The Steel Guitar Forum

Hi lapsteelers,

Beatles again, and this time it's Michelle by Paul McCartney, another favorite of mine
(and we named our first daughter after this song).
It took a lot of time and choices to get the arrangement ready, but again it shows: it's possible in C6 !
It's a delicat song to work on, the tablature is just cold notes, so bring it alive . . .

My version on YouTube is here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENKYAFtF-1s

Below are the first bars, and if like the challenge, just mail me,
and I'll send you the complete PDF and the mp3 backing track.
Hope you like it, let me know!
All the best,
Bert

That YouTube segment is phenomenal!

Thanks John!

Absolute great and beautiful!

Hi Bert, love your arrangements of Moon River and Michelle. Would be very grateful if you could send me the tabs/backing tracks. I've sent you a message/email.

Thanks

Sounds very good...One of my Favorite Beatle songs.

This is great! Bert, I’ve sent the email.

When I was a kid taking lap steel lessons in the ‘60s, I would bug the studio owners for Rock material to learn instead of always playing Hawaiian, old country, and gospel.

The studio owners were Southern folks who had moved to the Bay Area, and they weren’t too hot on the idea of rock and roll lap steel. This was several years prior to David Lindley putting it on the map with Jackson Browne.

I think the closest I got with The Beatles were Michelle and If I Fell. But I recall playing those songs in the traditional low bass “A” tuning.

It will be fun to give it a whirl in C6.

Hi Mark, I suppose in the meantime you've learned to play C6 too ?
When you're used to open tunings the "6th" can be an obstacle in the beginning.
But the combinations and slants of C6 are great !
By the way, I did If I Fell a few years ago, so I'll add that song too in my mail. Good luck !

Hey Bert - thanks for both of the songs, and getting them out to me so quickly.

In the Bay Area music studio where I took lessons as a kid in 1964 (for about 3 years) I think they sort of “borrowed” from the Oahu method of teaching steel guitar (which if memory serves went out of business a few years later) and combined it with Jerry Byrd’s teaching method where you start out in Open A then progress through other tunings and finally end up at C6. But it was a long time ago so a lot of the memories have faded. What happened with me is in my early twenties in the mid ‘70s acoustic and bluegrass music was exploding in California so I took up dobro at that point. And when I got back into lap steel later it was more about hearing David Lindley with Jackson Browne so I gravitated to open tunings for rock and blues lap steel, and I didn’t go after C6 at the time. I’ve only returned to it in the past several years, but it’s been slow going because I don’t lock myself in the woodshed enough to get really good at it.

In the playing out opportunities I’ve had I have stuck with the open tunings because typical C6 songs haven’t been in the repertoire. But they’re the same 12 notes of course - you just have to know where to find them.

Those two guitars in my avatar photo are made by Todd Clinesmith, who I have known for about 20 years. The 8 string lap steel is the first Model B which he made for me several years ago and he suggested I tune it to C6 “to get out of my comfort zone.” Wise words from the brilliant luthier who is also an excellent player!

Bert, great job on your demo.

Hello Bert,
I love the Beatles since I started to hear music in the mid sixties.
This is another song showsing that steel guitar is not only an instrument to play traditional Country Music but all kind of styles. Your Tabs forced me to start with the C6-Neck on my Pedal Steel.
Thanks for your great job.

Hi I would like to recieve the tab for Michele . Please let me know what I need to do
Thanks
Te