The Steel Guitar Forum

Travis Hillis wrote:Just about every song I hear on country radio has steel. It maybe buried under rock-guitar solos but it is there...

It's anything but dead.

Watch out, that 'rock-guitar' solo might be a steel. That's one of the problems with recording using a non-traditional sound: usually it's assumed that it's the guitar player. I'm sure that Paul has examples of this in his long recording career.

Yesterday I played at our state fair,just around the corner from the 1,100 LB. pumpkin and after our set a woman came up to me and asked me the name of the instrument that I was playing? I told her a steel guitar and she said what are the pedals for?I said ya got me it's a pedal steel guitar...One day I'll figure out what exactly I'm playing on!

Sometimes I think the steel is just too "Country" for what some producers want. Crossover is where the big money is I suppose. You can Rock it, Blues it, and even steel guitar it with lead guitar but the steel is a steel. I think producers throw a few steel licks in just to make sure everybody knows it Country, BUT they don't want it TOO Country. Everything cycles around. I'm not worried about the steel, pedal or otherwise, dying anytime soon.

Charley - love your avatar.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_J._Wilke

Hello Paul, I have enjoyed reading through some of the postings to this thread you started. I personally think the steel guitar has not died, in fact, I get more interested in it as the years go on. That doesn't mean I want to play it all the while. I play it when I feel like it. There are many steel players who are happy just picking around at home or with friends at home etc. I have met many new players in the last 3 or 4 years.

Gigs are dying here in the UK though. A few years ago it was not uncommon to have a Friday Saturday Sunday and perhaps a midweek gig too in the diary every week. And that would be in a radius of about 60 miles maximum. Now, one or two a month is a good diary of work.

This last weekend, while the StL convention was on, I was here, invited some friends and family round and we had fun eating bbq, chilli con carne, baked potatoes and salads and deserts, drinking, playing steel and singing to tracks and letting off fireworks (cos I love them). I was wishing I was at the convention though.

David.

I better walk Texas now. My dog, not the state!

The premise of this topic....is the steel-guitar dead?

It is dead for sure...the only proponents are members of the choir, as demonstrated by the comments above.

It's true that you hear a steel on a CD occasionally, but with very few exceptions it's obviously added as a gimmick rather that as a real asset to the music.

It seems to be slowing down in Texas too. I haven't been to Scottie's show for several years, and this is the first year that I didn't get at least one call to fill in for another steel player that did go to the show.

Barry Blackwood wrote:Charley - love your avatar.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_J._Wilke

Loved those guys, Barry! I think Leo Gordon is next!

first off steel guitar needs big name sponsors no one is thinking out of the box for the instrument or promoting it on a bigger scale. First thing you have to is when you have a concert for steel guitar make sure u have great backup players that can play more then country then ad a concert PA Some great lights and big screen both sides of the stage a great anouncer and some new blood for singers and also add the dobro players because some of them also play steel or would like to learn . And also take the time to show some of the young bucks a lick or two so that it keeps them excited about the Steel .
Ok now i will shut up ,,,,,,,,,,,,
Rusty Rhoads

Loved those guys, Barry! I think Leo Gordon is next!

Oh yeah, Leo Gordon. I think Clint Walker almost made a second career out of stomping him.!

This is such a silly conversation. Pedal steel guitar is not dead -- there's a live one sitting in my studio right now, just waiting to be fondled!

I think what you guys mean is that pedal steel is not being used in country music as much nowadays as it once was, and that therefore there is not as much paying work for country pedal steel guitar players as there used to be.

Both of those assertions are true, and they sadden me as much as they sadden you, but that has little or nothing to do with pedal steel. Pedal steel guitar is a musical instrument, arguably the cleverest ever designed. It can be used to play any kind of music, including a lot of stuff that has never been done before on any instrument. How can you think that pedal steel is "dead?" No musical instrument is "dead" as long as you can get sound out of it!

The music business might be miserable at the moment, and paying work for country pedal steel players might be particularly scarce, but as a musical instrument that is evolving and setting trends and breaking new territory, pedal steel is at the top of the pack. Your cup might be half empty, but my cup is half full!

Remember the 70's. This old drum was beating then. Then here comes Alan Jackson, George Strait, Vince Gill, Garth Brooks, I could go on and on.
The day of a steel player playing every note of every song is gone. I'm glad of that. Listen to the steel licks that Paul, Mike, Tommy and many others are adding to songs today. I think it is better than a steel player following every chord just to keep up with where he is at. Like the old way !
Jeff said it best. "Get in, get out " More is not always better. Steel guitar will be here when all other instruments have gone electronic. Steel players is not the only thing that make country music. Enjoy the Keys,guitar,fiddles and whatever. Just make sure what you do , on a steel, can't be duplicated on a piece of electronics. It's like air. We can't replace it at this time.

One more thing and I will shut up ! Clubs are dieing
only for the lazy bands that don't produce a quality product. The clubs have to pay good money for bands. If the band is running on 50 octain they will not pay the bills. Do it right or pick in the basement. The old days are gone. My opinion, hope I didn't step on too many toes.

Barry Hymen has made the perfect reply to this thread. Absolutely spot on!

David

What planet are you who say steel is not dead on? If Paul is feeling the pinch, if Johnnie Cox is willing to travel as a bassist,that should tell you, steel is dead! I bet greater NYC has the highest concentation of musicians in the US,and yet,there are only a few steel players here.

There are only two Honky Tonks in NYC,and what passes for C&W would make you sick to you stomach. Bluegrass is hot here. There are bluegrass bands everywhere. All play the same songs,same instrumentation,same harmony,same exact sound,and none use steel.

What Paul stated is true. To find a true country band is rare. The good ol Ray Price and Faron Young material is not being used in most clubs. It's like Loyd Green said. 'You take away all the production in the newer song, there's no 'beef''. You couldn't make an instrumental from these songs like the ol Hank Williams, Ray Price songs. No hard melody worth while listening to or to copy. I found that from my own experience. I sat on my hands half the night at a pickin gig. Dave Wright sat in for me one night and said the same thing. He told the band, 'they don't have need for steel.' The music has change the signature sound of steel. That sound evaporated. I personally would of had no interest in learning to play a steel if I had heard only what their pushing today. This country has changed as well. Like my Mother said, 'I'm glad I'm this old. I don't want to be around to see what's taking place in 10 years.'

Maybe "dead" is too strong a word. Perhaps "hibernating" is a more efficient term.
There are plenty of new "indie/alt/Americana" bands out there using steel. A new generation is embracing the instrument.
It may take a while for the players to learn to play well enough or in the preferred style to impress forum members, but they're out there doing their thing.
This by the way, makes me very happy!!!

It might not be dead, but the concept of low budget touring using a double neck steel with a personalized copedant/tuning is being killed by the airline industry.

What I have notice is that there is no shortage of pedal steel players. What there is a shortage of is good front man balladeers who NEED a pedal steel player.

I second what Rick Schmidt had to say. However, everywhere I go, people I meet are fascinated with the pedal steel guitar, are amazed at some of the music that comes out of it, intrigued, and want to know more.

I say - use your imagination, work on your technique, never stop learning, and play from your heart; people with ears will listen.

I continue to search for new sounds in my playing -- by way of my arrangements or a new technique. If we don't get something MORE out of our SG, it will sink faster than it is now. As it stands now, the SG is stereotyped--there's only one HOLE into which it fits. Another gridlock is non-musician-attorneys who call the shots in the studio. They simply want a copy of the noise that made X go platinum last yr, maybe with a sprinkle of some sort of gimmick to make it different.

Rick Schmidt wrote:It might not be dead, but the concept of low budget touring using a double neck steel with a personalized copedant/tuning is being killed by the airline industry.

Well, you could blame it on the airline industry, or you could blame it on the steel guitar manufacturers, most of whom haven't yet been motivated to find a suitable way to get a D10 in a case under the 50-lb flight limit; perhaps it's a lack of creative ingenuity (or, more likely, motivation) on the part of the builders rather than the airline's 'fault'? (By the way, I do get my MSA Millenium with 9+8 under the 50-lb weight limit in my Wheel-EZE case, as long as I put the pedal rack into my suitcase instead of the steel case. That's evidence of one builder's ingenuity in reducing the weight of a high-quality, customized guitar, by using carbon fibre materials).

Susan, I think you're right about folks being intrigued by the instrument. I've found that even if I play simple country, some people are quite curious about how the pedal steel is played, how long it takes to learn, etc.
I was recently introduced to a jazz guitarist (I can't play jazz, though I like it), and when he heard I'm a pedal steel guitarist, he said, "I bow to pedal steel players". Well, maybe not this one, but some people DO realize how unique our instrument is.
And with steel/pedal steel showing up in so many diverse musics, it is simply evolving, and being accepted where it once might have been denied access.

Pedal steel isn't dead, it just smells funny.

Mike Neer wrote:Pedal steel isn't dead, it just smells funny.

Sorry, that was me

Barry Hyman wrote:I think what you guys mean is that pedal steel is not being used in country music as much nowadays as it once was, and that therefore there is not as much paying work for country pedal steel guitar players as there used to be.

Barry, you said it all in this sentence.

Ted Solesky wrote:What Paul stated is true. To find a true country band is rare. The good ol Ray Price and Faron Young material is not being used in most clubs.

Ted, you summed things up perfectly.


Pedal steel is not dead, but the whiney honky-tonk crying in your beer country music that made it popular is indeed dead.