty three hundred views about what is the best music.Snipes and insults flying about something this juvenile. If a trained jazz player looks down on a three chord country picker he's a JERK,If that country picker makes fun of a jazz player he to is a JERK. It works both ways.Play the music you LOVE,and LOVE the music you play.

The tuning thing is the same way,a newbi can ask a question about tuning.

He will get a couple of dozen replies,[ALL DIFFERENT] Then the guano hits the fan. Each one will swear on their Emmons PP that their way is the ONLY way to tune a steel.Remember once on a tuning thread two FAMOUS players would have had a fist fight if they had been in the same room over the right way to tune. I know I'm just a dumb-assed redneck

But I can't see the point of all this bickering back and forth about what's BEST about this or that.

YOU BETCHA,DYK?BC.

Olli Haavisto · Post by **Olli Haavisto** » 14 Apr 2010 11:11 pm

I think calling people with musical knowledge stuffed shirts or being narrow minded to the point of musical bigotry won`t help the state of classic country.
As far as insults go, you`re doing just fine, Calvin...

As Roger said, this is probably waste of good bandwidth.....
I`m outta here.... good riddance,eh

Calvin Walley · Post by **Calvin Walley** » 15 Apr 2010 6:46 am

well Ollie

its been said that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing , and these stuffed shirts just proved it .

as far as the term i used "stuffed shirts" ..i was just being polite ...i could have used a much worse term for them
and say what you want about me, but you leave country music alone, !!!...... or deal with me

Roger Rettig · Post by **Roger Rettig** » 15 Apr 2010 7:06 am

I think Olli and I have dealt with you already; you just haven't figured it out yet.