C6 Copedant Help Request.

Bryan Bradfield · Post by **Bryan Bradfield** » 8 May 2003 5:32 pm

I'm a seasoned country & bluegrass dobroist. I've never played pedal steel. I have an 8 string Sierra Rock Slide, modified to work with 3 pedals. I want to set it up the with tones 6,1,3,5,6,1,3,5 low to high, similar to the top 8 strings of the Jimmy Day C6 tuning (A,C,E,G,A,C,E,G), shown in the tunings section of this web site. I want to play primarily western swing, and then possibly big band swing. With 3 pedals at my disposal, what are some recommendations for copedant? In a way, I'm asking what your most used, and most useful pedals are.

I would be willing to combine a pedal change with a knee lever change if strongly recommended, or two pedal changes into one pedal. I'd like to also know whether any of the recommendations need to be adjacent to one another, for pressing both together.

I'd like to know the "why" of your recommendations. What chord(s) would the pedal(s) provide?

Remember, I don't have the bottom 2 strings, and I don't yet want to add knee levers, or more pedals.

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Larry Bell · Post by **Larry Bell** » 8 May 2003 5:52 pm

My opinion:
#1 gives you F9 by raising 2 E to F and lowering 6 E to Eb

#2 gives you D9 by lowering 1 and 5 from G to F# and raise 7 from C to D

#3 gives you A7 by raising 3 and 7 from C to C# (leave out the top change for a 7#9)

Playing out of C root, this gives you a full I VI II V progression within 2 frets

Realize that the standard C6 setup calls for 10 strings and 5 pedals and one or more levers, so you're giving up A LOT. Within those constraints, these 3 changes give you a lot of possibilities.

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Larry Bell - email: larry@larrybell.org - gigs - Home Page
2003 Fessenden S/D-12 8x8, 1969 Emmons S-12 6x6, 1971 Dobro, Standel and Peavey Amps

C Dixon · Post by **C Dixon** » 8 May 2003 7:39 pm

My suggestion would differ from Larry's only in pedal 7 for pedal 8. IE instead of the Amaj/minor pedal (or "raised 9th" as some call it), I would opt for the major 9th voicings. That is raise 3 and 4 a whole tone, Particularly for "western swing" type tunes.

Having said that, it would be very hard for me to live with just 3 pedals on a C6 tuning. IF one could have one more pedal and at least one knee lever, I would add the Amaj/minor pedal and lower the top C to a B with that knee lever.

If there is ANY way you can have at LEAST a knee lever with 3 pedals, hook it up that way. You will never want to be without if you do.

Good luck and may Jesus bless you in your quests,

carl

Larry Bell · Post by **Larry Bell** » 9 May 2003 6:52 am

It's true
Any 3 pedal setup on C6, especially when you don't have the full tuning, is a BIG COMPROMISE.

After thinking about it more, I would ditch the G on top and put F on the bottom. There's A WHOLE LOT MORE you can do when you have that root note on the bottom. Carl mentions P7 which gives you a CMa9 chord and, indeed, the Ma7 family is not well represented in my offering -- BUT -- with F on the bottom, you have several inversions of a nice FMa7 or Ma9 chord.

No matter what you choose, you'll be missing A LOT from the standard C6 setup. HOWEVER, there's still a lot of music in the no pedals C6 tuning, so is the glass half empty or half full? (you'll have to answer that one)

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Larry Bell - email: larry@larrybell.org - gigs - Home Page
2003 Fessenden S/D-12 8x8, 1969 Emmons S-12 6x6, 1971 Dobro, Standel and Peavey Amps

Jerry Hayes · Post by **Jerry Hayes** » 9 May 2003 11:00 am

Hey Bryan,
Since you're a seasoned Bluegrass/Country Dobro player, why don't you use a G6th instead of a C6th as you're already used to the chord positions and such. I see you have an eight string tuning. On my Dobro and lap steel I use a G6th which is low to high...B D E G B D. To get those some scale positions you mentioned just use that tuning and add a G in the 7th spot and a C# in the 8th. Some changes you might try are as follows:

P1...raise the 2nd string B to C, lower the 5th string D to C, and lower the 6th string B to Bb. this will give you a good 4 chord with a dominant 7th.

P2...lower the 2nd and 5th string D's to C# and lower the 2nd & 6th string B's to A. this will give you the 2 chord with a dominant 7th on the 3rd and 7th strings.

P3...you should have a 6 chord with a 7th also so you already have the root on the 4th & 8th strings so you could just raise the 3rd and 7th string G's to G#.

There are a lot of other changes you could use but I'd try these if you have the capabilities........JH

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Livin' in the Past and the Future with a 12 string Mooney Universal tuning.

Doug Seymour · Post by **Doug Seymour** » 9 May 2003 4:40 pm

I have a S10 (it happens to be a keyless Excel, but that is irrelevant for what we're talking about here) I have 3 pedals & 5 knees and tune it to C6th. I have played C6th
since 1948 and with pedals since 1954. My first knee lever came on a 1968 Baldwin model ShoBud D10 cross over (also my first 10 string necks.....played 6 & 8 string tunings before that) Bobbe had me put the F note on my Fender 400 before he got me the cross-over. On the 8 string Fender 400 my top string was E. As (was it Carl) someone suggested adding the F on the 8th string (it had been a G) made it a greater tuning in my opinion.....Bobbe showed me some nice 4 pick grips for nice block chords! Very modern sounding! I have used P7 (the std set-up) on my RKL since 1973 & the normal P5 & p6 played w/the left foot combined with this KL
will cover a lot of ground for you. I think, doing it over again @ this point I'd say set up the 3 pedals near the center of the guitar
(to enable playing P3 w/your right foot) and add all the knee levers you could, to get all the other nice changes & combinations. I was looking @ Buddy Emmons C6th on b0b's site the other day......looks as good as anyone would need, to me! I like his 4 knees! Without the boowah P8 I think I'd also raise string 7 (the lower C) to C#. Adds some nice
positions & makes up for the fact that you don't have a G on top.[This message was edited by Doug Seymour on 09 May 2003 at 05:43 PM.]

Doug Seymour · Post by **Doug Seymour** » 9 May 2003 4:52 pm

I'm not computer literate enough to post my copedent on this forum, but for what it's worth, I'll gladly send it to anyone who might be interested. P7 on my RKL was "stolen" from Weldon Myrick's copedant in Winnie Winston's book. I doubt Weldon uses it now?
[This message was edited by Doug Seymour on 09 May 2003 at 05:53 PM.]

Bryan Bradfield · Post by **Bryan Bradfield** » 9 May 2003 6:19 pm

I'm grateful for the thoughtful responses. You've tended to resist moving me towards more pedals, and knee levers, as I had requested. Larry Bell - you had it right when you said that my glass is either half full or half empty. I consider it to be half full. I've recently become acquainted with forumite Harold Leach, of Eckville, Alberta, Canada. He commented that one can study the A & B pedals on the E9 neck for years and never capture all of the power within them. This statement suggests to me that my 3 pedal, 8 string studies will challenge me for some time to come.

The main point of disagreement among you seems to be in what I use for the first string, and for the eighth string. I'll be considering this for a few days. I strongly believe I'll want to keep the 5th scale tone (G in C6) on the top, but I am leaning toward changing the 8th string.

Jerry Hayes - you suggested using G6. Actually, that was my intent. I asked for responses in C6, as I thought that would be a more common, or natural way for most forumites to respond. I intended to transpose the responses from C6 to G6. Interestingly, I've been using a variant of your 6 string G6 tuning. I tune to GBEGBD, rather than your BDEGBD. I'm uncomfortable with my variant. At this point I've been playing the 8 string in the EGBDEGBD tuning without pedals for a couple of weeks. I am much more comfortable in having the D & G on either side of the E. I guess it's all those years of dobro playing.