why did you start playing steel?

John Bechtel · Post by **John Bechtel** » 20 Sep 2004 6:50 pm

I wanted to take reg. guitar lessons, after learning some Uke Rhythm from Arther Godfrey on TV, but; the teacher that I went to suggested learning Hawaiian Guitar first as a stepping-stone. Then my first real inspiration was Jerry Byrd. After that, I just dreaded the thought of having to punch a time-clock all of my life! But, I had to do that for 13-yrs. after High School. Then one day I just said “I'm going to Nashville and do something different!”¡ It was different alright, but; I'm still here and no time-clocks to punch!

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“Big John” Bechtel
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Geoff Cole · Post by **Geoff Cole** » 21 Sep 2004 5:27 pm

It was Tom Brumley's fault. I told him so too. He said "Yeah that's what I told Jerry Byrd".

Jimmy Dale · Post by **Jimmy Dale** » 21 Sep 2004 7:08 pm

I had a "Senior Moment" at age 45. Jim Miller
I'D RATHER BE STEELIN'

Andy Zahnd · Post by **Andy Zahnd** » 22 Sep 2004 12:53 pm

I just had no better excuse for not washing the dishes!!!!!

Paddy Long · Post by **Paddy Long** » 22 Sep 2004 1:17 pm

It's all Winnie Winston's fault - and I will always be eternally grateful !!!!!

Ray Minich · Post by **Ray Minich** » 22 Sep 2004 2:12 pm

What else ya gonna do with an oak plank and a 1963 Buck Owens record

Wayne Morgan · Post by **Wayne Morgan** » 22 Sep 2004 2:45 pm

Stony Stonecipher's playing in the early '70's live. Man I fell in love with the steel and it has lasted till now and for ever. What a deal ?? Thanks Stony !!!
Wayne

Anita Merritt · Post by **Anita Merritt** » 22 Sep 2004 7:34 pm

I've loved the sound ever since the Flying Burrito Brothers' "Gilded Palace of Sin" was released in the late 60's. (Yup, I first heard that LP when I was just a toddler...and if ya believe that I've got a bridge ta sell ya!

) I play prog rock and metal on 6-string electric and have just recently started learning non-pedal steel. I'm sure though that sooner or later I'll just have to take the plunge and go for a PSG.

Anita

Nicholas Dedring · Post by **Nicholas Dedring** » 23 Sep 2004 5:15 am

I always loved the sound, but finally getting to hear it up front on a record or two made it just seem like a necessity...

Weirdly enough: "Rowboat", with Leo LeBlanc on an early Beck record, and the real kicker was Russ Hicks on the Ween "12 Golden Country Greats" CD. I know, neither of these are going to make much sense to most folks here, but Ween had more steel more audibly than almost anything else I can think of.

jolynyk · Post by **jolynyk** » 23 Sep 2004 5:38 am

Wanted to emulate my hero, & mentor Kenton Kolberg.

Tommy Allison · Post by **Tommy Allison** » 23 Sep 2004 4:45 pm

Glutton for punishment.

James Cann · Post by **James Cann** » 28 Sep 2004 8:51 am

I can't remember why I started back in 1975, but I can say what got me back into it this year: BE's intro to ET's "Waltz across Texas," which I had actually heard years before, but it was on my birthday, when my wife had given me an ET CD, and to that, that we did indeed waltz --not across Texas--across the living room.

James
Sho-Bud LDG (en route)

David Spires · Post by **David Spires** » 28 Sep 2004 10:26 am

It was definately for the "chicks"...

David Spires

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Steel Guitarist for Jo Dee Messina: Carter D-10 8&7 / MSA Classic D-10 8&5; Line 6 Pod XT; Jagwire Artist Series Strings; Walker Professional Players' Chair; Peterson VS-II Tuner; and Goodrich Matchbro & LDR Pedal

Brett Day · Post by **Brett Day** » 28 Sep 2004 11:38 am

When I was little, the first instrument I loved was a guitar and by the time I turned nine years old I started loving the sound of the pedal steel guitar. I was still figuring out what instrument I could play back then and at the time I was strumming a guitar. So, then I tried to play piano with one hand, but couldn't get a good country sound, so then I decided to play steel guitar after hearing it on a lot of country songs and since I've got cerebral palsy, I wondered if I could play the pedal steel. I'm glad to be playing the pedal steel guitar. Brett, Emmons S-10, Morrell lapsteel

basilh · Post by **basilh** » 28 Sep 2004 2:50 pm

In the early fifties everyone was learning the guitar... it was the "In Thing"... I adopted the "Big Fish - Small Pond" philosophy and figured it was easier to become rich and famous playing Hawaiian Music... the pond dried up, and eventually infamous and definitely not rich,I often wonder what would have happened if I'd taken to playing "Country" style !!

Dan Tyack · Post by **Dan Tyack** » 28 Sep 2004 8:22 pm

To get chicks, of course..

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Bobbe Seymour · Post by **Bobbe Seymour** » 28 Sep 2004 9:39 pm

Tyack, my hero!

Me? Who said I started?

Gene H. Brown · Post by **Gene H. Brown** » 28 Sep 2004 9:54 pm

Cause it was the right thing to do!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

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If You Keep Pickin That Thing, It'll Never Heal!

Ben Elder · Post by **Ben Elder** » 29 Sep 2004 7:04 pm

My parents forced me. Oh, I begged and pleaded for the forbidden ecstasy of the interminal bleating of the flute, the verboten joy of ceaselessly precise etudes on the violin and the freewheeling, hedonistic joy of sternly-regimented classical piano lessons, but the elder Elders were tenacious in their hardbitten didactic principles. No amount of reason, untempered E9th tuning or emotional blackmail could budge them from their genetically predisposed tendencies toward ambiguously abusive discipline.

And as if denial to their first-born of the musical realm's most severely demanding instruments weren't enough, they coerced me into diverting the pennies I'd been saving all my life up till then (which I had charitably earmarked for the Overindulged Junior Birdmen of Kennebunkport and Crawford Fund) into a used ZB D-10, which, before saying my prayers (the ultimate in counterintuition), I had to take apart and reassemble nightly with USMC drill-team precision. ("Its...intonation...had...better...be..PER-fect...and...those...strings...better...shine, grunt!")

O! The longing for the forced 88-key marathon of memorized compositions in the six-flat keys by esoteric Russian composers! The dark endless toil of the repetition of Sisyphus meeting the oppression of Job and the draconian compositions of Paganini. The cloying wispy joy of the hole-y silver shaft would forever be a forbidden pleasure to this suffering innocent.

No, I couldn't be cool like other kids, I had to play the instrument that even Stalin and Hitler could not deploy on foes foreign and domestic. It was me and Webb Pierce, me and George Jones, me and Ernest Tubb, me and Buck Owens.

Me saddled for life with a pedal steel and these initials!

Forrest Lee Jr · Post by **Forrest Lee Jr** » 29 Sep 2004 8:11 pm

I started playing because you wouldn't play what I wanted in the studio! ha ha ha... all kidding aside, Damir you play great steel and it was a pleasure cutting all those tunes. I apologize for being such a "producer". But I have had a heck of a time getting the sound I'm looking for so I just decided to do it myself from now on, for better or for worse.

Oh yeah...The solo on my dads song from 1972 called "Higher To Go" that Jay Dee played steel on... Thats what did it for me. I still love that solo. Thats what made me fall in love with the instrument.
That and The Dukes Of Hazzard car chases!

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Forrest Lee Jr.

Michael McGee · Post by **Michael McGee** » 30 Sep 2004 7:44 am

Easy answer - the first time I heard Ray Price's 'Night Life'. 1969 - I was 16 and I still remember it like it was yesterday.

Currently at 51 years of age, I have never outgrown my hillbilly naivete. I distinctly remember remarking to my cousin (the owner of the record) that night that if it were ever possible for me to master the intro to that song, I would never ask God for anything else!

Of course, absolutely no one told me of the steel's heroin-like addictive qualities. So when I actually figured that intro out, I HAD TO HAVE MORE!

Now, here lies me, just a worn-out, old, pedal steel junkie...(Man, it's been fun!)

mm

Terry Sneed · Post by **Terry Sneed** » 30 Sep 2004 10:15 am

Because there just ain't no other instrument that sounds as purty as the pedal steel.
I was given Winnie Winston and Bill Keith's book, and it got me started. still got the book, and still use it to refresh my memory on certain things.
Terry

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84 SKH Emmons Legrand D10
session 400'rd Steelin for my Lord.