Tired of adding strings? Go backwards! Delete strings ...

[Andy Volk]

... with Mya-Moe's lap steel ukulele.

http://www.myamoeukuleles.com/model%20lap%20steel.php

[James Nottage]

I am fortunate to have one of their great ukeleles and have played one of the steels. While expensive, they are really wonderful instruments. The company is a treat to work with.

James

[Jim Williams]

Hmmm...a single string would eliminate having to learn harmony scales & chords...Wow...cool looking but $1600?

[Chris Rice]

It's got 4 strings...

[Paddy Burgin]

We make 'em at Burgin guitars, New Zealand, too.
Using a tenor uke plan as a guide. To used up some of our surplus weissenborn offcuts! Regards, Paddy Burgin www.burginguitars.co.nz

[Rick Aiello]

Sorry ... I need 5 strings ... ... 99.27% of what I play is on the top 5

0.73 % is on the low sixth string ... So it's a luxury I afford myself ...

I'll have to leave the 4 string stuff to Gerald R ...

[James Nottage]

Paddy, I have sent you a pm.

[Alan Brookes]

You think you've a found the basic minimum instrument with only one string, like Pythagoras's sonometer? John Lennon went one step further. In his teens he carried around a guitar with no strings on it at all.

[Bengt Erlandsen]

About "Hmmm...a single string would eliminate having to learn harmony scales & chords"

I would actually disagree. With just one string, one is forced to learn the scale and its intervals and harmony will soon become obvious once you understand the scale you are playing. Downside to playing on just one string is that it ruins all fun when playing an Equal temepered instrument like piano or regular 6string guitar as you will start hearing a lot more pure notes when sliding on that single string. I definitly had a couple waddafuc moments when I started hearing 2 different minor 3rds, 2different flat 7ths and a (flat)flat5th.
The first time I actually stumbled upon those intervals was on regular 6string guitar bending from the 5th to the 6th and realized there was 2 notes between the 5th and the 6th. So instead of playing in the key of A, E to F to F# (5th to 6th) I have kinda E to F- to F+ to F# and it does sound totally cool. Lately I been playing a lot in open D (6 string) Low D A D F#(just) A D high, playing melody on either the top A or D string and am starting to find a lot more intervals than one would normally think there would be.

Only 1 string isnt a limitation, it is actually a very creative and informative one and such be studied and played a lot more on.

It does help to have a reference Root note so maybe 2 strings would be best to start with.

I thought lapsteel and pedalsteel would drive me crazy but now it is my regular 6string that drives me crazy because it sounds so out of tune compared to what it did earlier, lol.
Frets is just a guideline, the real notes are nearby tho


B.Erlandsen

[Alan Brookes]

When I was at school we had a sonometer in the Physics Laboratory. For those of you who have not come across one, it's a long box with one string, kept in tension by being anchored to the box at a one end, the other end passing over a pulley onto a weight scale. The top had a long ruler in millimetres, and there was a moveable bridge. The purpose of the instrument was to demonstrate the mathematical relationship of string tension, vibrating length, and musical pitch, which you did by changing the weights on the scale and moving the bridge.


I used to drive our elderly Physics teacher crazy by sliding a tone bar up and down the strings and picking out all the latest hits, such as Sleep Walk, Apache, Walk Don't Run, etc.
"That's a scientific instrument, Brookes," he would say, "It's not for playing your rock and roll on..."