Why isn't PSG catching on with the youth?

[Bob Carlucci]

Been thinking about this topic this AM... here is what I am thinking...

1) We need more men and women to come down off the professional high horse and be willing to sit on the pony to encourage kids, youth, etc.

2) I believe we need to teach the basics first. Pedal steel is intimidating. Start them with non pedal, standard tunings, and teach some good basic music, such as the Nashville Number System.

3) We need to refurbishers that will take some of these older cheaper steels and put a little time in them to make them a little more playable and be willing to take a little less for them. I applaud people like Doug Earnest and GFI who are producing good "starter" guitars that are of near pro quality for a cheaper price.

4) We need to invite younger folks to steel jams and shows (and make sure they are "clean" shows) and some of the participants / exhibitors take a little time with them.

We've went through / are going through the same thing in ham radio. Sending a text on an cell phone is heard to compete with. But doing a demo with a top dollar rig isn't going to bring them in, because they know right off the bat they can't afford it. But bring in some older, cheaper, but proper working equipment, teach a little theory, show them how to solder, make antennas, etc. and it becomes a little more interesting.

All this comes from a newbie approaching a one year anniversary of playing steel, and loving the heck out of it! And, I had to save and scrimp to get into steel. I sold 3 other 6 string and bass guitars and amps to even get started. I built my own steel seat, music / tab rack, and guitar neck pad, and everything I have is used! I am still playing a GFI Student and a Rogue C6 lap steel. Sure, I'd like to trade up, but hard to do on SS fixed income. But until them, I am going to use and enjoy what I have, and every time I can get someone here at the house, or somewhere else that will listen to me, I am going to play a little for them and tell them my story about steel guitar.

There you go, my thoughts...

Disagree...with all due respect Scott..
If a young person wants to learn steel, HERE'S what they need to do..
Go buy a steel, best one they have the money for.. .. See how its tuned, learn how to tune the stops, and start playing along to CD'S.. In our day it was records.. I was a crappy guitar player, and learned steel in just a few months by practicing 6- 8 hours a day every day,, No one needs a "mentor" to learn pedal steel.. they need a pedal steel, some AMBITION, and time..
Thats it.. most of us are self taught, and proud of it.. Todays kids can do it IF they want to.. If they need mentors, and "old guys" to show them the ropes, they simply don't want it bad enough... bob

[Jim Williams]

When we reach the stage where the steel guitar can be swung from the hips while the singer is making lewd girations it might appeal to the fickle public.

The public doesn't want good music. I remember what Earl Scruggs said in the 60s about the changing trends in public awareness; "The popularity of folk music will certainly separate the wheat from the chaff. The chaff will get into the hit parade..."

Actually I think Peavey took a shot at that one with the PowerSlide.

[William W Western]

There is a lot of interest in PSG in Winnipeg, but it is mostly in the young 30'somethings with R&R and folk backgrounds. Here's a video with an example cut off a soon to be released Del Barber album.

http://youtu.be/v31yqISexjI

[Alan Brookes]

... Here's a video with an example cut off a soon to be released Del Barber album.
http://youtu.be/v31yqISexjI

They remind me of the Eagles.

[Atom Schmitt]

I think exposure is the toughest obstacle. I'm young, and I've only been playing a couple years, but I think a lot of you guys are missing the mark. Some by a pretty wide margin. Plenty of younger folks like country, and especially respond to the more traditional stuff with fiddles, banjos, steel, etc.

Here's what you have to remember: for most younger folks, the questions they ask and can't necessarily answer are not limited to:
- can I even afford one?
- where do I buy one?
- what amp should I play this through? what volume pedal is good? I need a seat? What about bars, picks, etc.
- crap, this one doesn't work properly, how do I tune it/set it up/re-string it/get it repaired?

And then of course finally:
- how does this confounded contraption even work?
- why do people keep talking about blocking?
- am I doing this right? It sounds nothing like [some guy in some recording]

Add to that the fact that you don't hear them live very often, it's easy to ignore the feeling a good steel guitar player can inject into a song. I always loved PSG, but it wasn't till I heard Ken Wilson playing with some buddies of mine from 20 feet away that I realized how much I wanted to play the instrument.

Spending the money up front was a gamble too. I am fortunate to have a pretty good day job so I was willing to drop a few thousand dollars I might not get much out of, on the off chance that maybe it'd stick. Luckily it did.

For me, it was also timing... for the last 9 months or so I had been playing with this big blues-rock guitar hero, and everyone knew he toured all over the world, so they just kind of assumed I'd be along for the ride. Since I wasn't going to quit my day job I got stuck in a tough spot - no international gigs to play, but everyone in town under the impression I was gone. And that was the biggest, scariest lull I've ever had in my gigging calendar as a professional musician. So I set out to learn steel in hopes of getting back to work more regularly. Long story short, it worked like a charm and now I'm playing more than I ever used to play, and making more money for all that work as well.

For what it's worth, I've been playing a little over 2 years, and I'm 30 now. I was fortunate to learn on stage though...I've already probably logged close to 250 gigs on the instrument. I'm not sure I would have stuck with it if I was just wailing away in my living room that whole time, not to mention, skill-wise I'd probably be about where I was 2 months in. Anyway, I have a lot of friends asking me questions indicating their own interest in getting into playing the instrument is growing. It's still being used in plenty of current music, and not just country. I think the pedal steel guitar is going to be just fine.

[chris ivey]

i don't think anyone 'needs' to do anything.
some people like steel, some don't know it exists. those who want to learn will.
lots of younger people like it. more and more lately, it seems. why is it anyones duty to do anything about it?
just like i wouldn't talk anyone into riding motorcycles, i wouldn't recommend steel either. if your going to do it anyway then do it.
everyone should worry more about their own self!

[Chris Walke]

i don't think anyone 'needs' to do anything.
some people like steel, some don't know it exists. those who want to learn will.
lots of younger people like it. more and more lately, it seems. why is it anyones duty to do anything about it?

I agree. I found PSG without someone going out of their way to tell me about it. I think a musician either gravitates to it or doesn't. We don't need outreach. When someone approaches me about it at a gig, I show them because it's just such an interesting instrument. I'll answer any questions they have. Other than that, there's not much we need to do, I don't think.

[Storm Rosson]

I think worldwide, that psg has a much larger and diverse community than it was ,say 40 years ago.

[Sean Borton]

There is a lot of interest in PSG in Winnipeg, but it is mostly in the young 30'somethings with R&R and folk backgrounds. Here's a video with an example cut off a soon to be released Del Barber album.

http://youtu.be/v31yqISexjI

I was going to say - the youth is alive and well here in Winnipeg. Lots in there 30's (youth to me - LOL) and I've met a few in their 20's as well.

Is that you in the video?

[Alan Brookes]

No musical instrument ever disappears, they just go in and out of favor according to the fashions of the time. Take the lute, for instance. It was all the rage until the 1700s, but by the 1800s it had all but disappeared. Now there are more lute players than ever before in the history of the instrument.

Don't forget that there are three times as many people around as there were forty years ago, which means an instrument only needs to be a third as popular with the public for it to still have the same number of adherents. There will always be steel players and there will always be people wanting to listen to them.

[Dan Beller-McKenna]

I have two words for everyone thinking an instrument can't make a comeback:

1) Accordion

2) Ukulele

Okay, now everyone can go relax and play their steels.

[William W Western]

Is that you in the video?

Sean...no, that is William J Western. He does a fair amount of session work in Winnipeg the bulk of which is R&R, country rock, folk, folk/rock, etc. Very little straight ahead country, though he finds C&W very enjoyable when it comes around.
BTW, he is another example of a teenager who attended Wayne Link's Steel Parties in the 90s and purchased his first PSG as an 18 year old through Al Brisco.

[Godfrey Arthur]

I'm pretty certain my mother would have come home with the Stella , regardless of what I wanted.

haha. i got the "stella" treatment from my folks. to be fair to them they did start me out on an accordion so i could play o' sole mio and because of that i now have two hammond B3's. but when it came to guitar i wanted a fender jazzmaster and then "stella" comes into my life. "i coulda been a contender...hey sstehhhlllllaaaaaaaaahhhh!"

i'm just starting on steel after admiring it and those that can play them, for too long a time.

godfrey

[Godfrey Arthur]

you can't run around the stage and shake your butt while you're playing a PSG. Most steelers stare down at the instrument and don't relate to the audience at all.

rock bands where the guitarists look down and stand still are called "shoegaze" an alternative rock genre, because it looks like they're staring at their shoes.

so is this "steelgaze?"

too much going on with steel to worry about pickin and grinnin..

godfrey

[Alan Brookes]

I think steel guitarists are more interested in the music than in performing for the public. They're more content to be sitting in the background. After all, the easiest job in a group is being the vocalist. The singer gets all the attention, but, in reality, anyone can sing, with no musical abilities at all. The music is coming from the band, but the audience pays attention to the singer.

It hasn't always been that way. Nowadays it's "Whatsisname and his Band"; until the 50s it was "Whatsisband, vocals by so-and-so."

[Ray Montee]

I tend to agree with you Alan. I've had to play behind some real gaggers and DRUNKEN Dopey Big name artists. Anyone can do that~

As you say, playing wholesome music is not as easy as some tend to think.

[Herb Steiner]

I... After all, the easiest job in a group is being the vocalist. The singer gets all the attention, but, in reality, anyone can sing, with no musical abilities at all. The music is coming from the band, but the audience pays attention to the singer.

It hasn't always been that way. Nowadays it's "Whatsisname and his Band"; until the 50s it was "Whatsisband, vocals by so-and-so."

What?!? I beg to disagree, sir.

Anyone can sing, just like anyone can play steel guitar if they have one, even if they've owned it for one day. But the Buddy Emmons of singers is Frank Sinatra, and you don't get to sing like that by farting around with a bar band.

So why do singers get all the attention?

Songs have stories to tell and messages to deliver. The reason people relate to the singers in the band is that these singers are communicating that story to them through lyrics in English, tone of voice, eye contact, and body language.

The steel guitarist does NONE of those things, so only a small group of devotees are interested in what we have "to say." It's the rare instrumentalist that rises to the attention level of a vocalist. So this is something we must accept... like, get over it?.

I think we all realize this is the case, but it's fun to gripe once and awhile. But always remember what Hyman Roth (played by Lee Strasburg) told Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) in Godfather II, "this is the business we have chosen."

[Tom Gorr]

There is wisdom lurking above this post...

There is real value and perceived value, and the rewards of talent are thus not often fairly divided.

Those with power who also be gentlemen, will endeavor to not treat others as if they are commodities. Discover the true heart of the people you engage with.

[Roger Rettig]

No-one had to persuade or cajole me into getting a guitar in 1957 - the amazing solos and obligato playing on the records of the day was enough to set me on fire.

I just HAD to try it for myself and from then on had a guitar in my hands for most of my waking day. If anything, my schoolwork suffered horribly as a result despite my parents imploring me to 'wake my ideas up' and study for my exams.

The same was true when I discovered the steel guitar in the early '70s. I awoke one day with the resolve to somehow find one and buy it (not easy in Britain) and, once again, I didn't need talking into it.

The vital ingredient is passion - it has a way of overcoming any and all obstacles.

[Donny Hinson]

Pedal steel guitar isn't like straight guitar, nor is it what it was like in the '60s. Aside from being hard to play, it's a complex beast, and (I think) a plethora of players out there do nothing but discourage beginners with comments like...

"You need at least 5 knee levers"
"You need a fancy tuner"
"You need a tube amp"
"You need an expensive bar"
"You need a keyless steel"
"You need a 12-string guitar"
"You need them expensive cables"
"You need another pickup"
"You need to lower the 6th"
"You need the Franklin Pedal"
"You need to raise 1&2"
"You need these special picks"
"You need these expensive strings"
"You need this multi-hundred $ volume pedal"
"You need this old book"
"You need this new course"
"You need a JBL speaker"
"You need to use special lube"

Etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum.

And then...you want to know why they'd rather just buy this for $199 and start playing???




Geeze guys, if I'd have had 100 old men telling me a Fender 1000 wasn't good enough to learn on, I'd have probably never bothered to learn, either!!!

[Tom Gorr]

HAHA....you nailed the wishlist, Sir. The $10,000 wishlist....(or $15,000 if the only thing left to buy is a 1964 Emmons)

[Alan Brookes]

...But the Buddy Emmons of singers is Frank Sinatra, and you don't get to sing like that by farting around with a bar band....

Nope, and not everyone has Frank Sinatra's talent. But on his early records it was "The Tommy Dorsey Band (vocal by Frank Sinatra)" that appeared on the label. I'll bet Frank couldn't have gotten a job in the band as an instrumentalist. It's a lot harder than singing. He was just blessed with a good voice.
(No disrespect intended for Frank. I'm one of the very few people who has almost all his records, and there are a lot of them.)

[Herb Steiner]

Alan
My point isn't that Frank could or couldn't lead Tommy Dorsey's band, or whose name is on the marquee.

My point is, and I'll give you the last word, is that I don't think that being a good singer is easy at all, and requires voice training or at least concentration and dedication to achieve excellence, not only in singing on pitch, but moving from note to note correctly, appropriate vibrato, word pronunciation, and general stagecraft needed to communicate effectively.

I've known and performed with too many good and great singers over the last 45 years that worked very hard at their craft, and their dedication is not to be discounted because that skill simply isn't recognized by some.

Yes, there are singers that don't work at their craft, just like there are steel players who don't as well... and I don't particularly care to listen to either of them.

Just MHO from my experience. Your mileage may vary, and as I said, I'll leave you with the last word.

Herb out.

[Dave Mudgett]

I disagree with the implicit premise of the original post, that pedal steel "isn't catching on with the youth" at least to the extent to say that it is catching on as much as - or I'd argue even significantly more than - it ever did. But I think it is, and probably always will be, a specialty instrument. Relative to most instruments except keyboards, it's complex, heavy, a bit unwieldy in its playing position, and requires the ability to precisely control about 6 degrees of freedom (2 feet, 2 knees, and 2 hands, one of which requires control of 3-5 fingers), and thus requires a very high degree of coordination. It is also a non-fixed-pitch instrument that requires good hand-ear coordination to even think about playing in tune.

The first time you sit down at a piano lesson, for which you can look up a pile of teachers in most any town, you strike middle-C and some adjacent notes,and quickly are on your way to playing a simple melody that sounds reasonably good, and then basic chords, and within a fairly short time, coordinated left-hand accompaniments to right-hand melodies, and then onward and upward. For wind and brass instruments, there is most often a well-orchestrated administrative structure to get recruits for marching bands so school football teams have a rah-rah parade section. At least in my part of the world, there is a well-organized system of teachers and lessons for violin and other orchestral instruments, and generally a local school or other orchestra to play in if you want to. Or if you want to play guitar, walk into any music store and find a pile of guitar teachers ready and willing to take on any player at most any level and sell them a perfectly workable guitar (and amp if desired) for between a hundred and a few hundred dollars. Learn your G, C, D, E, A, Em, Am, and Dm chords, some basic barre chords, and power chords, and you're ready to go start a rock or country band or be a folkie or singer/songwriter. And most all of this wants percussion of some sort, instruments and lessons for which are generally readily and cheaply available.

Notwithstanding any of this, anybody who finds themselves fatally attracted to steel guitar can go find a lap steel for anywhere from a hundred for a cheap new one to a few hundred for a nice vintage one, or a perfectly workable pedal steel and small amp for less than a grand, and find plenty of online resources to learn the basics. Once started down the road and into an online community like this forum, it isn't that hard to find a teacher and support network if you're motivated. The barriers to entry are, IMO, far less than 40-50 years ago. But it's still a specialty instrument, and that's fine with me.

On the singer vs. instrumentalist thing - I agree with Herb. It obviously takes some level of talent and hard work to do either well. Singing isn't a matter of simply 'having a great voice' or not, and neither is playing an instrument a matter of simply 'having talent' or not. If you don't think singing at a serious professional level requires hard work, I suggest you hang around some serious singers to divorce yourself from that myth. I think most people can train themselves to sing reasonably well, and the inverse of that statement is true - I think to sing reasonably well, most people need to train themselves. It's not a completely 'natural' act, in the sense of just waking up one day and being a good singer, for most of us. Maybe 'formal' training isn't always necessary, but I think that's true for most instruments also.

[Alan Brookes]

...Relative to most instruments except keyboards, it's complex, heavy, a bit unwieldy in its playing position, and requires the ability to precisely control about 6 degrees of freedom (2 feet, 2 knees, and 2 hands, one of which requires control of 3-5 fingers), and thus requires a very high degree of coordination...

Exactly. Add to that, it's an uncomfortable instrument to play, requiring you to sit upright in the one position where you can work the knee levers.
The acoustic guitar, on the other hand, is light and portable. You can take it anywhere with you. You don't need an amplifier, and you can sing to it around a campfire or at a party. Try backpacking with a pedal steel, amplifier and portable generator.
I've had an idea in my mind for some time for a lightweight pedal steel without a frame, with the mechanism worked by palm levers. Palm levers on lap steels up to now have only worked one string per lever. Imagine the flexibility if you could work an entire mechanism from palm levers. There would be very little set-up time. If you wanted one you could carry around and play anywhere you could install a small amplifier and speaker in the cabinet.
Someday soon I hope to build one.