The Steel Guitar Forum

Hey y’all, I tried finding maybe an older post regarding this but had no luck. No real reason for wanting to know this other than pure curiosity.
Can you give me some example of C6 playing that isn’t jazz or swing?
Maybe songs in the same realm of night life or walking after midnight.
Songs that are otherwise structured like a classic country song/shuffle or even a slower ballad if such a thing exists.
I lived in New Orleans for a spell and was fortunate enough to see Chris Acker very often.
His steel player, Nikolai Shveitser, would sometimes play nearly the whole set on his C6 neck, slow songs and all. Tough finding video of this though.
Don’t post much here but just a random thought. Thanks.

Older Carl Smith tunes with Johnny Sibert on steel. I think he used C6 mostly. Jerry Byrd played C6 on country records(early Hank Williams like “I’m so Lonesome I could Cry”) and his own solo records. They weren’t all Hawaiian, some were 40s/50s pop. By the way, I’m pretty sure that Don Helms used his E6 tuning for “Walking After Midnight” just for the record.

great neck for rock and blues. listen to buddy on witches brew. the three frets above pocket is minor pentatonic scale. you can get twangy baritone guitar on the low strings.

Seeing your batman shirt I guess you know who Neal Hefti is who wrote and performed the Batman Theme. Neal also had a great big band song called "Cute" which plays well on C6.

My humble version here:

http://www.gregcutshaw.com/Tab/Cute.wma

Steel tab here:

http://www.gregcutshaw.com/Tab/Tab6.html


An orchestra version of Neal's here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igY_DQzk4HY

Pete Drake recorded a lot of E9-sounding stuff on C6, pretty sure this is one: https://youtu.be/9xIxlNPYXH0

Jimmie Crawford did bluegrassy things like John Henry on C6. check out his excellent Rhode Island Red (at 22 mins): https://youtu.be/gjsiGn9nYyY
this one is more of a boogie: https://youtu.be/702eCqerPUc

Emmons did this classical piece: https://youtu.be/oVA8jOHdehk
and Jernigan does similar stuff, check out his version of Streets of Laredo (at 14:25): https://youtu.be/30KuxFzXfdk

also Buddy's version of the (semi-jazz) ballad Here's That Rainy Day: https://youtu.be/6qgvUCpd4NM

I attempt to play all kinds of non-swing/jazz on the back neck... learned a bunch of Beatles tunes on C6 in the last year. yesterday I was working on a horror movie medley for Halloween

good to see Nikolai mentioned, he's an incredible player and a great guy!

Some of Hank Thompson's stuff kind of falls in this category. Hank is generally sort of considered western swing it seems, but some (a lot?) of his music kind of blurs the lines between western swing and honky tonk. And the C6-ish playing on his records sounds like C6 and yet it isn't really 'jazzy' per se.

For example, it is easy to imagine the steel solo from this song being played in a more typical "E9" style and yet there it is on C6 (well technically I think it might have been Bb6, but same idea). Not sure if that's what you meant, but there's my two cents! Some great steel playing here regardless:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_qn1p7 ... ycoolsound

And here is Speedy West. I'm not a big fan of Tennessee Ernie (corny IMO), but the band cooks on this. My favourite part is after around 8:50. He's playing E6 and has his B lowered to A# for most of that solo. Can easily be played on C6 (with G lowered to F#).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQ-GZmH ... =ChrisClem

Oh and this is C6 (Buddy Emmons playing with Faron Young):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVgUoX- ... oung-Topic

Look for Curly Chalker, Shadow of your smile and so on. Curly used the C6 frequently on country stuff, and he was a master player.

Here's a tune I've seen played on E9 a lot, but in C6 here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_M5TfX1ipk

On Roger Miller’s A Trip In the Country Buddy plays backup on E9 and solos on C6 on many of the songs. That solo on Tall Tall Trees is so cool….

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CIkkQUyip ... 3s&index=1

Scott!

Thanks for reminding me about Doug's 'Streets of Laredo'!

I've just been trying to figure it out; it's a real brain-teaser and the grips are challenging, to say the least!

My favourite C6th piece is still Mike Smith's 'Jesus Loves Me' - the second verse where he plays the substitute chords and moving lines. It's brilliant, in my opinion.

I can't find a link to the audio. Can anybody else?

Not sure exactly what you're looking for, but lots of the old Pete Drake stuff was on C6th, and it certainly fulfills the "no jazz, no swing" category:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adUR32v--f0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3GzB57ZWJo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMwR1kXuGzk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZwTQ5uVRqw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O62UtOvYHkE

Thanks for all of your interesting replies to my vague question. I have listened to Curly Chalker fairly extensively. I heard once that he played for Hank Locklin early in his career. Does anyone know which recordings these would be or did he play on all of the early Locklin stuff?

Hal Merrill has been getting into Bach:

https://youtu.be/it_gR6We4LU

Camden Pugh wrote: Can you give me some example of C6 playing that isn’t jazz or swing?

Great question that I’ve also had. Will Van Horn’s excellent instrumental EP “Pedal Steel Guitar” is all C6 neck I believe.

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5 ... 00utaaKmZU

Paul Franklin's second solo on Alan Jackson's "I Don't Even Know Your Name." At about 3:15.
https://youtu.be/-aNjYlgwBN0

Thanks Camden and Scott for the kind words. If anything, do not follow my lead on non-jazz c6 playing! lol


+1 on the Pete Drake recommendations, I believe he had a high G in his c6 that he pulled to an A, which imo he used to great Mooney-esque effect. Even without that pull, you can get a lot of early E9 playing on a standard C6 copedent although it's going to have a different timbre due to the different tuning and string gauges.

Here's Paul Franklin demonstrating all that and more:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IE30Ixh8nrs

The Will Van Horn stuff is super cool and a great example of C6 outside of the jazz/swing idiom.

i thought i could cop some of the moves of an E9 pedal steel on my C6 lap steel in the early busking days, more out of necessity than anything else, lol.

Billy Robinson blows my gourd with his smooth, intelligent E9-informed playing on a non-pedal guitar:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2nXkL8V9P8

I believe Paul Franklin plays C6 on a George Strait song called Haven’t You Heard. There was a discussion on the forum about it. Players were baffled by the recurring lick in the song because it is straight-ahead modern honky tonk as it gets and everyone just assumed it was done in E9. So Paul chimed in on the discussion and solved the mystery.

The lick comes in on the 2nd chorus, but you can hear by itself at the end of the song. It’s so cool!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=O2L465MF4_o

It’s just a lick, I know. But it really opened up some minds here on the forum. Sorry I can’t find the topic in a search.

Also, if I’m not mistaken, Rusty Young played some of his wild n crazy stuff on C6.

I think C6 is pretty ripe for blues. I used to play my Stringmaster C6 neck in a rock band I was in.