The Steel Guitar Forum

B Minor with a diminished 7th tuning.

I was wondering if anyone knows the tuning for this for an 8 string?

I cannot seem to find any information on it other than one of Hank Thompson's steel player used to use it and Mr. Thompson was a big fan of it.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Andrew OSullivan wrote:B Minor with a diminished 7th tuning.

It'd help if you spelled the tuning, low to high

Seems as though you would need the following tones:

1 - b3 - b5 - 6 (bb7)

or

B - D - F - Ab


For an 8 string, I guess you could just go:

1. Ab
2. F
3. D
4. B
5. Ab
6. F
7. D
8. B

Hmmm. Never heard of such a tuning . It's of course not impossible, but I'd bet if you scratch below the surface you'll find one of the standard steel tunings - like C6th - either tuned down a whole step or with one or two strings altered. Players back in the day didn't always use correct music theory when talking about their tunings.

I first came across the tuning in the book Mel Bay presents the Hawaiian Steel, Vol 1 but they just have it for a six string. I didn't think anything of it since I only had two single necks guitar at the time, tuned to C6th and E13, but then I saw Asleep at the Wheel at Gruene Hall in May and I asked their steel guitarist what tunings he used for his 4 neck Fender and he and he mentioned that one as the last one and he mentioned it is a bit of an obscure one. I found the Hank Thompson reference in the Bear Family boxset and he mentioned how he really liked the sound of that tuning but I just double checked and it is a B flat 7th, not a B minor 7th.

Also I am not sure what Mr. William means by spelling the tuning low to high. Any insight would be appreciated.

Possibly B11th