The Steel Guitar Forum

John Ely has an awesome Hawaiian Steel Guitar Web Site.
Check out his Advanced Voicing Locator and Chord Locator.
They are wonderful tools to help seasoned players as well as beginners.
A wonderful gift to guys like me.
Thanks John!

David Phillips

oops, sorry I forgot to post the link

http://www.hawaiiansteel.com/

Thanks Ray

Gotz a link?

Here you go....

http://www.hawaiiansteel.com/

Very cool Ray! Thanks! Worked on a new song on bottleneck last night. "Miki, Miki." Got it from an old 78.

My pleasure, sir!

This is a TREMENDOUS resource.... The only thing that could make it more useful would be to include music notation and the intervals. A massage and a tax rebate would be nice, too.

It's sad, but many will skate right past or overlook this treasure. I have a book called "7,488 Guitar Chords". It's all right here in John Ely's Generic Chord Locator! Time invested with this program will produce great returns to your musical advancement. I nominate this tool as "MOST VALUABLE LINK".

One problem, it's dead wrong at least in G dobro tuning for a Cmajor chord! It does have potential.

This one is more developed, works better and can have custom tunings. Albeit none steel centric.

http://www.looknohands.com

Why do you say it's "dead wrong", AJ? It shows the C major chord for open G tuning at the 5th and 17th frets, which appears to be correct to me.

maybe I misread it but, it was listing the first fret (654) as a C chord or the 2nd fret (543) as one. With the number 5 on all 3 notes. Makes no sense.

Its a great resource

I searched for weeks looking for such a tool on the internet (had completely overlooked it on Jon's site!)

Then Ray pointed out and its been a great help ever since

AJ, I had the same confusion the first time I looked at this program. Those are not frets you are looking at. Each "box" that looks like a fret is really just stand alone tab for that particular position. It is NOT a fretboard diagram!

Normally with Major tunings, we look at a full bar at the 5th fret as the full chord. John is showing 3-note chord "grips" for the many different ways to get voicings for a "C Triad".

I thought that might be the case! That is horribly bad designing then! It would really suck if a newbie lost out on the resource due to that confusion. I do hope they fix what otherwise could be a great resource.

Or, we could just say it is OUR problem, and not John's????

unfortunately Ray that's just not the case. there are standards albeit some differing and some flakey ones but, definitely more standard than that and if you deviate from them you get confusion. As an educator I have been battling for some standardization in the steel world for a few years. I consistently see new and more convoluted ways of spreading information or should i disinformation.

It maybe that we look at things differently.

When I first used the chord locater it was obvious to me what it meant and how to use it.

After seeing this thread I can see how it could be confusing to some but for me it is perfectly simple

AJ, I'm all for standardization, but it seems to be an uphill struggle. It's hard to find two people to agree on what is a standard C6 tuning. My bar is made of lead-filled glass. I don't feel quite right calling it a "steel".

Keep in mind that Mr. Ely is offering up what he has for FREE. I find the Chord Locator to be very useful for my own purposes. Sure, it would be nice if the diagram(s) would also show a separate diagram of ALL the notes for each chord, on a fingerboard. This way you could graphically see the voicings using all six strings, in some cases, like your "C" major chord example above. Until that happens, I just use a printout from another program, in conjunction with John's diagrams.

Check out this page-- it's designed a little differently and some may find it handier. Plus a generous bank of steel guitar tunings to work with.

http://www.mightyfinemusic.com/chord_finder.asp

Ray Langley wrote:AJ, I'm all for standardization, but it seems to be an uphill struggle. It's hard to find two people to agree on what is a standard C6 tuning. My bar is made of lead-filled glass. I don't feel quite right calling it a "steel".

Keep in mind that Mr. Ely is offering up what he has for FREE. I find the Chord Locator to be very useful for my own purposes. Sure, it would be nice if the diagram(s) would also show a separate diagram of ALL the notes for each chord, on a fingerboard. This way you could graphically see the voicings using all six strings, in some cases, like your "C" major chord example above. Until that happens, I just use a printout from another program, in conjunction with John's diagrams.

Standardization of tuning is a disaster but, standardization of tab is doable. Especially if you consider that the regular guitar world has got it down to one basic format with little permutation. Offering something for FREE with the best of intentions goes sour and does a disservice if it's confusing.
I have students come to me in total confusion over all the different TAB formats in the steel guitar world. This is why I encourage learning to read notes.

If you look at looknohands.com you'll see that the note names and chord degrees are also supplied. That's very beneficial as well. I(t would be of service to the steel world if this working and proven template (also offered for free by the way) were adapted to this new cho0rd generator.

Thanks, everyone, for the great comments and suggestions. I can't tell you how helpful it is to get feedback, positive and negative. I've tried to address the problem AJ had recognizing the results as Tab vs. Fretboard Diagrams. Now the user chooses which method to use. Hopefully the Tab notation looks more like the real deal now. It's really hard to spit out out Standard Notation or legitimate Tab notation on the fly using the standard PHP graphics package. The locator results are not pre-programmed -- there are billions of result sets depending on what options are selected, so the graphics delivery has to be fast. Also, the fact that my tab results are always whole notes, one per measure, make less pressing the need for legit Tab or Standard Notation.

I'm working on a results display that analyzes and labels chord tones. Great idea, Ray.

In short, I wanted to thank you all. This is a tool I've been wanting to create for years, particularly as a way to teach myself how to use open strings to create fat chords I was used to playing before chucking my pedals. I quickly realized I'd have to modify it to make it more user-friendly.

Please don't hesitate to email me or post questions or comments in this thread or on my ChordLocator message board.

Regards, John Ely

Hey John-- kudos on the website! It's already an extremely useful resource, and your desire to improve it is much appreciated.

Nice work on the PHP! Having dealt with PHP's GD functions I now what a b!#ch it can be!

John,

How bout some tunes on your site?

Drew

Yes it's a great website. I found that John will respond quickly to any suggestions you have for him.