The Steel Guitar Forum

What should a beginner avoid doing, or what are some of the pitfalls that you overcame that made you a better player? Think about it. If you were to start all over again, what would you not do in your practice or playing that you once started out doing but later found to work against your development? With all the great players on this forum it must be easy to come up with a top 10 list of things to avoid. <font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Jack Latimer on 07 May 2005 at 02:41 AM.]</p></FONT>

Buying a Steel!!!

My drug store bill for ant-acids wouldn't be nearly so high!!

I think starting with out instructional aids would be my #1 thing..

Larry

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Emmons S/D-10, 3/4, Sessions 400 Ltd. Home Grown E/F Rack
"ROCKIN COUNTRY"

1. Never waste your time and money on teachers, books, videos and other teaching methods. You're smart, you can figure this all out by yourself.

2. Pump the volume pedal up and down to camoflage your poor blocking technique.

3. Use exaagerated vibrato on every note to hide your poor intonation.

4. When working, for example, the AB pedals, move your left foot back and forth from left to right to go from B to A to BA, to avoid having to learn how to pivot your ankle properly.

5. Don't worry about your body-to-steel geometry. Real steel players can tough it out regardless of how poorly it fits, and that pain in your arm and legs is nothing.

6. Don't work carefully on playing single notes and chords to a good reference source tone to develop your intonation. Remember Rule # 3.

7. Don't practice lots of different roll patterns and the various permutations of them - you wouldn't want to make the steel sound like a banjo, which also uses many of these same rolls and techniques.

8. Just find one comfortable way to do something, learn to do it at warp speed, don't ever bother with different approaches, and be sure to apply that lick everywhere you can think of to impress everybody.

9. Never, ever learn music theory or how to read musical notation. They'll suck the soul right out of you.

10. Never practice to a metronome or drum machine. Timing is instinctive - either you're born with it or there's nothing you can do to develop it.

11. When you're practicing along to a record, make sure the record is so loud that neither you or anyone else can hear how poorly or out of tune you're playing.

12. Never slow difficult passages down and try to learn them slowly - that's for wimps. Just tough it out at full speed till you get it. In fact, the faster, the better.

13. Don't ever leave the woodshed to play with other people until you're convinced you are a brilliant player. Playing with people requires no special training if you can just play everything fast enough.

14. If you do get out with people, to get good and practiced at playing and to show everyone how much you've improved, make sure that you play fills continuously during a song: when the singer is singing, when the singer isn't singing, when someone else is taking a solo, and during all intros and outros. In fact, you should noodle around audibly between songs to keep limber and demonstrate your prowess.

15. Finally, never, ever join the Steel Guitar Forum. You might never come up for air.

Dave Mudgett

<SMALL>11. When you're practicing along to a record, make sure the record is so loud that neither you or anyone else can hear how poorly or out of tune you're playing.</SMALL>

Hey! You stole that page out of my book on vocal technique!

Sheesh!
Charlie <font size="1" color="#8e236b"><p align="center">[This message was edited by Charles Dempsey on 06 May 2005 at 10:01 PM.]</p></FONT>

Well seriously, AHEM, I can tell you what I did, I've been at it for 26 years. Played by myself in my house with instructional mateials, the Winnie Winston book being the main man. I remember one night I played all night long with no amp, so as not to disturb the household, and this was my best learing experience at home. After about a year (part time, I have a day job) I got into a band and this was the best learning experience of all. Just keep at it, and good luck.

Jon

do not practice vibrato until you can play in tune without it

Dave:
That reply is a bookful. I think I'll have to paste that on my wall.

What's sad is that #9 and 13 seem to be true.

Avoid lifting the bar.

Before anyone jumps on me about that, let me explain. For several years when I started playing I was unaware of right hand blocking techniques. It was easy enough to just lift the bar to stop the notes from sounding. Problem is, lifting the bar makes a noise that is inappropriate for many types of music.

It took me about a year to break that bad habit and learn to block properly.

Today I lift the bar frequently for the traditional effect in blues, or when simulating country Dobro parts. But most of the time the bar stays on the strings, as it should.

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<font size="1"><img align=right src="http://b0b.com/Hotb0b.gif" width="96 height="96">Bobby Lee - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs, Open Hearts
Sierra SD-12 (Ext E9), Williams D-12 Crossover, Sierra S-12 (F Diatonic)
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Pumping the volume pedal. Play without one sometimes when you practice. Learn to control volume with your hands.

Professional players rarely use the "no attack, swell" technique. That's what I mean by "pumping". It's cliche and it makes you sound like a total amateur.

Pumping the volume pedal is an easy habit to fall into. As a former drummer, I find myself stomping on that thing like a kick drum sometimes. Any suggestions? Just not using it while practicing doesn't seem like it's going to fix the problem. I'm trying to force myself to not get into the habit, but when I get deep in thought about my left and right hands, sometimes my old drummer's foot has mind of it's own.

Jack, I did that badly at first. For me, it was a way to cover serious technique problems. I started playing the steel out right after I started playing, ready or not - my band needed a steel player, there wasn't one available, so I was it. It didn't help me to practice without the volume pedal, since my foot subconsciously made the pedal moves anyway, and I didn't even get the feedback that the volume was changing. The only thing that helped was to force myself keep the pedal to the metal all the time for a while when practicing. I think I started getting used to it, although it's natural to use the volume pedal as a noise gate also when hum starts to get annoying in quiet passages.

It's really just this simple: Listen to every player you can. Learn all styles of playing and don't limit yourself. Associate with other good pickers and you'll find yourself learning from these guys. Take your time and my thing is "NEVER QUIT". I've been playing about 35 years and I'm still learning. The sky's the limit!

I went straight from being a drummer to steel player also. What helped me out a lot was to sit at my steel and "pretend" to play along with a song with only my hands (not necessarily paying close attention to whether I fretting correctly or not) with no amp. My main focus was to get through the song with my right foot never moving on the volume pedal during the song. After a little while, you will find that you will gain control over your right leg/foot as you need.

You folks are the best and b0b what a great site.

Billy: I don't plan to quit. I get a bit more excited with every step up in the learning curve. I'm only crawling, but hope to be able to run someday.

Richard: Nice to hear a fellow drummers thoughts. I'm going to try that tip.

Dave: I just can't imagine playing out right from the start. You must have far more talent than I do. A fire wouldn't clear a room as fast as my playing would.

Thanks again folks!

If you play a guitar, you place your finger in back of the fret. On a steel guitar, you place the bar exactly on the fret. This is hard to keep in mind. Especially the first 3 or 4 frets, since your viewing angle is so askewed.

Your seating position and height will determine the angle, so listening carefully is very inportant.

CEW

Ditto to all that volume pedal advice. One of the first things that gives away an inexperienced player is their poor volume pedal technique .....

Uh, Jack, if you had heard it, you might not feel this way. What I didn't say is that I brought a B-Bender Tele for when I got into trouble, which was plenty.

But I do think most players wait too long to play out. There are things one learns only during trial by fire.

I'll go the opposite way - the single most important thing you should do is figure out why you're trying to play pedal steel guitar. If you want to get a job playing hits in a bar band, that will dictate a different approach than using steel as one component of recording original compositions. If you're playing music in order to keep your brain alive in the face of an onslaught of cultural mediocrity, lean your learning more towards music theory, if you're trying to pick up chicks a more portable instrument might be in order. Music can be either a solitary or communal experience, or both. If you're playing just for fun, figure out what makes you happy and focus your masochism in that direction.

Right Hand Technique.

If you don't have someone who can show you how to work your right hand properly, get Jeff Newman's "Right Hand Alpha" DVD. I'd been playing for about 6 months when I got the DVD and my tone was much improved (many times over) within 30 minutes. After about 2 weeks many things I'd been struggling with for months started to fall in place. I certainly wasted a lot of time doing things wrong.

Stay focused on playing well. AVOID gadgets.
Good strings, picks, a bar or two, volume pedal and amp. Are really all that is needed.
Add a simple reverb if you like.

It is still easy for me to get off track wondering about impedance, hum, pickups, delays, fancy tuners, all kinds of holders, seats, music stands, etc it never ends.

Maybe I need the diversion as an excuse to not practice.

hope this helps

Never remember, or bother to write down, the knob positions on your NV 400, (or other goodies) so's that when you get to a practise session or a gig, you gotta spend a half hour finding your tone again, whilst annoying the local townspeople with open string serenade.

Thanks again folks. Zaim, I sent you a personal email with a question concerning the Jeff Newman DVD. I've heard so many good comments about this DVD.