The Steel Guitar Forum

Well this one guy came up during break and asked me what was the name of that Ironing boad thang I was playing and I told him that sounded quite right for the particular one I was playing many years ago as it wouldn't stay tuned over a few minutes at a time and i was aggravated at that point in time and I never forgot what he called it either TOMMY

You can count on me, Stephen. Jus' call me 'Ole Reliable'...

Having recognized your quick wit on more than one occasion on this forum, "Ole Reliable" Sir, you'd be on my short list of forumites that I figured might respond to that quip........

I gleaned this from a Tom McGuane novel:

"...electric guitars that were played in
front of you with one hand plucking and the
other manipulating an iron bar that sent
undulant notes into the room like sea
serpents..."

That just about says it all.

Of all the weird names posted here in the past, the one I like best is "Table top string thingy".

"High Capacity Cheese Slicer" strikes a nice chord...

I believe it was Dave Van Allen who once said someone spoke of his D10 as a "double-decker table slide".

I'll never forget that one!

"Lemme see...was it a Show~Boat or an Emmison?"

How do you save these patent drawings to your computer? The PDF file seems to be broken.
And screen captures are too pixellated.
Any help appreciated.

***EDIT***
Not to worry, guys. I found it.
All you do is go to the USPTO site and save the source as a TIF file.

I cant imagine someone going through life not knowing what a Pedal Steel Guitar is, Seems to me that would be quite a waste, anyone agree! au

What about calling it a Hawaiian Guitar with Tone changers. People will then ask; "What do the tone changers do" Then you reply, "They give me more chord options". People are smart if you give them a chance to understand...if they can fix complicated cars and computers, a steel is easy for them to comprehend.

'have had mine referred to as a "table harp"

i actually try to avoid any discussion of it amongst the general population.. i'm not sure the human race is quite ready for it to become common knowledge...interestingly enough though, the asian doctor who will be giving me a colonoscopy on friday is familiar with the pedal steel guitar!

chris ivey wrote:.interestingly enough though, the asian doctor who will be giving me a colonoscopy on friday is familiar with the pedal steel guitar!

That's a pretty amazing co-incidence. The doctor who gave me one 3 or 4 years ago has a brother in law who plays steel and dobro. Seriously.

Maybe proctologists (colonoscopists???) are the steel players of the medical world. Who really goes to medical school with a dream of being a proctologist, anyway? Probably an easy transition for a proctologist to be a steel guitar fan - they must know what it's like to put up with abuse from the rest of their professional community.

Jeff Newman wrote about the pucker factor.

the large intestine must be a smaller world than we realize!

the asian doctor who will be giving me a colonoscopy on friday is familiar with the pedal steel guitar!

There are some people to whom you should never tell this; it will do nothing to bolster your reputation, I guarontee.

I was in a music store in boston, buying a volume pedal, and the guy asked me what it was for. I told him it was for a pedal steel, and he told me that he had a 50 dollar pedal steel he bought from Musicians Friend. Since i have the same (lap steel) guitar, I asked him if his pedal steel had pedals, to which he replied, "no, I don't think so."

I've also heard/seen it as:
Steal Petal
Table Guitar
Stand-Up Guitar
Is that a Keyboard?
That thing Kingsley plays

And when you're in a session, and the engineer goes, "steel player, can you do that wah-wah-wah-y sounding lick again?"

I overheard this conversation one night in a bar:

Guy 1: "What is that thing the guy is playing sitting down?"
Guy 2: "It's kind of an electric dulcimer."

and later in the evening during "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry":

Guy 1: "I've heard that song before, who originally did that song?"
Guy 2: "That's a Cowboy Junkies song"
Guy 1: "Oh yeah, they're cool"

Here are some that people have said to me over the years. These were serious, not kidding around!

Iron Guitar
Sliding Guitar
String Guitar
Upright Guitar
Board Guitar
Slide
Synthesizer
Keyboard
Dobro
Steel Pedal
Pedal Guitar
Pedal

My favorite one was said in jest: Hawaiian Cheese Slicer

One time a recording studio engineer hung a mic over the strings of my PSG, and asked "will this pick it up okay?" The guy was serious! I had to read him the riot act.

Steel pedal guitar??? Wow, I thought everyone knew it was a steel peddle guitar!

We play a club every Sat on a patio with an awning. We call it the "partio" ..After a downpour one night we called mine a "paddle steel". I am a lover of the movie Cool Hand Luke so I call all my instruments a "yo-yo"........what we have here is....failure to communicate....

This is a fun subject. Some of the names are hilarious. People come up to mine and are amazed by it. But still the Cowboy gets the girl!

When I built my first lap steel in 1963 the rest of the band named it the "Electric Barbed Wire Fence", a reflection of the sounds I was producing with it.

"Pineapple Pearl Harbor Guitar"

Going slightly off-topic, I was surprised to learn that there is a barbed wire appreciation society http://www.antiquebarbedwiresociety.com/collector.html