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Topic: Hawaiian Pedal Steel |
John Castelletti
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Posted 17 Mar 2011 5:55 am |
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I have been playing for about 3 months now and have been on the E9th neck of my Pro III exclusively. I want to get into playing traditional Hawaiian music. I spent a lot of time in the islands as a younger man and really came to love the people of Hawaii as well as their music. I can play some slack key on a normal guitar and want to start playing as a duo with another guitarist.
So my question is where do I begin? Does the C6 lend itself well to this style of music or would I be better off with a different tuning on a lap steel? Thanks in advance. |
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Brad Bechtel
From:
San Francisco, CA
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Posted 17 Mar 2011 6:42 am
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Although it's relatively uncommon, Jules Ah See was a renowned pedal steeler playing Hawaiian music. If you are going to be playing Hawaiian on a lap steel, the most common tuning used will be C6th. Go to the Steel Without Pedals section and read this recent post by Basil Henriques (another pedal steeler who plays Hawaiian in the UK).
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Brad’s Page of Steel
A web site devoted to acoustic & electric lap steel guitars |
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Jim Hollingsworth
From:
Way out West
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Posted 17 Mar 2011 9:46 am C6
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Hi Brad,
I have undertaken learning Hawaiian tunes on my pedal guitar and find that the pedal changes really add to the mix. Lap steel requires you use bar slants & thereby miss some chord notes or that you bend some strings with you finders (behind the bar). I do most of Hawaiian on the standard C6 tuning and find it is the easiest - tho' I sometimes do things on E9.
Good luck,
Jim |
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Andy Sandoval
From:
Bakersfield, California, USA
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Posted 17 Mar 2011 10:04 am
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| I like to use C6 for most of my Hawaiian stuff but there's no reason you can't play the same song on E9. Here's a link to some E9 Hawaiian tabs. Click Here |
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Larry Allen
From:
Kapaa, Kauai,Hawaii
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Posted 17 Mar 2011 10:10 am Hawaiian E9
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| I use the A & B pedals down on my E9 to get that 6th Hawaiian sound. ADD your E lower KL and you have Jerry Byrd's B11 sound.......Larry |
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Erv Niehaus
From:
Litchfield, MN, USA
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Posted 17 Mar 2011 10:18 am
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Andy,
Thanks for the plug!  |
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Edward Meisse
From:
Santa Rosa, California, USA
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Posted 18 Mar 2011 12:03 pm
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| Brad Bechtel wrote: |
| Although it's relatively uncommon, Jules Ah See was a renowned pedal steeler playing Hawaiian music. If you are going to be playing Hawaiian on a lap steel, the most common tuning used will be C6th. Go to the Steel Without Pedals section and read this recent post by Basil Henriques (another pedal steeler who plays Hawaiian in the UK). |
I bought my C6 pedal guitar after hearing Basil's work. If I understand correctly though, and I'm 99.99% correct that I do, he plays his Hawaiian music almost exclusively in E9.
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Amor vincit omnia |
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