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Topic: Acoustical Ephemera: Virtual Hallucinations? |
David Mason
From:
Cambridge, MD, USA
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Posted 2 Feb 2006 3:38 am |
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Or: does bar noise and pick noise even really exist?
When you're playing a solidbody electric pedal steel guitar with the tone amplified through magnetic pickups, the noises coming out of the speakers are quite different in tonal content than that of the acoustical instrument alone. Unless your pickup is terminally (or intentionally) microphonic, why would the length of string vibrating behind the bar even matter, except to possibly add sustain at certain frets? Likewise, how does the string length from the back of the nut to the tuners matter, except as it affects tension?
I have a couple of DVD's of acoustic Indian lap slide guitarists and it's clear from their hand positions that they couldn't possibly be muting behind the bar, and it doesn't seem to matter to their sound. Perhaps it's a matter of percentage of overall tonal content. Looking at videos of pedal steel guitarists, they too often lift the back of the bar to play single note stuff, and nothing untoward seems to occur. Yet, you're supposed to “mute behind the bar.†I do understand about using the tip of your finger to catch and deaden a string for musical reasons as you move from higher to lower strings; even then, wouldn't efficient pick blocking negate this need? Is it necessary or efficient to mute the same string two or three different ways?
There was thread recently about pick noise during blocking that started these thoughts. I often play acoustically early in the morning and do have some pick noise, but once I switch over to an amplified signal none of it comes through. I tend to use more midrange and less treble than most, but often more tube overdrive too. I've never heard a steel guitarist that I can remember who clicked as they played; DO even really bad steel guitarists actually make clicky noises, or is this only an acoustic “problem?†Likewise, my bars do make a scrapey noise acoustically when playing softly, but then, nothing comes out through headphones or the speakers.
So my question is, how effective is it to contort your hands into unnatural positions, worry about, buy equipment to alleviate, and/or spend valuable practice time working to correct aural conditions that don't in effect even exist?
(I also wondered, if you're using a 20K pickup, does aluminum vs. metal necks, thickness of the aprons etc., matter twice as much or half as much as with a 10K pickup?)[This message was edited by b0b on 02 February 2006 at 10:50 AM.] |
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Donny Hinson
From:
Glen Burnie, Md. U.S.A.
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Posted 2 Feb 2006 8:59 am
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David, believe it or not...there's some of us that really don't really care for Indian music, and also don't like their tone, playing styles, or techniques. If you like and admire it, that's wonderful, but we don't all share your obvious enthusiam.
In fact, we all don't all feel the same about any style of music. Different strokes for different folks.  |
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Bobby Lee
From:
Cloverdale, California, USA
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Posted 2 Feb 2006 10:57 am
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For my first 3 years of playing steel, I lifted the bar instead of muting with my right hand. I was oblivious to the noise. Then a non-musician listening to me play pointed it out to me. "Is it supposed to sound like that?" he asked. Suddenly the "bar kiss" noise in my playing was deafening to my ears.
It took a year of dedicated practice to purge my bad habit of lifting the bar. Today I lift the bar deliberately in blues and rock for the effect.
Total control of the strings is still the goal of my practice regimine. I rarely practice songs or music - those are things that I work on in band rehearsal. At home alone, I work almost exclusively on technique.
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 Bobby Lee (a.k.a. b0b) - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs, Open Hearts
Williams D-12 E9, C6add9, Sierra Olympic S-12 (F Diatonic)
Sierra Laptop S-8 (E6add9), Fender Stringmaster D-8 (E13, C6 or A6) My Blog |
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David Doggett
From:
Bawl'mer, MD (formerly of MS, Nawluns, Gnashville, Knocksville, Lost Angeles, Bahsten. and Philly)
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Posted 2 Feb 2006 11:58 pm
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I don't think pick and bar noise is an illusion. I hear lots of pick clicking and bar scraping when I play solo at home amplified, especially with headphones (my pickups are new and not microphonic). But when I play with a group it mostly seems to get lost in the mix. The pick clicking is less when my technique is at its best.
The bar scraping has a lot to do with how hard you pick. If you pick lightly, the bar scraping is a bigger proportion of the sound, especially at the end of long notes when the string vibration is dieing and your volume pedal is going way down - the string scraping really gets amplified. If you pick harder, the intended string vibration is a bigger proportion of the sound, and the vibration sustains longer and competes better with the scraping at the end of long notes. But if you pick too hard, your technique is more difficult to control. There is a sweet spot for picking firmness where bar noises are minimized, the strings really sing and sustain, and your technique is free to develop. Long time players and pros live in that sweet spot, and it is a big part of what people mean when they say that tone is in the hands. I'm still struggling with this. Sometimes I wish I could pick everything with the same steady firmness, like a machine, and get all my volume dynamics from the volume pedal. But my foot lacks subtlety, and it seems impossible to keep my picking hand from getting involved in contolling the volume.
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Student of the Steel: Zum uni, Fender tube amps, squareneck and roundneck resos, tenor sax, keyboards
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