Leaving Your Steel at Church

Tom Campbell · Post by **Tom Campbell** » 17 Sep 2009 12:42 pm

I am thinking about leaving a steel at church because I am getting tired of setting up for 4-5 songs every Sunday. The church is not in the "greatest" neighborhood, but does have an alarm system connected to a security service...albeit a little slow to respond. I was wondering what some of you "church players" do concerning leaving your steel.

Stan Schober · Post by **Stan Schober** » 17 Sep 2009 1:01 pm

I used to leave a considerable amount of tools at a school that I worked for. Ask the pastor to designate a closet that you can put it in, and install a good deadbolt lock on the door.

Darvin Willhoite · Post by **Darvin Willhoite** » 17 Sep 2009 2:59 pm

I leave mine on the stage at my church all the time. We are not in the best part of town either, but neither are we in the worst. We have had some things stolen though, but it was when the church was unlocked for various functions. We also have an alarm system.

I had two 6 string guitars stolen from the church several years ago by a handyman that had been hired to do some clean up work. I found one for sale on Ebay, the seller had bought it at a city wide garage sale, and he knew who bought the other one. I got them both back with no problems, but a broken lock on one of the cases.

Jeff Hyman · Post by **Jeff Hyman** » 17 Sep 2009 3:06 pm

Why not just call your home owners insurance agent and see what a rider will cost to keep the PSG outside your home?

Bill Stroud · Post by **Bill Stroud** » 17 Sep 2009 3:08 pm

I leave a complete setup Steel, two Amps, Seat, Volume Pedal Peterson Tuner and a lot more, I guess I've been lucky, but I've done that for years.
Bill

Jerry Eilander · Post by **Jerry Eilander** » 17 Sep 2009 11:52 pm

our church is insured for all that ,
but its little fingers that pee me off ,
a cover is a must , bar and picks away from your steel,
cheers Jerry

Tony Prior · Post by **Tony Prior** » 18 Sep 2009 12:36 am

The Church is a building.

When I played in Church I used the same logic as when I play out.

I don't leave anything behind that cannot be exactly replaced.

I left my Hartke half stack at Church, but never the Fender amps or any Instruments. At gigs I leave only the items that can be replaced very quickly and easily.

I would never leave a Steel Guitar @ Church or a gig.

Anyway, next questions ? Do you have two Steel guitars ?
How do you practice daily if you only have one ?

t

Bill Stroud · Post by **Bill Stroud** » 18 Sep 2009 1:39 am

Tony, you are right anyone could get robbed. I guess I've been lucky. I keep my Steel covered.
I've got 7 Steels but I wouldn't want any of them to be stole by a theif. But it could happen.

Larry Lorows · Post by **Larry Lorows** » 18 Sep 2009 2:42 am

I left my extra steel and amp at church and once I found my picks and bar had been moved. After that, I made sure they were put away in my seat. No problems from then on. Larry

Mark Treepaz · Post by **Mark Treepaz** » 18 Sep 2009 5:22 am

It's a sad state of affairs when you have to be concerned about safely leaving equipment in a place of worship. Oh , I know that's reality and the world we live in and all of that. Nonetheless, still sad.

Bill Ford · Post by **Bill Ford** » 18 Sep 2009 5:34 am

I leave mine at Church, never had a problem missing anything, kept under a good heavy duty "Sharp" cover,also keep picks/bar in my seat. Sometime special programs require the stage be cleared, I have a storage area for those times,sometimes use that time to take it home for string changes/maint. I have one with the same setup at home for practice.

Bill

Cal Sharp · Post by **Cal Sharp** » 18 Sep 2009 7:25 am

The chance of some cell phone driver rear-ending you and smashing your guitar is probably just as likely as getting it stolen from a church or a bar. And, yeah, good idea Bill, keep it covered with a Sharp cover.

Greg Wisecup · Post by **Greg Wisecup** » 18 Sep 2009 7:42 am

Cal, I just thought of that very issue. I put in a call to my (insurance agent) wife immediately. I have no need for full coverage on the car that I drive so I should do something. For all of us to think back on; how many hundreds or more nights have we left our gear at a long term bar gig? Kinda scary thinking back about what could have happened. Fire, theft, drunks falling onto it. I did MC a benefit years ago for a fellow who lost his bass gear in a bar fire. Other than that I don't recall ever having or hearing of any issues like that.

Mark Eaton · Post by **Mark Eaton** » 18 Sep 2009 7:42 am

We have a quality alarm system at our church, but I still wouldn't leave it there.

I am aware of a number of episodes where churches have been broken into and music gear has been stolen, so I respectfully disagree with Cal's logic.

Of course, if some burglars saw a pedal steel, they might not know what the thing is and leave it behind. $:\$

Wasn't actually in the church, because at the time we were one of those churches that leased a school auditorium for Sunday services and we had to set up and tear down each week, but we kept our equipment in one of those long white trailers (attached to an older Ford pickup) like one uses to transport custom cars and the like, and we kept it in a shopping center behind our church office in the parking lot, and on New Years Day morning about four years ago, I was scheduled to lead the band.

I receive a call at about 7 a.m. from our music director that our trailer was stolen. There was almost $20,000 in sound gear in there. I got on the phone and rustled up amps, mikes, mike stands, cables, etc. and we still had music for the service at 10:30.

I know that the thieves realized, or even knew ahead of time that the equipment belonged to a church, because there was a bunch of other stuff in there that was obviously church-related, but apparently this fact didn't give them pause because all the gear was gone when we found the pickup and trailer later that day abandoned in a field behind the local Home Depot.

Don Barnhardt · Post by **Don Barnhardt** » 18 Sep 2009 7:44 am

Like Tony said ,never leave your best stuff anywhere.

Greg Wisecup · Post by **Greg Wisecup** » 18 Sep 2009 7:47 am

My wife's reply to me.

In the house yes BUT in your car, NO. Nat????wide will not cover musicians or their gear if you play and receive any form of payment. You actually have to take out special insurance for that. I can try to find a vendor if you like. I would need year make and model numbers and serial numbers including dollar value of each item, Guitars, amps, tuner, chords ect........
I never really thought about it. Mine is covered because I don't play professionally. What a croc, I know!!!!!!

Mark Treepaz · Post by **Mark Treepaz** » 18 Sep 2009 8:01 am

Greg Wisecup wrote:My wife's reply to me.

In the house yes BUT in your car, NO. Nat????wide will not cover musicians or their gear if you play and receive any form of payment. You actually have to take out special insurance for that. I can try to find a vendor if you like. I would need year make and model numbers and serial numbers including dollar value of each item, Guitars, amps, tuner, chords ect........
I never really thought about it. Mine is covered because I don't play professionally. What a croc, I know!!!!!!

Yep. You're correct. I found that out several years ago when I bought my home. It just so happened that my insurance agent knew that I played professionally, so he made sure that my instruments weren't covered under my normal homeowners policy! And this was from an agent that my entire family used for over 25 years for all of their Home Owners AND all their vehicle insurances! Nice guy huh?

I wonder if that's governed by individual state insurance laws, or is that across-the-board for all homeowners insurance regardless of where you live?

Cal Sharp · Post by **Cal Sharp** » 18 Sep 2009 8:14 am

never leave your best stuff anywhere.

Geez, you have to leave it SOMEwhere. I left a '74 Emmons at home when I came to work this morning. I might be getting robbed right now. Probably the best thing is to get musicians' insurance, it's available, never looked into it.

Greg Wisecup · Post by **Greg Wisecup** » 18 Sep 2009 8:48 am

My wife just called me. She got one quote for about 600.00 a year

She's going to check around. I'll let you know if she finds nationally known company that's affordable.

Cal Sharp · Post by **Cal Sharp** » 18 Sep 2009 8:56 am

I typed in $10,000 here and got a quick quote of $110.
http://www.musicproinsurance.com/
Don't know anything about this company, maybe your wife does, Greg.

Greg Wisecup · Post by **Greg Wisecup** » 18 Sep 2009 9:06 am

That sounds more like it C#. I'll have her ck it out. Fine job! That's why we're paying you the big money Cal!

Jim Lindsey (Louisiana) · Post by **Jim Lindsey (Louisiana)** » 18 Sep 2009 9:10 am

I used to leave one of my steels set up at church all the time and had really good luck with it. However, I got a lesson (a tough expensive one) about leaving things of value at church when I was attending a church in Ft Smith, Arkansas.

The church in question had a weekly radio spot and no way to get a good recording, so I took two Peavey CD-30 microphones, a $3,000 TEAC reel-to-reel and a Pioneer CT-F750 cassette deck over there to set up and allow them to record decent tapes to take over to the radio station for airing.

In the mean time, the band I was with had an out of town gig to do, so I left my recording rig at the church with the confidence that everything would be all right.

When I went back to the church after my gig, I found all of my recording rig gone and the pastor sheepishly explaining that the assistant pastor had "backslid" and stolen them. The church had no insurance and the pastor, while apologetic that my equipment was gone, said that I should just forget and drop the matter as well as forgive the backslidden assistant pastor for the theft and quoted something like "if a man taketh thy coat, give him thy cloak also".

Despite bringing the police into the picture, nothing was ever resolved. No one in the church would testify or witness against the felonious assistant pastor and my recording gear was never recovered.

Lesson learned ... I never leave anything of value anywhere unless I know for certain that the venue has insurance to cover theft or damage.

Mark Treepaz · Post by **Mark Treepaz** » 18 Sep 2009 9:11 am

Cal Sharp wrote:I typed in $10,000 here and got a quick quote of $110.
http://www.musicproinsurance.com/
Don't know anything about this company, maybe your wife does, Greg.

Reading up on it, it doesn't like seem too bad of a deal. The actual carrier of the policy is Hanover.

Luke Morell · Post by **Luke Morell** » 18 Sep 2009 9:27 am

I use to leave my steel and lead guitar at church, but it got broken into

a couple weeks ago, and had some stuff stolen. So now I bring my stuff home.

Tom Campbell · Post by **Tom Campbell** » 18 Sep 2009 12:33 pm

I guess one solution mentioned is to lock it up in some type of storage closet and make sure your home owners insurance covers your guitar in a "not-for-profit" environment.
If I was to pick up and move the guitar to a storage area, I might as well just pack it up and haul it home. Its a nice Sierra Session and I would hate to lose it.
The church does a certain amount of mission work with substance abuse individuals and their meetings are held in the sanctuary where the instruments are in view...possible temptation