The Steel Guitar Forum

As a new steel player I am trying very hard to learn to play by ear and try to stay away from tabs and I feel I'm doing quite well but for the life of me I'm having a hard time with the intro with Brad Paisley's Welcome to the Future. Can anyone help?

Warren, I don't say this to be funny or sarcastic but it appears that you’re asking for tab.
I don't think you’re being fair to yourself by limiting the learning process to just using your ear.
I would use the "Oh yeow!" method of using tab.
You look over the tab till you see about where everything is played on the neck and then you fold up the tab book and then practice by ear and then for the parts you couldn't play you open the tab book and find that part "Oh yeow!" that's the way that goes.
After a lot of practice and a lot of "Oh yeow!" you discover that most steel guitar playing is "Oh yeow!" followed closely by another "Oh yeow!" followed by a lot more "Oh yeow!"

I find that the best way to learn a lick is to record it (on the computer), and isolate just a couple of seconds at a time, letting it loop while I find the best way for me to play it with my slightly non-standard copedent.

Bo, It's not that I'm opposed to tabs at all.I just thought that I would learn more about playing the steel by ear. I would appreciate it very much if someone had a tab of the intro. And Richard i have never tried to record onto the computer but it sounds like a very interesting way to achive that goal.

This might get you in the ballpark:

First riff


Second riff

Richard thank you very much! I am in Las Vegas for a couple of days and can't wait till I get home to try it. I was real close to that as i recall. Its so nice to have help form experts like yourself and Bo and many others. This is a wonderful Forum!

Warren, you may want to try this:

Fred,

Thank you for the tabs. I will definitely give this a try when I get home next week. If I could find a pedal steel guitar here in Vegas, I would give it a try now! Thanks again!

well what I hear is not off the B pedal but rather the 13 fret ( D) position , Less energy less pedal movement.

yes many redundant positons but then it gets down to how much energy and pedal movement is there..

When I sit down to take a lick apart the first thing I listen for is the energy and the phrasing..the little stuff that is real important...

First I played this one on the telecaster to get the "degree" of notes then I layed it out in a few positions to get the feel and the "energy exerted " by Randal..

Here is what I hear , 3 elements with minimal pedal action and they flow very nicely across the D chord and end on the root G. And don't forget, we are allowed to move the bar !

remember, think relative positions, not necessarily AB at first...

this one has the E raised (8th string) for the first phrase element.

just another option for you...

hope it helps, here is a short MP3
www.tprior.com/future.mp3

Hi Warren
I just seen your post, do it like Richard has tabed it for you, He nailed it all.
Keith

I vote for Richard's version

Brandon

I thank you all for helping me on this one! Keith, your son Randle is one heck of a Steel Guitar Player! I heard he picked it up from you. His musical talent matches the Brad Paisley talent to the T!

I am a beginner and find it hard to figure out. Richard's stuff here is good but I was hoping to find tabs for more of the song.

Like the parts that start at 1:36 1:50 and 4:12 of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwKht1_SyXU