The Steel Guitar Forum

He played on an album by Bakersfield boy Lewis Talley and the Tallywhackers circa 1969,70 or thereabouts, titled "Nightime at Pat and Charlies". He was a very good player.

Frank Hardcastle was a wonderfully nice guy and a superb pedal steel and guitar player. We met in 1973 at the Stallion Club in Oxnard, CA where he played the devil out of his Fender 2000 double neck in Toby Rean's band. He gave me some of my first lessons on pedal steel and always made time for my many annoying questions about steel guitar and how it worked. Frank was truly a master of the instrument, especially in the Bakersfield style. I hope he is still alive and well; I haven't spoken with him in decades.

Truly a fine person and a stellar musician.

Steve Fishell

Thank you Steve. You are a great steeler as well.

The last time I spoke to Frankie on the phone, he was living in Texas. He said he was unable to play anymore due to arthritis.
As Fish said, he was a master on his Fender '2000.

I saw Frank at the ISGC a number of years ago.(1990s?) He played A D-12 Emmons PSG. I bought his cassette with about 12 tunes on it. A unique tune I believe he wrote & was played on the C-6 tuning was entitled: "Somewhere In France".

Roger

I had the great pleasure to run into Frank, I think about 25 years ago. It was definitely during the time Russ Rask was publishing the Steel Guitar World magazine.

He was living in Arkanas and picking with a band out of Joplin, MO. He had mastered a Yamaha synth thing hooked up to his steel and had some really cool things worked out on it, the most memorable being Ghost Riders in the Sky. It was just too cool for school! All they guys in the band called him Daddy Frank.

He was very nice and very encouraging to a younger guy (me) who had an interest in steel.

His back neck was A6.

If we're talking about the same guy, there was a "Daddy Frank" Hardcastle in Ft Smith, Arkansas for awhile who played with Whatta Band for a time. I really enjoyed his playing and he was a super nice guy. Not too long after he left Whatta Band, I joined the group and had a great time with them.

I last saw Frank years ago at the John Wayne Theater in Knotts Berry Farm in Buena Park, Ca. Frank was playing in a trio with an old friend of mine named Toby Minter, just steel bass & drums. Toby was band leader and lead vocalist as well as drummer and used the last name "Rean" for some reason or other. Toby and I worked for Fred Maddox for awhile and I think Frank might have visited us at the club but that was in the sixties and my memory's a little fuzzy for that period. But for sure, Frank was an excellent player who could cover all the bases on steel as he showed with Toby's band. Ballads, rockers or whatever, he could do 'em all.........JH in Va.

Jerry, Toby's middle name was Rean, that was the name change from Minter. We worked together right after he got out of High School. As you said, we usually worked a trio, until he hired Big Bill Garner, a great lead player that we all worked with.
It was an honor to be a pallbearer at his funeral here in Bakersfield.
Sorry to get away from Frankie Hardcastle, but it all ties together, with a great steel player.

Frank Hardcastle subbed for me a couple of times I had to be away for surgery. This was on "The Little O' Oprey". When I got back I had many of our regular attendees ask me why I can't make my guitar sound like a keyboard, horns, violins etc.!! He was a great player. At that time he lived in Bentonville, AR I believe or perhaps Rogers, AR. Those cities are grown together as if they are one.
He was also a master with the delay pedal. His version of "Ghost Riders In The Sky" was awesome.
Jerry

I know this is an old thread but if it's the same Frank Hardcastle. he's married to my aunt and living in Rogers, Arkansas. She's in her 90's but real sharp - I talked to her today and she mentioned that Frank had sold his equipment recently because there was not much work anymore. She married him after my uncle died in the 80's and they lived around Rogers then moved to Texas for a few years but went back to Arkansas in the last year or so. If anyone would like to contact him, I'll be glad to pass along a phone number to him. Just PM me with your info and I'll call them. I've never met or talked to him but would like to get acquainted one of these days.

Just got off the phone talking to Frank for about a half hour - he is, indeed the same Frank Hardcastle. I sent him the link to this page. Very nice man - I enjoyed talking to him and we'll stay in touch.

Here's Frankie working out in 1957 with Johnny Cuviello's band:

http://picosong.com/Jyn5

Red Simpson on guitar; Johnny Cuviello, drums.

I got to know Frankie in the early 1980s when he was working with the house band at the Borden Hotel in Whitehall, Montana. He was a monster player on his Fender 2000. He claimed Leo Fender had given him the guitar. He showed me the serial number one night. It was something like 00010000. He said it was the first one built after the prototype. He was something. Played A6 and C6 tunings. He called the E9 tuning “corny.” He could play E9 Nashville licks, he could thump pick like Chet or Travis, he could do big band horn arrangements. He’d even stand the bar on the pointed end and play single note runs that if you weren’t looking you would have sworn was a telecaster. He could do it all. And he was good friends with Norm Hamlet too.