Will more pedals an knee leavers make you a pro faster?

[Stuart Legg]

Fred I wouldn't worry about it. Your statement was very similar to what Einstein once said regarding new theories.

[Fred Treece]

Thanks, Stuart. Mad Magazine comes to mind...

[Chris Bauer]

More than once I've had someone comment that with an 8x8 guitar, I must be a deep player and I have to tell them that I only have extra knees because I don't know the fretboard nearly as well as I should.

[Tony Smart]

Will more pedals and knee levers make me a pro faster?

Absolutely YES....

I can assure you that with 99 pedals and knee levers you will become a Top Pro Player at least a week sooner.........

[John Goux]

Fred I was not commenting on your always well written posts.
I was just thinking,
Django only used 2 fingers. Good enough for Django, good enough for me.
J

[Fred Treece]

Okay John, we be cool

Django made the most of his limited resources, but I imagine he wouldn’t have minded a full compliment of them. Interesting to think what kind of steel player he might have been. Badass for sure...

[Donny Hinson]

...I'm not gonna be embarrassed by someone who plays rings around me, or I find has superior ability at some particular thing.

Sounds reasonable. But then what would you say to people who remark "He has less pedals than you do, but he plays a lot more and a lot better". Well, I guess at that point you'd have to cave in and say...

"What makes you a good player or a great player is not how many pedals and levers you have."

Geeze, I've been saying that here for almost two decades.

I don't care how many pedals and levers you have, or what kind or brand of guitar or amp you have. You can have two pedals or eleven, no levers or ten. You can have a twenty-five dollar amp, or a three thousand dollar amp. Playing in tune, in time, and playing with imagination and feeling is far more important. The only reason I even get into these "How many/What Brand" arguments is that I think that players who tell a prospective beginner that they need at least four or five levers and they really ought to try a ______ guitar are forgetting what playing is all about.

Playing is not about what you have, it's about what you can do.

[Barry Blackwood]

"What makes you a good player or a great player is not how many pedals and levers you have."

True. Then again....

[Charlie McDonald]

Since you're a pro, Johnie, and were just baiting us, perhaps you were asking "Will more pedals and knee leavers make me, a pro, faster?"
Or did we understand you right?

[Barry Blackwood]

Rhetorical question..

[George Kimery]

Off subject, but sort of related: Will another amp make me sound more professional faster? I have always had a burning desire to try different amps. It has nothing to do with dissatisfaction with what I am playing. I just enjoy twisting knobs on amps and see what I can get out of them. Will chasing amps make me sound more professional? I think not.

[Dave Mudgett]

...I'm not gonna be embarrassed by someone who plays rings around me, or I find has superior ability at some particular thing.

Sounds reasonable. But then what would you say to people who remark "He has less pedals than you do, but he plays a lot more and a lot better".

1. If someone said that, I'd probably say something like, "Hey, he/she is a really fine player - gives me something to shoot for." And I have definitely seen much better players than me work wonders with a fairly simple setup.

2. I've never heard anybody say that to anybody, nor can I imagine why anybody would say something like that. But that begs the question of how many people even know how to figure out how many pedals and levers are on a particular steel guitar; and beyond that, even what a pedal steel is and how it works.

Well, I guess at that point you'd have to cave in and say...

"What makes you a good player or a great player is not how many pedals and levers you have."

I absolutely agree, and I have never argued that pedals/levers make the player. The only reason I would ever even care about what pedals or levers a player has would be if I heard something interesting that makes me want to figure out how it was done.

I argued earlier that having that extra pedal or lever can sometimes make a move, that would otherwise be tricky, easier, especially for someone learning. For example, one can get some F-lever moves using a bar slant. Or one can get what the B=>Bb lever does, split with the A-pedal, by simply half-pedaling A. And so on, and I'm not arguing that it's not a good idea to learn how to do that stuff. But I still want those changes on my steel.

I've been a musician most of my life; but pedal steel, a relatively small portion of that period. I'm happy to be even middlin' at this point. I need nobody to point out that I have plenty of work to do. FWIW, nobody has ever come up to me and told me I sucked, even when I thought I did. At a recent gig, an older fellow (ha! around my age) who obviously knew something about pedal steel and old country music came up to me and said, during the first set break, "Not bad - OK, not an "A", but maybe a "B+".

[Roger Rettig]

"Not bad - OK, not an "A", but maybe a "B+".....

That sounds like a more thoughtful evaluation than we usually get.

I get a variation of responses. If there's been a pre-gig conversation he might come up to me afterwards and say nice things. If he doesn't come up at all and goes straight home I'll assume that he wasn't impressed!

[Jack Hanson]

"Will more pedals an knee leavers make me a pro faster?"

That's only half the battle. In order to truly step up to the next level, you will definitely require two identical top-line amplifiers of the latest design (preferably with consecutive serial numbers). Next, you will need the bare minimum of attachments (drink holder, ashtray, tuner, iPad, etc.) dangling from your instrument. A mini-fridge and kitchen sink are optional.

A classic blonde Telecaster, either one that looks like it's never been played (alternately one that looks like it was run over by a bus -- either extreme is acceptable), sitting on a stand just out of reach, is a definite plus.

The object is for it to take longer to set up and tear down than it takes to play the entire first two sets.

[Brooks Montgomery]

"Will more pedals an knee leavers make me a pro faster?"

That's only half the battle. In order to truly step up to the next level, you will definitely require two identical top-line amplifiers of the latest design (preferably with consecutive serial numbers). Next, you will need the bare minimum of attachments (drink holder.....

thanks for making my day Jack! I've got the drink holder, so.... watch out world!

[Richard Sinkler]

"Will more pedals an knee leavers make me a pro faster?"

That's only half the battle. In order to truly step up to the next level, you will definitely require two identical top-line amplifiers of the latest design (preferably with consecutive serial numbers). Next, you will need the bare minimum of attachments (drink holder, ashtray, tuner, iPad, etc.) dangling from your instrument. A mini-fridge and kitchen sink are optional.

A classic blonde Telecaster, either one that looks like it's never been played (alternately one that looks like it was run over by a bus -- either extreme is acceptable), sitting on a stand just out of reach, is a definite plus.

The object is for it to take longer to set up and tear down than it takes to play the entire first two sets.

A classic blonde Telecaster, either one that looks like it's never been played (alternately one that looks like it was run over by a bus -- either extreme is acceptable), sitting on a stand just out of reach, is a definite plus.

Knowing how to play it is not a requirement, but it needs to be clearly noticeable. And you must not have more than 3p/4k on that Tele.

[Barry Blackwood]

Your statement was very similar to what Einstein once said regarding new theories.

You mean this?

[Wayne Quinn]

I would think along the same line as Paul Sutherland on this subject. Lloyd Green.

[Johnie King]

Waynes a smart man he thinks in the box just that some of us do good to set on the right side of the guitar. So less is more for us.

[Johnie King]

Jack that’s funny I don’t care who u are. Jerry Byrd did nicely with out pedals

[Johnie King]

Barry nice picture I believe I saw that steel in St. Louis steel convention yesteryear

[Donny Hinson]

I've never heard anybody say that to anybody, nor can I imagine why anybody would say something like that.

You're lucky, then. I've played with some guys that would cut you off at the knees if you couldn't play certain things. And then, there are those thinly-veiled comments like "Oh, you do pretty good on the slow stuff". Or Buddy's "I really like that song you were tryin' to play". I can also imagine that some players have heard the line "I don't like your sound" and took that to mean they needed different equipment, and not some more seat-time.

Taking criticism is a hard thing, sometimes. But I doubt any pro ever made it to the top without getting some.

[Tony Prior]

I guess I am not getting the opposition, one way or the other . Of course extra levers do NOT make us a better player but may offer other alternatives to similar phrases which may sound the same but are NOT the same. How many times have we heard something and said " wow..what was that "? I know I have.

I personally do not use the lower 5 lever when hanging on 5 and 8 , I use the raise 8 lever and play a fret lower. It's the same notes but sound different.

Here is a change I play now and then , using raise 7 and lower 6. On the MP3 clip, the first phrase is only using raise 7, the 2nd is using raise 7 and lowering 6. many may say they sound exactly the same, but the nuance is, they are not the same . One is a single lever simple phrase, the other is a two lever simple phrase with a sustaining 7th string, both very similar but different. I use this when landing on a 5 chord or approaching the 5 chord now and then, obviously there can be multiple instances. It's about what we may feel at the moment, not how many levers we have. Redundancy makes for nice music and phrasing. Maybe its a "what was that" moment.

Isn't adding a phrase here and there outside the box the thing that separates each of us from each other ? Maybe that extra lever is what allows us to do that..NO ? Isn't that extra little phrase the thing that sparks another little phrase ? I think it is.

http://www.tprior.com/2levers.mp3

[Dave Mudgett]

Donny, I was responding to this comment:

For me, there was nothing more humbling (and embarrassing) than having a ton of guitar, and having a great player (with far less guitar) set up beside me and play more, and play better.

There are lots of better pedal steel players out there than me, and I'm sure some of them would find me inadequate. But I can't imagine anybody commenting, "You have too much guitar, son."

On criticism - I have ears and am pretty self-critical, so I welcome honest critique and it's not gonna crush me. But my area is pretty pedal-steel-starved, and we only see each other occasionally. Most people I work with don't know a lot of other steel players - some don't know any but me. We had our first steel guitar show here in March, and I hope we can continue and perhaps expand that. And once the dust settles (a bunch of crazy stuff the last year since I retired), I should be able to get down to Nashville more. I'm sure I can get all the criticism I want there.

And just so it's clear - again, I'll state: I completely agree that the guitar doesn't make the player. Not at all. Good players pick what works for them, and all I was ever trying to say is that anybody who's serious about any instrument should think carefully about what instrument they're playing and how it's set up, and pick something that works for them - and then "Shut Up and Play Your Guitar".

[Ray Minich]

Trying to learn to play the steel was/is hard. But not trying is harder....