The Steel Guitar Forum

Joe, Carl started this thread over two years ago!

I think we should use hieroglyphics and be done with it.

<SMALL>" teaches the student what the freakin' lever actually does, increasing musical awareness"</SMALL>

I'm with you Herb!
I learned from Al Brisco who uses arrows like you use #s and bs. Same idea.

We'll never have a standard, so I suggest all tab have a note on the bottom that defines the functions as they relate to letters.

Nice to see Jack Stoner back.

Jack's post is also from over two years ago!

I'm with you chas
What do you have on your Ankh lever?


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<small>Larry Bell - email: larry@larrybell.org - gigs - Home Page
2000 Fessenden S-12 8x8, 1969 Emmons S-12 6x6, 1971 Dobro<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Larry Bell on 05 August 2002 at 01:45 PM.]</p></FONT>

Seems like there is a lot of confusion built in to this thread.

To me it doesn't matter what they are called as long as I know what the "freakin'" pedal/lever does. When I get tab, I always write my designations for the pedals and levers on the tab so it is clearer to me. I would change "D lever" to RKL (D# to D?C#), "F lever" to LKR (E's to F), etc. This way I don't have to think so hard as to what lever/pedal I should be pressing. It tells me.

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Carter D10 9p/10k
Richard Sinkler

Nice to see Jim's freakin' back (side.)

This confusion is too much for an old man like me and that is why I only buy tablature from one teacher. I personally think that Jimmy Crawford, John Hughey, Weldon Myrick and Terry Bethel had the best idea when they put together their "Manual of Style".

kd...and the beat goes on...<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Kenny Dail on 05 August 2002 at 08:42 PM.]</p></FONT><FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Kenny Dail on 05 August 2002 at 08:43 PM.]</p></FONT>

<SMALL>What do you have on your Ankh lever?</SMALL>

Larry, my Ankh lever is kind of my "stealth" lever. Every time I push it, it does something different. It's how I create the appearance of spontaneity in my playing.

KENNY NAILED IT.
It is the only answer that doesn't require having to learn a bunch of meaningless letter-function relationships and doesn't adapt to new changes without changing the system.

Jimmie called it MuSymTab and it uses Musical Symbols (duuuuh) like # and b (can also use X, the double sharp -- or just use multiple #/b for more than 1/2 step r/l). It included a complete system for fingering, standard notation over the tab, and other stuff as well, but the #/b thing was the piece I found most useful for just jotting down tab.

I've seen every permutation out there for representing strings, frets, and pedals -- and this is absolutely the best. The added advantage is that you begin to think about your pedals and levers as creating musical intervals and you learn your setup much more thoroughly. It works as well on C6 and universal tunings as it does on E9.

If ANYTHING should be a standard, it should be the use of sharp and flat symbols to denote pedal and knee lever function. IN MY OPINION.

And, <font size=1>all seriousness aside</font> chas -- I have a lever like that too -- it's not truly random but oldtimer's disease (CRS) makes it seem that way.

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<small>Larry Bell - email: larry@larrybell.org - gigs - Home Page
2000 Fessenden S-12 8x8, 1969 Emmons S-12 6x6, 1971 Dobro

I am glad someone finally broached this subject on lettered levers on PSG. I copied off Mr. Reggie Duncan's tab lick on the AUDIO-VIDEO of him playin with a band and with h;im usin the DAY setup and me being a beginner and using the EMMONS setup Iwas lost as a goose when he went to 14F----15. Any help is apprecaited. Runnin the Forum you get different tabs from different folksand these letters throw me cause I' m lookin for a half day to see what lever fits. So THANKS FORUMITES for this tidbit of info. But still there is no standard for the beginner like me to feed off of. KENNY FOY LYNNVILLE KY.

Sorry, Kenny. My D knee lever lowers the 2nd string. My E knee lever lowers the E's. My F knee lever, raises the E's to F. That is why I call it the F lever.

As for the floor setup, it doesn't matter.
The ABC letters work for either. Your's is set up A B C . Mine is C B A . My C is your C. My A is your A. And so forth.

If you need any additional help or have any suggestions, please email me! Anytime!

Thanks, MR. DUNCAN.Really appreciate the info.And again that was a fantastic job on the video. When I want a fix for the true sound of what a PSG is to sound like I click on that video. It gives me goose bumps. Thanks again. KENNY RAY

Hey Carl,
I'm with you on this one. I think they should be just as you stated. As someone mentioned about the "H" lever to lower the B's. That's correct too. In Germany the B note is called an H. If you buy a set of guitar strings over there they have E H G D A E and if you have one of those old Korg tuners which we all used to use there was an H in Parenthses next to the B note. So that's cool for that change (B to Bb)

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Livin' in the Past and the Future with a 12 string Mooney tuning.

Not quite true anymore, Jerry. When you were here maybe, but these days a whole lot of strings (at least those for electric guitar and those are all I know about) are imported from the U.S. and thus the packages say B on them. Personally, I steadily refuse to use the term H... I know some who do, but after all it´s American music we´re playing in the band and therefore we should keep it INTERNATIONAL... (just my opinion)

Regards, Joe

Chas--FYI the Ankh lever has been around since ancient Egyptian times and predated any Portuguese guitarist fishermen. Seriously, I was reading a 1979 SG mag article by Fred Layman which seems appropriate to this discussion:
"My own conclusion is that the variety of tunings and lack of standardization did, in the long run, hurt the development of the instrument and its wide use in modern music". As Herb suggests, being a learner myself struggling through tablature, I quickly learned to take a red pen to the pedal designations to standardize them "+" or "-". What could be simpler? Does anyone really want to be deified in the pedal change anyway? <FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by William Steward on 20 August 2002 at 07:38 PM.]</p></FONT>