Stoney Stonecipher and My Steel Guitar Beginnings

[Brett Day]

Recently I've been thinking about how 26 years ago, I'd decided I wanted to switch from keyboards to the pedal steel guitar. It started with how I first started loving the steel at the age of eight. After my freshman year in high school, I decided that, although I loved playing keyboards, I was looking for a stringed instrument used in country music, so I remembered how much I love the steel guitar, so a friend of mine who I went to church with said that a distant cousin of his played the steel guitar, and my friend gave me the brochure about Stoney's steel guitar show in 1998, but I didn't go to the show, so then I went to Dollywood, where Stoney was playing steel with a show called The Kinfolks Show and after the show, I met Stoney and told him how I was wanting to play steel, so he said for me to rent a steel to see if I liked it and if I could handle it, then he gave me a set of Kyser fingerpicks, which I would put on my fingers every day and practice steel techniques even though I didn't have a steel at the time. In a music store called Phil's Music in Mauldin, South Carolina, there was a Sierra Artist S-10 pedal steel, and I rented it. I tried it out and decided that I really loved playing the pedal steel, so in December of '99 at the age of eighteen, I got my first steel, an Emmons GS-10 from Steel Guitar Nashville and have been playing ever since then! I miss Stoney now and a lot of times while using my polymer bar, I think about how he said, "I believe you can handle a pedal steel with your left hand like it is", and he was right!

[Rick Campbell]

Brett,

Stoney was a dear friend he was an icon to the Knoxville steel community. I play a lot of shows with him through the years. He had a strong passion for steel guitar. I was once fired from a steel job because he became available to play. They put me on Fiddle, and gave Stoney the steel job. I was a little irritated but I knew it was the logical thing to do. We played good music and had fun. Stoney RIP

RC

[Larry Dering]

I too remember Stoney and the many shows I attended in Knoxville. He was a friendly and helpful friend. I miss him and the great times I enjoyed in Knoxville and Pigeon Forge. My good Friend Herby Wallace had a cabin we rented while attending Stoneys shows. Those days are my favorite memories.