The Steel Guitar Forum

I just bought a vintage steel record of Cal Hand entitled"The Wylie Butler".
It's a record from 1977 on Takoma records.
This is a very different steel guitar album than every other I know,especially from that year.
Does anybody know more about Cal Hand and this album?
Did it inspire you or were you surprised as well?
Over all I like it,it's produced by Leo Kottke and some songs have no backing band,just pedal steel.
Thanks,for reading this!

Cal is an old friend of mine and a mentor as well.
He hails from Georgia, D.C. and Missouri, growing up with the bluegrass and country music of those regions. Close friends with Rodney Dillard, Tut Taylor, Leo Kottke and the late, great Uncle Josh Graves, Cal started his professional musical career on the dobro and like many others he moved towards steel guitar in a few years as well.
When we met in 1969-'70 he was touring the country in an old school bus, performing on dobro and pedal steel guitar with an acoustic band(w/jug and washtub bass,now thats acoustic...)called The Sorry Mutha's, taken from the Leadbelly tune of the same name. They were a big hit on the coffeehouse and festival circuits in the 60's and early 70's, and their concerts featured music ranging from 20's-30's blues to bluegrass and straight country, with some folk tunes and originals as well, all done in their inimitable style. That band also featured one Bill Hinckley, a childhood friend of Cal's who can play anything with strings on it and did so in the band, making he and Cal an excellent lead section in the tradition of those we all love to hear play together in such a setting. While surely not a pure country band they could cover anything you might want to hear in that genre as well and do it convincingly. I wish you couldve heard them live.
After the Mutha's more or less disbanded, Cal went to work at The Flame Club in Mpls,Mn. backing several different artists there, along with other local club work and stints on the road with various artists such as Marilyn Sellars, Leo Kottke, Rosalie Sorrels, The Prairie Home Companion and others. In fact, Cal was part of the original cast of PHC along with Bill Hinckley and Bill's wife Judy Larson, also of Mutha's fame.
Cal also held a long running gig on psg @ Denny's Loft in St.Paul, Mn, eventually handing it off to me when he began to tour nationwide with Leo. Cal was also part of the Sound80 Studio's crew in Mpls. which was the beneficary of 3M's audio recording division(their headquarters being in nearby St.Paul)innovating many recording techniques and methods now in use.
Cal's own recordings and those with Leo, Rosalie etc., feature an inventive use of dobro and pedal steel, probably coming from his extensive background in small acoustic bands where playing amplified steel guitar especially is a tough road to hoe and musical taste is the ultimate pre-requisite, of which Cal has an abundance. I know Leo shares my opinion
In the 80's, club and recording work in Mpls began to fade away for everyone, and Cal, family man that he is went to work for the US Postal service as a mail-carrier, while continuing to perform on PHC and other local shows and recording sessions, as he does still to this day. A quick check of his discography will yield much more than the few artists Ive mentioned, and is worth a good look.
Cal's a great guy and truly loves steel guitar and dobro as much as anyone I know. He's managed to get a few other steel players in the area into his division at the Lyndale, Mpls. Post Office station, so they have a daily running dialouge and commentary going on steel, dobro and country music in general as he continues to provide inspiration and help to all the local steel and dobro players who have nothing but admiration for the man. Im proud to call him my friend. He'll have to tell you about Wylie Butler though...its a funny story

Thanks for this beautiful and interesting story about Cal.
I am curious now about"The Wylie Butler",i'ts a fine steel album and now I understand some of the sounds and songs,knowing his acoustic background.
I hope somehow the album is getting more listeners 'cause it's a special album.....
Thanks again and sure enough Cal is proud to call you his friend
Thanks again!

If I'm not mistaken, Cal played on some of the early Midwest Country shows too. Probably when they were still in MPLS.

I think Cal's getting a new comp, so maybe when he gets back online he'll respond to your post. I do believe he's a forum member.

MC

Mike, great articulate write up on Cal! I ran into him some years back and we reminisced when he was playing a club in South St. Paul as a regular act and I would see him frequently, SSP being my home town.
I traded a nice Sho~Bro to Cal for a 1981 black Dobro (60D). Still have but wish I could find the Sho~Bro!
Cal's a class "A" act, player & gentleman and I still ahve my vinyl "Wylie Butler " LP

Has the album been reissued on CD?

Mike,

I can't find any info on a CD release for Cal Hand's The Wylie Butler, but Amazon.com has two used copies of the vinyl for sale:

http://www.amazon.com/Wylie-Butler-Cal- ... 541&sr=1-1

http://www.amazon.com/WYLIE-BUTLER-VINY ... 785&sr=1-2

I've had a copy since the mid 70's and enjoy it still. Some songs are in the same style that Leo Kottke is known for (Leo Kottke and Peter Ostroushko both accompany Cal on this album). On these songs, Cal complements the style very well on PSG (I believe it's an Emmons p/p). Other songs have a very ethereal style, similar to that of B. J. Cole, ala Transparent Music . Mike, I think you'd enjoy this album.

Keep on pickin'!
Glenn

Hey, Mike, you could get another dose on Leo Kottke's album "Dreams and all that Stuff", which is available on CD. Some simple, lovely playing from Cal.

"Butler" isn't on CD - it'd be great to see it reissued, but probably a tough sell to a label. Seems like it's difficult enough to get pedal steel albums out that are somewhat normal sounding...that one is extremely unusual and probably doesn't have a huge market potential - but it's one of my favorites.

I had that album on vinyl, lost it along the way someplace. I recall the song title "They only took the stage" or something like that. Cal told me it was about moving the Opry out of the Ryman to the new venue.

I took pedal lessons from Cal at Suneson's Music on Lake St in Minneapolis in the 70's. All the names that Mike Cass mentions (including his own) were people one could see on most any given weekend in the local area. Great music scene back there. Sure brings back memories.

If anybody (else) recorded all the old PHC shows (from 1982 until about three years ago--hey, it could happen!), s/he should dig through (circa mid-'80s?) the accumulated cassettes for the commercial bit for the "Cal Hand Steel Guitar Necktie."

I finally cracked the shrinkwrap on a second "Wylie Butler" to make a digital version of "Angels We Have Heard on High" for my bluegrass/acoustic radio show. (Retired after 20 years in Nov. 2007 to fight weekend sleep-deprivation.) While I was at it, I also made zeroes and ones out of the best version of the best melody in the world, "Redwing."

Whatever anybody's charging for "Wylie Butler," pay it.

http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=CuMujwJWudQ

There is some of his recent playing on YouTube!

On one particular tune from a Kottke album (Ice Water) called "Tilt Billings and the Student Prince", I've often wondered if Cal and Tilt are the same person--especially at 'Ron Nagle's House Party' where a drunk stumbles and sits on the Student Prince..ruining the 'voice' of that guitar forever.

The YouTube sitting appears to be the annual musicians gear trade/swap event at the St. Paul Armory. I didn't make it this year.

Cal Hand's Dobro and steel playing on Leo Kotke's early albums got me interested - and ultimately started - in steel guitar back in 1976 when I bought a Marlen D10 from Leonard Stadtler. Circumstances forced me to quit playing in the 80s and I sold my Marlen (and a Dobro 60D) in 1991.

However, thanks to all the people here who have posted about the excellent steels available today, I'm now "returning to the fold", with a Carter pre-owned D10 found on their website.

Gentlemen (and ladies too), I look forward to being a member of this amazing community for quite a while. Now if I can just remember how to play some of those Cal Hand licks...

Ben Elder wrote:Whatever anybody's charging for "Wylie Butler," pay it.

This seems like an opportune time to resurrect this old thread. I feel fortunate to have recently purchased a new shrink-wrapped copy of The Wylie Butler from an eBay seller in Illinois to replace my original copy that went missing decades ago.

I am also one of the guys who Cal taught how to play pedal steel in the basement of Suneson's Music Center in the mid- to late-seventies. Cal was playing an older blonde birdseye rack and barrel single neck 3 x 3 'Bud at that time. The first song he taught me was The Tennessee Waltz, and the second one was his plaintive, hauntingly lovely version of Redwing. Some years later, after I purchased a Dobro from Rog & Char Suneson, I returned to Cal for Dobro lessons. He was a master player.

Since I've been gone from the Twin Cities for years, I've lost track of Cal. If anyone here is still in contact with him, say hi from me. A really good guy, excellent teacher, and great player.

Any updates on Cal's more recent comings and goings from Twin Cites folks would be most welcome.

I just spoke to Cal Hand the other night. I took dobro lessons from him at West Bank School of Music, and then pedal steel lessons at Suneson's. He gave the the referral to get my first pro gig playing on the road in a country band. Great guy then, and still. Here's pre-pandemic shot of him and Leo Kotke who came out to see my blues duo partner and I at a low-key coffeehouse then called the Underground Music Cafe.

Great photo! Thanks for sharing, Randy.

Leo is a buddy of my duo partner. We are in no way in the same league as these masters, so it's an honor (and a little disconcerting) to have them in the crowd at a gig. Fortunately I play mostly piano in this context, so that relieves some pressure. BTW, I plan to be selling _ here on this forum_ my Dobro Model 60 and Sho-Bud similar to the one Cal had. I bought it from Clem Schmitz - another nexus of the mid 70's Mpls country scene - who added knee levers for his son. I need to finance a new "toy" I have on order: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLepW7TVTBM Be well and keep pickin.'