The Steel Guitar Forum

Hi All,

I am new to the forum and new to me is a 1953 Fender Deluxe 8, a real smooth sounding guitar.

Just wanted to say hi, and thanks for all the great resources here on the forum for new steel players.

Cheers!

<font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Mark Tomlinson on 05 October 2006 at 10:40 AM.]</p></FONT>

Hey - welcome! Enjoy that guitar, looks like a beauty, and let us know how you're doing with it.

Thanks, one question I have...do folks post any soundbites on the forum, and how is that accomplished?

I can just share link from my other website...<font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Mark Tomlinson on 05 October 2006 at 12:59 PM.]</p></FONT>

Mark, I have a Fender lap steel just like yours. Its a great sounding instrument. I tune it to C6/A7. I am curious, what tuning do you use and what kind of music do you play. I have been using this steel on a Rockabilly gig. We also play some older C&W.

Bob, which version of C6/A7 do you use. I've just bought a D8 and am wondering exactly what I'll do with a second tuning.

Well, hey - here's a noob question - what is C6/A7 tuning?

I mean, I know C6 and A6 - but what do you mean?

You can hear some of my playing on my website (click below) or here: Http://www.careytomlinson.org/mark/mysite.htm

I've also posted a few dobro tunes over on reso-nation.org.

Cheers,

Mark


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Mark Tomlinson
mark@careytomlinson.org www.careytomlinson.org


<font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Mark Tomlinson on 06 October 2006 at 12:53 AM.]</p></FONT>

The C6/A7 tuning that I use is this;
Low to High ( A,C,C#,E,G,A,C,E ). I believe that Jerry Byrd came up with this tuning, but the Low A that he used was an octave down. I didn't use the low octave A because I wanted to use it on single note lines. You can get a lot of cool chords with this without having to slant the bar quite as often. It is similar to using the 8th pedal on a psg.

Hey Mark, good pickin'. I like the tone you were getting on your samples.

<bump>

I'm curious about the pickup on my lap steel, where it is a single, string-through type (I don't even know what you call it), and not the typical 2 single-coil setup you see on stringmasters.

I've scoured some of the threads here on SGF and the web, but no solid answer.



Anyone care to review, analyze and elaborate?

Thanks,

-mt

Do a search for "trapezoid" in this forum and you'll find many previous discussions of this type of pickup. Some people prefer the trapezoid/string through pickups to the dual pickups with the strings passing over the pickups as found in the later Fender steels.

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Brad's Page of Steel
A web site devoted to acoustic & electric lap steel guitars

Hi Mark, nice guitar, mine is a '55 looks just like it only mine has the blonde finish. No less an authority than the Knight of Tweed himself has told me that he prefers this pickup to the Stringmaster, and if that isn't enough Bobbe says the same. Really nice playing on your web site,
Byron

As Brad says search for trapazoid, but also search for trap. I prefer this kind of pickup to the stringmaster pickups and i've owned both. They're both great, but the trap pickups have a more bluesy/ jazzy tone. They feature more of the fundamental and less harmonics.

If you go to Rick Aiello's website (recommended), he's got more info about these and how to adjust them. <font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Dan Sawyer on 11 October 2006 at 11:29 PM.]</p></FONT>

Okay...so, in all my playin and searching I guess I failed to see the geometry that was under my right hand. Thank you guys very much for that tip - now I know what to look for and have fun researching.

After this summer's fun at the Port Townsend Slide and Steel experience listening to several PSG's, Sierra's and some nice old Stringmasters - I'm now only remembering what the 2 single-coil pickups sound like. I bought this D-8 without ever hearing it - and I was impressed with the sound right from the start.

Thanks again - what great info!

This forum is excellent!!!

Trapezoid was known as "direct through" pickup's Trapezoids Rule. That steel is a beauty.