Misnomer

Mike Perlowin · Post by **Mike Perlowin** » 7 Aug 2006 3:35 am

I keep telling you guys, we need to change the name of our instrument to TIFKATPSG (The Instrument Formerly Known As The Pedal Steel Guitar.)

Why won't anybody believe me.

I'm gonna go eat some worms.

Joe Smith · Post by **Joe Smith** » 7 Aug 2006 5:06 am

Didn't Cousin Jody used to call his lap steel a biscuit board? I don't think he ever did make any biscuits on it.

Gene Jones · Post by **Gene Jones** » 7 Aug 2006 6:12 am

Its kinda like my motorcycle, it says Triumph right across the tank on both sides, made in England in bold letters on the frame, and people will still come up and ask if it is a Harley.

John, I had a similar problem. When I owned a Goldwing people used to come up to me and ask if it was a motorcycle?

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<img height=100 width=70 src=http://genejones.bizland.com/Scan10095.jpg>
www.genejones.com

David Doggett · Post by **David Doggett** » 7 Aug 2006 6:19 am

What we have here is a case of convergent evolution, plus a bunch of very old out-of-date definitions. The Galpin Society’s definitions seem so technical and dated that they are irrelevant to public usage. The public and instrument makers have distinguished between lutes and guitars for centuries. And you can make up all the technical definitions you want, but everyone will always consider a lyre a type of harp. The Galpin definitions seem to seize on one technical aspect while ignoring the entire rest of the instrument. Even by the Galpin definitions, the Hawaiian guitar was a guitar, because it had a body and a neck. Naturally, they originally were regular guitars with the strings simply raised. Some began to have a hollow neck (Weisenborn, National tricone square-neck). Did this suddenly make them zithers rather than guitars? But others, identical in every other way, still had solid round-necks. The community of users and builders distinguished these by the very serviceable “square-neck” and “round-neck” terms – same instrument, different necks. Once electric pickups were added, it was recognized that the resonant body was no longer needed for amplification, and in fact caused unwanted feedback. So the body and neck were made solid. Many of the original electric steel guitars had separate necks (the frypan), others had single-piece bodies that were shaped like they had a neck, and finally others just had a single solid plank for the body and neck. But some of these, such as the Gibson Console, had a hollow body. So at this point, some steel guitars had converged to the same technical configuration as the zither and dulcimer. But the fret marks were still like a guitar – and they were played by guitarists as a type of guitar. It is just as legitimate to call it a variation of the instrument it evolved from (the guitar) as it is to suddenly call it something that historically is completely different (zither, dulcimer) just because of a single technical change (elimination of the neck joint).

Development of a logical system of nomenclature can be useful. But take a lesson from biology, which has been doing this scientifically for a long time. Insects and bats have wings, but they are not descended from birds, and are not considered part of the bird family. Steel guitars descended from guitars and are clearly a part of the guitar family, in spite of incidental convergent technical similarities to zithers and dulcimers. Also, calling it “steel” because it is mostly played with a steel bar is practical nomenclature, even if the bar is sometimes made of brass or glass. Likewise, “slide guitar” works because slides were originally made of glass, bone, and other materials, rather than steel. The user community has settled on these two terms to differentiate between playing horizontal with a bar, and playing vertical with a tube on the finger. You could call this fretless playing, but that would get confused with the violin family, which is fretless (no markers even), but is fretted with the fingers. Steel and slide guitars have the same frets as guitars. They have just been converted to visual markers.

In setting up a nomenclature system, there is lumping and splitting. Lumping gives us families, and splitting gives us the different members of families (species in biology). It is entirely appropriate for the lumping to consider history and evolution. You don’t take a new species out of its family just because it evolves something similar to members of another family. Birds and bats did not become insects when they evolved wings. Steel guitars did not become zithers when the neck joint was eliminated. That was just a coincidence, and shouldn’t automatically change the family. If you want to insist on a detailed technical nomenclature, do it right. It has to evolve with the evolution of the instruments. It can't be a static thing carried over whole-clothe from the distant past.

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Student of the Steel: Zum uni, Fender tube amps, squareneck and roundneck resos, tenor sax, keyboards

[This message was edited by David Doggett on 07 August 2006 at 01:04 PM.]

Peter · Post by **Peter** » 7 Aug 2006 9:00 am

Look at this link: http://steelguitarforum.com/Forum2/HTML/009599.html

But what is it? A guitar?

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<img align=left src="http://home.telkomsa.net/peterden/al%20saut/forum/face50.bmp" border="0">Peter den Hartogh
1978 Emmons S10 P/P; 1977 Sho-Bud D10 ProIII Custom;Guya Stringmaster
1975 Fender Artist S10; Fender 1000; Remington U12; 1947 Gibson BR4
[This message was edited by Peter on 07 August 2006 at 10:01 AM.][This message was edited by Peter on 07 August 2006 at 10:55 AM.]

Wil Limanen · Post by **Wil Limanen** » 7 Aug 2006 10:08 am

Psalm 33:2
Praise the Lord with HARP: sing unto him with the psaltery and an instrument of ten strings.

Bobbe Seymour · Post by **Bobbe Seymour** » 7 Aug 2006 1:57 pm

And then again, Leo Fender did have something to base his solid body technoligy on, his neighbors solid body guitars, the neighbor was Paul Bigsby.

Bobbe

Kelly Hydorn · Post by **Kelly Hydorn** » 7 Aug 2006 8:03 pm

Whatd he say?

Post by **Dave Mudgett** » 7 Aug 2006 8:50 pm

I'll tell ya' what. You wanna call it a zither, a lute, or a harp, that's fine with me, y'all go right ahead.

Myself, I'm gonna call it a guitar. The guitar is the world's most popular instrument. Stages over the world are filled with guitars. Chicks like 'em. In fact, most everybody out there in radioland likes 'em. Why fight it?

In heaven, they may hand us a harp. Here on earth, I play guitars.

Ian Finlay · Post by **Ian Finlay** » 8 Aug 2006 12:55 am

If a guitar is defined by the statement that "the Lute family consists of all instruments where the string passes over the body, with a separate neck", then the Bond/Steinberger guitars (moulded in one piece) and the 70's style through-neck guitars (basically one piece) aren't in the lute family.

Also, to save all you Americans coming to the UK and being embarassed, we don't call muffins "American muffins", just muffins. We only call McDonalds style fries "fries" - the British version are "chips" and much thicker. What you call "chips" we call "crisps", except for "tortilla chips" which we call... "tortilla chips". "Zucchini" are "courgettes" and "cilantro" is "coriander". And "zits" are "bollocks" (but you have to be a Jasper Carrot fan to get that one).

Ian

David Mason · Post by **David Mason** » 8 Aug 2006 2:26 am

I think technically you have to call it a "electric vichitra veena", given that the Indians invented the technique of playing a standard horizontal veena with a glass egg sometime in the 19th century, then an Indian sailor taught it to a Hawaiian, etc. http://www.buckinghammusic.com/veena/veena.html
Scroll down. Google.

Mike Perlowin · Post by **Mike Perlowin** » 8 Aug 2006 2:34 am

I think technically you have to call it a "electric vichitra veena"...

Electric PEDAL Vichitra Veena [This message was edited by Mike Perlowin on 08 August 2006 at 05:13 AM.]

ed packard · Post by **ed packard** » 8 Aug 2006 5:54 am

Ian F...Embarrassed in the UK??? I could starve to death in the UK...I can't even interpret a restaurant menu there.

My mother used to get on me about "speaking the King's English", so I would give her this line in BRIT to translate:

"Did you hear about the snippy little twit, who at the end of the day had her nickers in a twist because someone gave her cold bangers for breakfast?" OK Yanks, try translating.

Then there is the "one off" (no, not a PSG player), and "sod that for a lark" (you don't want to know), and neither did the users know when I asked them (I did).

Of course what we Yanks, Canadians, Ausies, Newfy's,etc. have done to the language is pretty funny also.

For instance, the front of the BEAST bears the label "Electric Concert Harp".

Pray tell sir, where is Kenton? In Kent somewhere? RSVP (sorry 'bout the French).

David Doggett · Post by **David Doggett** » 8 Aug 2006 6:46 am

From the Buckingham Music web site, concerning the Saraswati Veena:

The highest quality veenas have the entire body carved from a single block of wood, while the ordinary veenas have a body which is carved in three sections (resonator, neck and head).

So according to the Galpin rules, you get either a zither or a guitar, depending on how much you pay. This shows the impracticality of assigning a family based on a single construction trait that varies within different models of the same instrument.
And I couldn’t help but notice the references to movable frets and the preference for non-equal temper. Concerning the Been:

Metallic frets are disposed on that tube on a slightly angled axis. They are always movable (fixed by wax or strings) and so can be adapted for every raga (the notes of the raga are not fixed by equal temperament).

And concerning the Vichitraveena played with a glass egg: <BLOCKQUOTE>quote:<HR>The strings are stopped by a glass egg, a technique originating most probably from the playing of the tempura: this instrument (which is now only used to accompany singers), was used a long time ago by some musicians of the Gwalior gharana to play a melody, stopping the note with a wooden stick...
…Because of the absence of frets, one can play perfect meends (glissandos) on a octave and a half, something difficult to perform on a been, and so get closer to the abilities of the human voice.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
The recognition of the difference between Just Intonation and Equal Temper must go back centuries in India. Seems we Amurcun steelers are really late to the dance, for the whole slide thing, as well as the ET/JI debate. I can’t wait to hear Way to Survive on a vichitraveena.

Ray Minich · Post by **Ray Minich** » 8 Aug 2006 6:54 am

Maybe it really is an "interrociter".

John Drury · Post by **John Drury** » 9 Aug 2006 2:23 am

I think technically you have to call it a "electric vichitra veena", given that the Indians invented the technique of playing a standard horizontal veena with a glass egg sometime in the 19th century, then an Indian sailor taught it to a Hawaiian, etc.

Soooooo, that would make the steel club I belong to the:

North Tenessee Electric Vichitra Veena Association

Hey! I like that!

John Drury
NTEVVA #3

Gareth Carthew · Post by **Gareth Carthew** » 9 Aug 2006 7:39 am

I was going to put my two pence/cents worth into the "is a PSG a Guitar or not" discussion but I realised that it doesn't really matter to me that much. So to try and bring this back around to the original point being made...

..just explain why the general public find some confusion...

I'm afraid I have to disagree with the original post. Not on the content, it's obvious to me that Alan knows his stuff on the topic of the evolution of instruments; far more than I.
But simply that I don't believe the confusion over our instrument with the general population has anything to do with whether it is technically a guitar, or a Zither or whatever. Nor if the guitar as we know it today is even still a guitar.

The majority of people don't know what a PSG is for the single, plain and very compelling reason that they don't see them very often!

Almost everyone in the world would know what an electric guitar is because they see them all the time. Pedal Steel is just not as publically visable.

As far as I can see that's the only reason for any "general public" confusion.

If you asked someone on the street what a Zither is the vast majority won't have a clue so telling them a "Pedal Steel Guitar" is technically a "Zither" sure isn't going to help them understand it!

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 9 Aug 2006 7:50 am

Ian & Ed:

It's going a bit off the subject. As an Englishman who has lived in California for the last 26 years, I could fill a book with the errors you can fall into.

My first was the English expression, "Keep your pecker up !" In England your pecker is your nose, but over here it's your penis. The other is the word Fanny, which in the U.S. means bottom, but in England refers to a part of the female anatomy.

Ian, yes, they call muffins muffins in England, but what they sell over here as English Muffins are not sold in England except in specialty import stores, where they are called American Muffins.

I don't know where you get the idea about zits and bollocks: zits over here are pimples, bollocks speak for themselves, the word is the Ango-Saxon diminutive of balls.

Getting back onto the subject: under the definition of guitar, a Weissenborn really isn't a guitar, either. It has no separate neck, and it could legitimately be called a zither, except that it doesn't have a fingerboard either. Mine just has painted frets, which are there just as markers.

It's an interesting subject !

David Doggett · Post by **David Doggett** » 9 Aug 2006 8:37 am

I think part of the problem is that the idea of "families" doesn't work well for instruments. A mandolin is a mandolin because of its size, tuning, and double strings. Any of those overlap with other instruments. But it is the combination that makes the mandolin. Putting a round back on it does not make it a lute. And putting a flat back on it does not make it a guitar. Likewise, making a guitar neck hollow does not make it a zither in the eyes of players or the public. Any instrument is a whole configuration of characteristics. Using just one characteristic causes problems. You think a tube with keys and a reed defines the reed instruments. Then you come across a harmonica, or bagpipes, or a kazoo. How the instrument is played must be as important as the parts of the hardware. A flute belongs with the other woodwinds, even if it is made entirely of metal, likewise the sax.

ed packard · Post by **ed packard** » 9 Aug 2006 8:51 am

Alan,Ian...There is a great book called "The Story Of English"...unfortunately it does not cover musical instruments, but does touch on "a rose by any other name" etc.

One of the best expressions to go with "pecker up" & "dobber down" is from the Brit lady that asked the Yank she had met to "knock her up some time"!

Do you suppose that there is any connection between "fret"(on an instrument), and "to fret" (as in to worry)?

Re the PSG...are the rods rods, the bell cranks bellcranks, pickups pickups, etc., or are there alternative terms used?

Klaus Caprani · Post by **Klaus Caprani** » 9 Aug 2006 9:09 am

Joe Schmidt wrote:

Maybe electric pedal harp might be a better name

After Andreas Vollenweider I figure that's already taken.

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Klaus Caprani

MCI RangeXpander S-10 3x4
www.klauscaprani.com

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 12 Aug 2006 2:39 pm

Ed:

Yes I have two copies of the Story of English. It went along with the BBC Television series which ran to about 6 hrs. and I have that on tape.

I've always been interested in linguistics. I'm probably the only steel guitarist you'll meet who has studied Anglo-Saxon as a language subject. It's very close to modern Dutch/Flemish, which I've also studied.

ed packard · Post by **ed packard** » 13 Aug 2006 7:17 am

Alan...fantastic...and I may be the only PSG "sort of" player you amy ever meet that has worked on tribal language translation.

Some of that work fits into automatic phrase/word recognition (triggers) in modern communications.

Mike Perlowin · Post by **Mike Perlowin** » 13 Aug 2006 7:22 am

Let's just call it "The instrument Jerry Garcia Played."

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Warning: I have a telecaster and I'm not afraid to use it.
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Jim Sliff · Post by **Jim Sliff** » 13 Aug 2006 8:08 am

Mike - You made my morning. I have to clean up all this coffee now...

FWIW If you listen to a Deering Crossfire - it's a banjo.

Recall Gibson's nomenclature:

"ES" = Electric Spanish
"EH" = Electric Hawaiian

Leo used the same "Spanish" guitar term for the original Esquire (which became the Broadcaster, then Tele). Interestingly, the lap and stand-up models were just called "guitars" initially.

But the pedal steel essentially developed from a "Spanish" guitar, played on one's lap, with a knife or some other hard object sliding around over the frets (not on them) to create notes. Which evolved into the resophonic guitar ("Dobro" is a brand name) to get more volume, to the "EH"-type guitars (made by a bunch of manufacturers) to the first pedal-type guitars, made to change tunings (not to play licks), to the modern pedal steel.

It's a guitar. It's just on a particular branch of the evolutionary tree, with lute-like instruments at the roots.

It doesn't need a name change at all. The name is a short, fairly precise description of what it is, has become common and widespread in usage in conversation and print, and thereby according o the normal rules of the English language it's the correct name.