The Steel Guitar Forum

Does anyone here play lap steel in standard guitar tuning? Pros and cons appreciated.

For single-note runs you may find it easier... but when you want to get polyphonic you run into problems.

I came to steel from slide guitar... first you're doing it in EADGBE, then you put the guitar into a tuning, say E chord, A chord, or G low bass... never moving more than two frets due to tension problems. Then... why not lay it down!?

While a nice 1-3 or 2-4 string diatonic dyad can be played with slants, the 3-5 string dyad requires a two-fret slant for the minor... not fun. And the EADGBE strum just doesn't sound good.

Then, when you're ready to make three-note maj/min chords, you get into the 6th tunings... these require string changes, you can't use regular guitar strings to only span an octave and a 1/3. Close harmonies are where steel guitar lives, for me.

So... no, not many folks string up a lapsteel in standard tuning, in my experience.

No, but I do have one in Dave Gilmour's G6 which is close - low to high DGDGBE which is good for rock style playing.

Fat power chord on the botton - major triad on strings 234 and minor on 123. Easy to strum avoiding the 6th note on the top string (the "H Bomb") and, as a guitar player, you know where all the notes are on the top 4 strings fpr single note stuff.

The Em11 tuning of a standard 6 string guitar makes sense when you have frets and fingers available to fret simultaneously up and down the fretboard. The same tuning sequence that makes sense on a guitar becomes very complicated to use with a steel laid across the strings.

I think that you’ll find that if any players here are using that tuning, it’s probably going to be for a specific song or two.

Probably the easiest tuning for a guitar player to learn quickly would be open E, EBEG#BE. Changing one of the B strings to a C# will give you E6/C#m7, and open up a whole bunch more possibilities.

Reinhard,

I really like the open G tuning (GBDGBD) for lap steel, and Dobro as well. Strings 4, 3, and 2 in this tuning are the same as Standard tuning - if that's what you're familiar with. Check it out.

Have fun,

Ian