When did you start playing steel?

[Dave Mudgett]

Technically, I got my first pedal steel in 1999, and played it some that year. I played in an Americana band, and I even did a production of "Always, Patsy Cline" that fall - only because they couldn't find anybody else around here. With the help of Tim McCasland's tapes, I sorta' figured out the most very basic moves and had enough experience as a musician to know when to lay out (most of the time!) so as to not stink up the joint too much. Playing slide guitar since the 60s also helped. I also shouldered a B-bender Tele so I didn't just sit on my ass all night.

But I wound up in grad school (computer science) again, one course in Fall 99 and fully in Spring 2000. If you know anything about comp sci grad school, you know that I had basically zero time for a couple of years. So had to pretty much put things down for a while. So I really only started getting serious a year or two later. I joined the forum in 2004 and was off to the races. So I checked 2000s.

I have been playing something since 1960 - classical piano for 8 years fairly seriously, but guitar since '67 or '68. I still play guitar a lot - the reason I play steel is that I love the sound of steel and there was a pretty serious void around here. I asked my buddy who fronted the Americana band why he didn't find a replacement for his lap steel player who went back to greater Philly and he said, "Do you know one?". Once I got into it, I found a few, but nobody was playing in bands like this one. I was still running my guitar store and had just picked up a couple of pedal steels at a guitar show - one friend took the Maverick, and I took the Emmons student, both 3+1, and started "playing" with them two weeks later.

And I really started out on pedal steel. But I play without pedals quite a bit now. And of course slide guitar too. I see them as all closely related.

[Jim Pitman]

I ordered an MSA U12 in 81. It took a year to get to me.
I had been playing at home with SB Maverick in the late 70's. Earlier, I bought a Dobro brand Dobro new in 1973 and was gigging with it the same year. I had to because my brother loaned me the money so we could start a duo. I was "indentured" for about a half year at age 17 until I paid it off with gig money.

[Len Ryder]

Late 40’s. 6 string acoustic

[Slim Heilpern]

I had expected to see the wave of baby boomers in the 1970s, but the rise of new players in the 2010s surprised me. Very interesting.

In my case, I made a very short lived and failed attempt as a 16 year old hippie to pick it up in 1971, but life got in the way (had to sell my Maverick to go on the road playing telecaster with my band). As I approached retirement age 5 years ago, I realized it was now or never. I play my Williams daily now and absolutely love it!

- Slim

[Tommy Shown]

I started in late 1979 early 1980. I was a bass player for this and I got burned out on it The bass that is

[Dave Hopping]

Late '70s. Been getting more into country, starting with Sneaky Pete and even "Teach Your Children". Took the plunge and began with a Fender/ Sho-Bud 3+ 1, moved up to an MSA Classic D-10. Was gigging all the time, and I got to where I could play it enough to (sort-of) get by onstage. Been a long slow trip!

[Dave Mudgett]

Bob Jennings wrote:

1996 on a Fender Stringmaster double neck, then on a well used Sho-Bud single neck on a double frame, then in 1999 ordered a new Williams single neck on a double frame, have an eight string single neck on a double neck frame with pad custom made for me by Herb Remington in late 1998; a one-of-a-kind.

Bob Jennings

[Herb Steiner]

April, 1968.

After a brief folk guitar phase, by 1962 I was into bluegrass and was playing mando and dobro. I also farted around with a Fender Deluxe in A6 because I was a Spade Cooley fan. I had a band and had also been doing publishing demo sessions for Michael Murphey songs at Screen Gems, so I was a pretty serious bluegrasser. In 1968, Linda Ronstadt hired me as a dobro and mando player. She was just going out on her own for the first time after the Stone Poneys had disbanded, and put together a band of various LA pickers to be the "and the Stone Poneys."

About three weeks into the gig, Linda asked if I played steel. I told her no, but if she wanted me to play it, I'll get one and learn it. So with help from Red Rhodes, I borrowed a Fender 2000 from Nesmith (he had 5! ) and immediately ordered a Sho~Bud which arrived about a month later... a Crossover!! Anyway, I then got to work. When Linda's gig ended in early 1969, I soon went into the honky tonks of Los Angeles working between 4 and 6 nights a week for three years 9pm-2am. THAT is where a steel player used to learn. In June of 72 I moved to Austin TX and in that vicinity is where I remain.

So as to pedal steel, I'd say I started in April of 1968

[Allen Peterson]

1982. Bought a single neck Dekley from Herb Remington. It came with two lessons from Herb. Pretty good deal. Wish I still had the Dekley.

[Bobby Burns]

I think Herb Steiner wins the prize. No one else can say they learned steel because Linda Ronstadt wanted them to!

[Bill Galvan]

1949. I was 13 years old and my parents thought I should have some kind of musical education. They
suggested the piano because it would give me a solid
foundation for any musical genre I might pursue. But
I wanted to play the trumpet. I had seen a guy(Harry
James)in the movies and he was married to the sexiest woman in the world (Betty Grable). The local horn
teacher said "no way" because I was missing two front
teeth. So I reluctantly I agreed to my parents second
suggestion, guitar lessens. They thought it would make me popular (for parties) with my friends. The guitar
instructor in our town switched me from rhythm to
steel guitar because I wanted to play melodies and he
only taught chords on the Spanish guitar.

[Jon Voth]

Around 2018 for me. Glad to see the 2010s as the 2nd most rated decade.

Been a pro brass player my whole career and started PSG on a whim (I've been an amateur guitarist my life-never did much with it).

It's opened a drastically different genre and way of performing music to me, and I couldn't be happier. Doesn't pay much & I don't care.

[Ben Lawson]

In 1955 my father bought me a Gretsch lap steel and amp. I didn't play with it until 1969. In 1970 I bought an Emmons D10. Took three months from the day I got it until I had it on stage. I was obsessed with it. I still have the 1950 lap steel but I never learned how to play it very well!

[Joe Krumel]

kinda surprised at the amount of starting players in 2010.Gives me some hope it wont go the way of the accordion.

[Tom Grosz]

I’m a decade cusper. I migrated from slide guitar to lap steel in 2009 when I was 25. Within a year and a half I entered the world of pedals and levers — my fingers were starting to bleed from trying cop pedal steel licks by bending behind the bar while sliding it!

[David Ball]

Even though I had listened to steel a lot in the 60's, went to Sho Bud a lot in the 70's, I didn't get my first steel until the early 80's, so that was my vote.

Dave

[Shorty Smith]

Doyle Grisham, my friend, was playing steel for the Glaser Brothers. He assisted me in buying my first Emmons D10 in 1973 from Emmons Factory in NC, $1200.00, steel, case and Volume pedal delivered. I played lead guitar in a country band in Columbus, Ga but practiced on the steel guitar for 5 years before in 1978 I took it out to play on stage. My 1970 Fender Telecaster went in the case and has been there since, I still have it, perfect condition. Shorty

[John Butler]

Started learning 6 string in'61. Stayed with that until 'o3.
Always loved the sound of steel. Everyone said " its too hard to play". A friend had a 12 sting MSA. Very affordable.
While I was learning to play it, I kept thinking, this isn't hard. This is like meeting an old friend. Although I still have 6 string guitars, my Mullen and I are joined at the hip. 18 years and counting!!

[Bill Terry]

I worked at a music store in Fort Worth, TX from the mid 70's to '89. We took in an MSA Sidekick on trade in the early 80's if I remember right (we were NOT a steel guitar shop). I piddled with it in the store, got a little interested, and later upgraded to a BMI S-10 that I got from Steve Lamb at Steel City Music. That was 80's, so that's what I checked in the poll.. BUT...

I doubled on steel and guitar in some country gigs around town, but 'double' really meant I played 3 or 4 songs a night on steel, and they had to be I-IV-V, no minor chords. LOL.. I was still a guitar player that happened to own a steel. A little later on I traded the BMI back to Steve for a 70's ShoBud Pro I, but it didn't make me any better, just cooler.

I moved to Austin in the mid-90's for a day gig, and started trying to get connected locally. I found that if you threw a rock in Austin, you'd hit about 10 guitar players, and they were all great. So I stumbled onto a one-time gig where they had a regular guitar player, but no steel. When they found out I played steel, they asked if I could play steel for an entire gig. If so, they'd hire me full-time. My mind was saying 'no' at the same time my mouth was saying 'yes'. LOL..

So I buckled down and started learning more, and somehow managed to not get fired. Later I had the good fortune to run into Ricky Davis and take a lesson or two, and it became addictive and my main instrument. I give Ricky a lot of credit for 'correcting' some really bad stuff (right hand mostly) and getting me started the right direction.

All that said, to this day I still consider myself a guitar player who owns a steel, even though my guitar chops are really rusty. I don't have the solid steel guitar background all these guys who grew up listening to traditional country have. I was a rocker with a Les Paul in front of a Marshall half-stack until the rock clubs all started closing in Fort Worth, forcing me to play country or not work.

I feel like a faker most of the time.

[Herb Steiner]

I feel like a faker most of the time.

That's a hook for a hit song, I predict.

[Don R Brown]

....I soon went into the honky tonks of Los Angeles working between 4 and 6 nights a week for three years 9pm-2am.

Talk about a college education - that right there would do it! Herb, it would take a lifetime in today's world to get the experience you got in those 3 years.

[Herb Steiner]

....I soon went into the honky tonks of Los Angeles working between 4 and 6 nights a week for three years 9pm-2am.

Talk about a college education - that right there would do it! Herb, it would take a lifetime in today's world to get the experience you got in those 3 years.

That those experiences don't exist anymore is fer sure true enough, Don. But I didn't have Internet, YouTube, Facebook, and a thousand players taught by Jeff Newman who went out and became steel teachers themselves. In those days there was the Neil Flanz album and Jeff had one course out, which regretfully I never purchased. I did get help from Jeff's "Music to Get C6 By" course, the only product of his I ever bought, but that was later.

Nowadays, players don't have to spend 20 to 30 hours a week with a bunch of drunks in the unhealthy environment of a smoky ol' honkytonk to learn how to play. They can sit the same number of hours in front of their laptop and learn the same stuff correctly the first time, not by the seat of their pants like I did.

If their laptop happens to be situated in a smoky ol' honkytonk, so much the better.

[David Ball]

If their laptop happens to be situated in a smoky ol' honkytonk, so much the better.

Amen to that!

[Ron Shalita]

1977 for me

[Don R Brown]

Herb, I am a huge fan of YouTube, both for instruction videos and the chance to hear hundreds of different steel players, not only the top-shelf pros, but also the obscure guys (and gals) on some local band. I learn from them all.

That said, I find I learn SO much more in one night or two nights when the music camp has an open jam, or the rare occasion I've played at a private party. The videos give you a chance to go back, slow it down, repeat 10 times, and absorb it, which is very beneficial. But when it's live, even though at the lowest level, when they point at the steel you have to come through. Those old days when so many of today's veterans were learning and advancing provided experience that has made you guys who you are.

I WISH I could have checked the "60's" or "70's" box, but for better or worse it was 2012 for me.