What got you started?

[Larry Allen]

I had been playing Guitar and Trombone for a living for 40 years then cut off my left middle finger taking the blade off my dozer…Stu Schulman, who I jammed with, taught me Dobro then Pedal Steel…he turned me on to lots of steel players..Thanks Stu!

[Darrell Criswell]

My experience was similar to the one Johnny Bush describes in his biography. I went to a night club in Memphis in the 70's called The People's Choice, it had two bands on different floors and often had Leo LeBlanc on steel. I had heard the sound of steel on records and TV but when I heard it live I believe every neuron in my brain fired, it was the most fascinating sound I ever heard.

[Don R Brown]

It was a two-part deal for me. First was in fall 2011, when we saw Amber Digby at Sportsman's Tavern in Buffalo NY. Dicky Overby did not go on that tour, and I'd be curious who filled in, but at any rate we sat about 10 feet away from the steel just by chance. I knew what it was but had never paid much attention to them, and to be honest that night it was more of a curiosity to me than anything. However, apparently it planted a seed which germinated!

For many years I had been listening to an internet station (Radio Free Texas) which specialized in Red Dirt music, and had gotten into looking up various independent artists on YouTube. Not long after watching the steel at Amber's concert, I came across a clip taken with a cell phone, of "Agave Posse Band" playing a private party, with Carmen Acciaioli playing steel. Something about how the steel fit into that song just ignited the fire. From that point on, there was no turning back, I decided I had to give it a try. Almost 10 years later, I'm wishing I had started about 1970!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuL1UpSKSZw

[Al Evans]

Very similar path as yours, Mr. Dragon. Deliverin’ was one of the first albums I ever bought, and I was an instant Rusty Young Poconut. I promised myself back then I would learn how to play pedal steel someday. Reaching age 60, 47 years later, I finally bought one.

Same here, more or less. I picked up an MSA brochure in a music store in San Jose in the mid-1970s and knew I would be addicted if I actually touched one. I had a new business and a new daughter, and laid the idea aside for 40+ years. A little less than four years ago, at 71, I saw an MSA D10 Classic -- just like the one in the brochure! -- for sale on Craigslist for an amount I actually had in a stack of money dedicated to "musical stuff". Retired and with no particular responsibilities, I bought it... and was lost.

I play several instruments. Although I'm not particularly great at pedal steel, it is my favorite.

--Al Evans

[David Ball]

I grew up in Nashville in the 60s and early 70s. Used to go to the Sho Bud store downtown, and always heard great steel playing coming out of the various taverns on and around Broadway.

I always loved the sound, and had heard it all my life, But it was watching the local TV shows like Bobby Lord, Wilburn Brothers, Porter Waggoner, the Noon Show and a bunch of others that let me understand where that sound was coming from. I guess I was listening to pretty much all of the greats in those days, just didn't know who they were for the most part.

I didn't actually own a steel until the mid eighties, but I've been hooked ever since. I'll never be a great player, but I do enjoy it.

Dave

[Jerry Dragon]

It has been very interesting reading these and listening to the "links". I have to devote more time. I just moved into the house we are in and there is a million things to do. Yesterday I spent most of the day repairing my front stoop made of brick. I am no mason and it ain't pretty but it will get the insurance company off my back. They gave me till the end of October to get it done, so I am ahead of schedule. I am also learning how to repair amps and that is taking a ton of my time up and is quite shocking at times.
Thanx for all the stories, keep em coming. I think if I had lived in the south I would have been exposed more and got to it earlier. It is rare to run across a steel player up north.
J.D.

[Michael Sawyer]

When i was around 12 years old,i heard Lonesome,Or'ny,and Mean,on my parents Zenith console stereo.At the time i was learning the chords to the simplest of Lynyrd Skynyrd's stuff,but the sound of that steel guitar opened a whole new world for me.
The solo on that song,and seeing Clyde Mattocks play live in '82,is why I am playing steel today.

[Johnny Cox]

A record by a local DJ in Williamson, WVA named Jimmy Wolford. Hal Rugg was the player. Heard that sound and was hooked. That was 1966. My parents moved to Nashville in 67. In my 7th grade year I got my first pedal steel. When I started school that year Hal's daughter was in my homeroom class. The rest is history.

[Mike Bacciarini]

Rusty Young…. Kind Woman

[Brett Day]

There are quite a few things that got me started playing steel. Having cerebral palsy in my left hand, I knew I wouldn't be able to fret the strings on guitar. One day, I was spending the day with my aunt Denise, and the TV was turned on to CMT, and at the time, Ricky Skaggs was using electric guitar, piano, drums, electric bass, and steel guitar in his band, and Bruce Bouton was on steel-I didn't know any steel guitarists back then, but I loved the instrument with strings which I thought looked like a table, so I asked my aunt Denise what that instrument was, and she said, "It's a steel guitar", and several years later, I was at a country music show in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina called the Carolina Opry and there was a steel guitarist named Myron Smith. Myron was playing a ZumSteel D-10, and his wife, Janet was the bass guitarist in the band. I couldn't get over the looks and sounds of the steel guitar and that's how I started loving it. In 1996, while I was a keyboard player, a band called Ricochet had one or two songs on the radio-Bruce Bouton was on their first record, and at the time, they had a steel guitarist named Teddy Carr, but before I'd heard of Teddy, I heard Bruce Bouton, Paul Franklin, Dennis Delorme with Prairie Oyster, John Hughey with Vince Gill, Dan Dugmore, and Sonny Garrish on different records, I heard Buddy Emmons on John Anderson's records in the nineties and by 1992, I heard Gates Nichols with Confederate Railroad. I think Ricochet was the band that made me want to play steel.

[Jerry Dragon]

I related this in another thread. I was doing sound for Commander Cody one time and as they were setting up I got talking with Tiny Olsen. I expressed my interest in PSGs to him and he opened his case and showed me the underside of his explaining how it worked. Somehow the conversation turned to trains and we both were interested in trains and steam locomotives. We had about a twenty minute discussion about the two. That led me to visiting this site before I ever got a PSG and as a CNC programmer/machinist I wound up making some parts for people. I think it was John Widgen (spelling?) from Ct. that I made some Emmons bell cranks for. I also made some Emmons pedals and some Emmons extended pedals for forum members also. I also made, I think it was 85 bell cranks, some pickup covers for a custom build I wanted to have made that never panned out. All this helping me on my journey to finally purchasing my own PSG. My first purchase was a Marlen D10 which was a little much for me. I traded that for a vintage stratocaster. Then I got the ZB D10 which was a basket case, I still have parts of that. I realized the D10s were to much at one time so I decided to look for an S10. The Dekley came up on the site here for a very reasonable price with good reviews from forum members so I wound up with it and am very happy with it. I can't remember who I bought it from. This site was the icing on the cake when it came to my final decision to stick with it.
Thanks Bob
J.D.

[Don R Brown]

Somehow the conversation turned to trains and we both were interested in trains and steam locomotives. We had about a twenty minute discussion about the two.

Let me guess - your favorite diesel locomotive model is the E-9.

You may have heard it already, but the late Herbie Wallace was not only a top-shelf steel player, but a die-hard rail fan as well. We now have a place in Tennessee not far from Chattanooga, but he passed away before I had a chance to meet him and discuss our mutual interests.

[Jon Voth]

I play tuba in The U.S. Army Band "Pershing's Own" D.C. for 24 years, & kinda been an amateur guitar player. We have an unofficial country/bluegrass group that gets together occasionally for events and as part of major variety shows-U.S. Army Band "Country Roads". Once I asked to be a part of it, to learn any instrument-just for fun. The leader said how about PSG. I honestly knew little about it but said sure, almost as a joke.

About 4 years ago he had requisitioned a steel, amp, seat, all the stuff-and the joke was on me. But I quickly fell for it and now I'm all in-it's a lot of fun and really challenging.

[Jerry Dragon]

Actually it would be the GG1 although it is not a diesel.

John Voth, great story.

[Karl Paulsen]

Actually it would be the GG1 although it is not a diesel.

John Voth, great story.

It's no BL2, but I suppose the GG1 is nice enough...
😁 😉.

[Andy Jones]

Listening to John Hughey on Conway Twitty's records and watching Buddy Charleton on The Ernest Tubb show.

John kept me in goose bumps playing in the high register and Buddy could get more out of the A and B pedal than anyone I could think of.They were both solid,not flashy or showy in my opinion,just tasteful and spot-on always.

[Earnest Bovine]

Don't get me started.