All who have purchased the eBook or the printed book are invited to contact me for the upgrade. You can also click on the Bebop Lap Steel link above. It is, however, password protected, so if you don’t remember the password, feel free to contact me.

Thank you again to all for making this book such a success.

The price of the book will remain at $14.95 for a limited time, after which is will increase to $16.95.

As you’ve seen, we’ve been working on using short one bar phrases separated by a bar of silence, and have even used the concept of question/response. It is exciting when you recognize the effectiveness of this approach–suddenly, it is as if a little mystery has been demystified. The problem is, when you measure the musical merit of the lines that we’ve played on their own, they fall short. They are boring and predictable. We don’t have to wait any longer to begin introducing new elements to make things a little more musical.

I’d like to introduce a new element: the pick-up. The pick-up is simply going to shift the beginning of our melodic line into the measure preceding it. Doing this will make a significant difference in the way our lines sounds, giving them a much more polished and swinging sound.

A pick-up can be any number of notes, or even a tied-note which crosses over the bar line, but for our purposes, we will try to stick with a pick-up of 1 1/2 beats, or three 8th notes. Am I confusing you? Let me explain: if we count our measures as 1 an 2 an 3 an 4 an, our phrase will begin on the “an” following 3, or the up beat of 3. So, our pick-up will be “an 4 an”.

Take a look at and listen to this variation of our Simple Blues:

Again, it is not the most exciting piece of music, but in order to keep consistent with the development of a particular theme, I’ve simply modified the previous example.

So, now we have a pick-up played for each of our phrases and, in turn, no longer have one measure of rest. It is a bit busier now than before, but it doesn’t need to be–we can also shorten our phrases. You should experiment as much as possible with doing this.

Since I’ve introduced the pick-up, now is a good time to introduce a related and deeper concept called “anticipation“. An anticipation is a harmonic device which we use to create tension within our pick-up. What an anticipation does is introduce the next chord change before the current chord change is finished which, depending on how extreme we get with it, can really add excitement and tension to the line. The anticipation works particularly well in the transition from the I chord to the V7 chord (in this case, G7). If you take a look at the chords C7 and G7, the significant different is that the G7 has a B natural, whereas the C7 has a Bb. We could use this to our advantage to add a sense of forward motion to our line, playing the change before it even happens. Listen to the example:

In this example, I introduced the notes B, A and Ab as pick-up notes to the G7. The notes B and Ab clash a bit with C7 (they are the 3rd and b9 of G7), creating a slight amount of tension. It is very subtle (and, admittedly, not very musical), but in future discussions I hope to demonstrate how effective it can be.

Here is a great example of “anticipation” in this solo by Oscar Aleman–at 1:23 you can hear Oscar anticipate the I chord coming from the V7 chord.

It may not be completely clear to you what is going on, but you will hear that something has happened–that ‘something’ was an anticipation.

If you are working with these concepts and exercises, I’d love to hear from you. It lets me know that I am presenting the material clearly and that someone actually cares.

Hopefully, next installment I will focus on how to make this more steel guitar-related. Up to this point, it has been important to keep the concept general and not confuse it with any of the steel guitar matter that can drive us all crazy!

In this segment, I’d like to expand upon the concept presented in Part 1 by introducing another element–the repeated answer. In Part 1, we asked a question, paused, and then answered the question, pausing again afterward. The answers to the questions could range from being somewhat related to the question on a melodic level, or they could be random, as long as they met the criteria for a response–the descending final note of the phrase. This time, we are going to use the same response to every question. Ask yourself these questions and responses aloud:

Can I get you something to eat? No, thank you.
Would you like something to drink? No, thank you.
Is there anything I can do for you? No, thank you.

Now, imagine that each of those questions is a different melodic phrase–they can vary wildly, if you like. Imagine them being responded to with a simple 3 word answer: “No, thank you.” Another really effective way of implementing this, and a technique I’ve used myself, is to actually say little phrases verbally while you are improvising. It sounds strange, but again, it really gets you thinking more about your phrasing. For instance, I might say, “Are you thinking about me, baby?” The significance of this is that rhythmically I’ve introduced something other than just 8th notes, and it was done in a very natural manner: “think-ing a-bout” would give me an 8th note triplet and an 8th note. Do you follow?

This is a very complex subject called “prosody” that became very clear to me after reading the wonderful book by Pedro De Alcantara entitled, “Integrated Practice: Coordination, Rhythm & Sound.” This is one of the most fascinating and well-written books on the subject of music that I have ever read–let’s just say, it helped changed the way I look at some things in music. Prosody is the study of rhythm in the written and spoken language, particularly poetry. The significance of this is not only the rhythm, but the emphasis on syllables or “stresses“, otherwise known as the “meter“. (Do you remember iamb and trochee, etc., from your English classes?) I know this seems a little far out there to bring into a conversation about simple improvisation, but it definitely is something to think about and may be one of the unspoken elements we hear in great improvisation.

This brings to mind the great Eddie Harris, one of my favorite musicians, and the brilliant way he utilized this very same approach. You can hear it on some of his funkier tracks, like “Listen Here”, where he repeats a phrase in the lower range followed by playing in the upper range. Check out Listen Here (the repeating phrase begins at about 1:45):

Can you hear how incredibly effective that is? The mere presence of that 3 note phrase really keeps him keyed in to the tune and the groove and he plays some really beautiful stuff off of it. That little phrase locks him in solid. That is a legendary cut, if you’ve never heard it before.

Here is an example I put together quickly, very similar to the one used in Part 1, but I’ve made the changes necessary to stick with the theme of the repeated answer.

Click on the arrow to listen to MIDI file.

Spend some time with this and make some recordings of yourself doing it. It doesn’t matter which tuning you play in or which instrument you are playing on–the effects will be the same. You will notice the change in your playing. This is very effective for many styles of music other than Jazz–it sounds great in Rock and Blues, as well.

Go to Part 3: http://www.mikeneer.com/lapsteelin/?p=1393

Improvisation is simultaneously one of the easiest and one of the most difficult things musicians do. One of the most daunting aspects of improvisation is the fact that there are endless possibilities–where does one even begin to improvise? By imposing a rigid set of guidelines, we can begin to put the process to work and eliminate all the confusion about where to start. As we conquer each phase of development, we can begin to remove the guidelines, because at that point we will have gained a familiarity with structure.

Regardless of the style of music we play, the one common element is melody. I’m not suggesting that the same melodic content would work across the board in all styles–it is important that we understand what is appropriate for the music we are playing and how tolerant that style is. Obviously, if we try to impose a lot of Jazz vocabulary on a style such as Country, we may find that the music does not tolerate it. However, we may explore those possibilities through personal practice and find that there are boundaries we can expand, if even slightly.

The more we think about melody, the more we find ourselves paying deeper attention to the content of the melody–the direction of the phrases, the duration of the notes, the rhythms, the repeated motifs, the dynamics, etc. Deep listening really is the most effective way of absorbing and learning to play music. I mean this not only with listening to the music of others but, more importantly, listening to our own inner voice and translating that to our instrument. This is something that any one of us can sit down right now and do. We may end up playing things that sound familiar, maybe even fragments of melodies we’ve heard before, but with more and more practice and development, we can create fresh, new, exciting melodic content which lives and develops in the moment. We are all unique and we will all come up with something different, even despite our best efforts to play something that sounds like our heroes. This is really our opportunity to focus on what it is that makes each of us unique.

I’d like to talk for a moment about guidelines and how they will help us directly. When we are improvising, we are faced with many decisions, from note choices to rhythms to length of phrases, etc., and this can really be a bit overwhelming for a beginning improviser. You may even find that the more information you learn with regard to harmony, the more confusing it can be. We have to find a way to harness all of the information we have and not let it be a distraction to what we are trying to accomplish, which is improvising a melody. Rather than using everything we know when we improvise, it becomes more about forgetting what we know and just making music. This is why it is so important for us to be able to listen internally. Our mind dictates the melody to us–it is our ears’ responsibility to guide our hands into playing that melody. Before every action is a thought–what we play should be a response to our thoughts. For more on the role of the brain and central nervous system in the performance and learning of music, I’d highly recommend the book, “The Art of Piano Playing” by George Kochevitsky. It can be a bit of a dry read at times, but it is fascinating and really lays out his argument in a very scientific and fact-based manner. The first chapter on the introduction of the piano to a world of harpsichordists and the difficulties they encountered in physically playing the instrument is really wonderful and enlightening.

Let’s start off with some very simple guidelines: we are going to limit the duration of our phrases and separate them with silence. Silence is a very important element of improvisation and of music in general. We will start off using phrases of 1 bar in length, followed by 1 bar of silence. This will give the impression that we are creating a dialog. We can use a question and response approach to keep our phrases related to each other and we will use a strict rhythmic pattern that we will not deviate from. So, how in the world do we create a question with a melodic line? It’s very simple: ask yourself a question aloud–”Would you like some tea?” Notice how the last word, tea, rises in pitch? This is exactly how we do it with music; the last note of the phrase is an ascending note. Now, respond to the question aloud: “No, not at this moment.” Hear how the pitch of the last word descends? That is how we respond to the question–using a descending note at the end of the phrase. This kind of structure will be beneficial to us in the long run, so don’t succumb to the urge to depart from it. We are also going to use the simple 12-Bar Blues form for this, as the structure of it is one that is familiar to everyone.

So, according to the guidelines set forth above, our improvisation on a 12-bar Blues form would look like this:

Bar 1: question–end phrase with ascending note
Bar 2: silence
Bar 3: response–end phrase with descending note
Bar 4: silence
Bar 5: question–end phrase with ascending note
Bar 6: silence
Bar 7: response–end phrase with descending note
Bar 8: silence
Bar 9: question–end phrase with ascending note
Bar 10: silence
Bar 11: response–end phrase with descending note
Bar 12: silence

To keep the melodic content simple, I suggest just using a simple pentatonic scale: In this case, lets play Blues in C Major using the C minor pentatonic scale to generate our melodic content: C Eb F G Bb

If this seems a little confusing to you, just think about it for a moment by trying to imagine a Blues progression in your mind. As you listen to the progression, imagine that you are playing, following the guidelines listed above. You can even try singing short phrases, making sure to ask a question, respond, and then take the time to reflect (silence). You can make your responses to the question more relevant by using the same phrase in each, only making the phrase end in accordance with our guidelines.

The following example demonstrates a simple question/response pattern over a simple 12 Bar Blues. Again, just to clarify, the examples presented in these exercises are just to demonstrate the concepts–you should be playing your own melodies, listening intently to make sure they fit within the guidelines and that they are as musical as possible. Attention to these details will make a big difference in your overall development as an improviser.

Now, if after hearing this you say, “No, thanks, I’d rather not play like that,” I’d completely understand. But think about it–did you hear the structure and did this quick little example effectively communicate the idea of question/response? That is all the matters here. We want to get you inside of the music as you are playing and following the guidelines in order to be able to better organize your ideas in a more communicative way. There will be many more examples and expansions and contractions of the guidelines further down the road, but for now, try to take the opportunity to add this kind of structured improvisation to your practice routine. Remember: You are not creating art; you are merely trying to communicate simple ideas, so don’t get hung up on what you are playing. Just be sure to follow the guidelines.

If you have the ability to record yourself, please do so. If you use Band In A Box, set up a simple 12 Bar Blues progression in any key you choose. Most of all, have fun! Where there’s fun, there’s guaranteed to be results.

All for now.

Go to Part 2: http://www.mikeneer.com/lapsteelin/?p=1364

It is a difficult arrangement to play and requires a lot of palm blocking, as you will no doubt find out. You will also notice that there is a behind the bar string pull in which the note is pulled up 1/2 step and held, then released when changing bar position. It is very easy with some practice and a tough ring finger.

This is what it sounds like. You may note there is a discrepancy between what is written and what I played in the 32nd bar. What is written is correct with regard to Monk’s melody. I’m not sure what I was thinking when I made the slight change (basically a half step difference), but nonetheless, I have corrected it.

Listen to Monk play it:

The other day, Andy Volk sent me an email with his arrangement of A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square, a beautiful song from 1940 composed by Jack Strachey and Manning Sherwin with lyrics by Eric Maschwitz.

It is a wonderful song that has been recorded many times by myriad artists, from Nat Cole to Frank Sinatra to Manhattan Transfer to my favorite instrumental version by jazz organist Sam Yahel. Andy provided a version for C6 that was chock full of slants and moves that were a little tough for me; I couldn’t make all the chords flow easily from one to the next and on some slants intonation was an issue (something to be wary of, particularly on a ballad). He thought it would be interesting to see how I might approach it, for better or worse, and I agreed with him that it’s cool blog fodder.

I spent about 1/2 hour with the tune and got it together quickly, trying to keep it simple, but making sure the chord qualities were represented. It took about an hour to notate and tab it, as I was able to copy and paste some sections, keeping it all relatively simple. I hope to find the time to give it a real chord solo treatment where the playing develops and unfolds with each new chorus.

The first pass through this tune I tried to stick true to the melody in arranging it. I made a few changes to the harmony, but rather insignificant ones (although it would have been nice if I hipped the rhythm guitarist to them ). One favorite of mine is substituting a dominant chord in place of a minor 7 chord in a turnaround. My melody F7 clashes with my rhythm guitar Fm7, but we could fix that in subsequent versions. Sometimes you just have to know when to ignore a chord, such as the Dmi7b5. In that case I went straight to the G7 chord. You have to remember this is not a true solo arrangement, as there is accompaniment. It is a little tough to be Joe Pass on a 6 string lap steel.

Here is my arrangement; simple but effective, I think. Here is a ( very) rough mp3 of it (I really didn’t have time to nail it). Also, I played very loosely with the melody, not following the written chart’s rhythm precisely (played on my Electar Model M with a Rick Aiello Potbelly pickup):
A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square

I will try to further elaborate on the process and I will publish some more in a bit, but right now it is time for my run, so I’ve got to bolt. I’ll check back in a while. Let me know your thoughts on this one, don’t be shy.

Before I begin reharmonizing and rearranging the first draft of “A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square”, I thought I would take a moment to outline some of the strategies I will consider.

The first area of reharmonization, and probably the most common one, is the Tritone Substitution. The tritone substitution most commonly occurs with dominant 7th chords. When looking for a chord’s tritone sub, we look for the note that is a b5 (3 whole steps) above the root of our chord (i.e., for C, go up 3 whole steps to find F#). F#7 is a tritone substitute for C7 and works beautifully when moving to the next chord F (chromatic bass movement).

The next thing to consider is Chord Qualities. The “quality” of a chord is whether it is major, minor, diminished, dominant, augmented, half-diminished. We can explore changing the quality of a chord, keeping the root the same (i.e., Gmaj becomes Gmin, etc.). This can really have a great impact on the mood of a tune. Lennie Tristano did an arrangement of “Pennies From Heaven” in a minor key and called it “Pennies From Minor.” Retaining the melody notes is still an important factor to consider, though.

We can also insert chords that have a specific harmonic function to create resolution. This is called Functional Harmony. An example of this would be if your piece of music had several static bars of a chord–we could easily insert a V7 chord in the same measure as our original (one measure of C becomes G7 C), or maybe even a turnaround to cycle right back to our original chord, which adds a nice sense of bass movement and harmony. We could also include tritone substitution (one measure of C becomes Db7 C (we subbed Db7 for G7)). We can change our minor function chords, such as the ii7, iii7 or vi7 chords to dominants, the way I did in the case of the F7 chord. This is very much what Charlie Parker did when he reharmonized the blues. Instead of 4 bars of F, then to Bb, he would use F Em7b5 A7 Dm7 Dbm7 Cm7 F7 then Bb. That’s an example of functional harmony.

We can also consider altering our chords so that the extensions, or color tones, create a sense of color and tension, and we can begin to use inner voice movement. Alterations can really add a lot to a piece, and done effectively can really make a part come alive and seem to jump out.

Pedal points are another tool that are often used in creating interesting bridges, for example. A bass note becomes constant while the harmonies on top of it shift. Some of the most effective ways of using a pedal point are to keep the chords on top as simple triads (major triads can be very effective here).

These are just some of the tools I will contemplate using in reharmonizing. It is possible to go overboard and really ruin an arrangement by trying to do too much; however, it is best to learn what going overboard means by doing it. Sometimes you have to know when to say when–if you’ve gone too far, hopefully your ears will hear it. The goal is to begin using these tools to bring about a certain mood. No one can tell you what that mood should be, but making sure you get that point across should be the biggest priority.

Hopefully, I’ll find the time to have another chorus ready in a few days.
___________________________________
Part 3

Continuing on with “A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square”, I worked up another verse with some mild reharmonizations and some stylistic devices, such as behind the bar string pulls which can be very effective, especially when you’re looking for a melody note that doesn’t exist in your particular chord shape.

I’ve highlighted the chords with string pulls in yellow. The easiest way to do these would be to use your ring finger, as your middle finger is busy keeping the bar steady. Some of the bends are on the upper frets which makes the physical act of doing the pull a bit easier, due to the reduced amount of tension as you move further away from the nut. Also, note that I’ve included the new chord names in the space between the tab and the notation. Compare this to the original lead sheet posted in Part 1. All of the chords bascially fit into one of the categories mentioned in Part 2. I used tritone substitution (particularly in bar 3 (A7) and bar 9 (E7b9) and I also used functional substitutions (D7, F7) as well as non-functional substitutions (BMaj7 and DbMaj9)–ultimately, the goal is to make it sound good and I think this certainly qualifies, no matter what you call it.

Below the score you will find a few notes on my choices in the reharmonization.

In bar 3, I chose A7 as a tritone sub for Eb7 (actually the lead sheet calls for a Bb-7 to Eb7) because it makes a nice chromatic bass movement to Ab, the following chord.
Bar 4, I subbed D7 for Dmi7b5 (functional substitution) for no other reason that it was available and that there is a inner voice movement as it moves to G7 then finally to Cmi. That is the kind of thing I strive for.
Bar 5, I subbed Db9 for Ab-6–they are very close in structure, but I really like the string pull to the 9th there.
In bar 7 I utilized non-functional harmony and found nice chords which contained my melody notes and had a desirable bass movement, moving up in whole steps back to our tonic.
In bar 8, another functional substitution as I subbed G7 for Eb and created a III-VI-II-V back to Eb. In bar 9 I subbed the E7b9 for the Bb7 or V7 chord and again introduced chromatic bass movement.

I hope you’re enjoying this as much as I am. I will continue to post reharmonization as the inspiration strikes and as time allows; however, please keep in mind that I have a very short attention span and my mind is already onto other selections.

Peace.

This show was recorded by someone with 2 video cameras, but the audio on both videos is distorted, so I apologize for the less than stellar sound.

I don’t really gig much anymore, as I have chosen to spend more time advancing my music studies and pursuing other musical interests, so I feel happy to at least have had the chance to take a crack at this with a band.

Tom Morrell told the story of a time when he had some time off between gigs in California. Tom was looking to buy a pair of shoes, so he stopped to ask where he might buy a pair. He walked into a shop owned by a little Asian woman and asked her. She pointed to her right and yelled, “Fulawka!” Confused, Tom replied, “Huh?” Again, she just pointed and said, “Fulawka!” He walked out the door and looked to his right, and down the street a block away was a Foot Locker.

This song is called “Phoolawka“.

Thanks to Kyle Aaron for the story.

Tom Morrell and the Time Warp Tophands, with Craig Chambers, live from the 12th Annual Legends of Western Swing Festival, featuring Tom Morrell – steel guitar, Craig Chambers, Leon Chambers and Rich O’Brien – guitars, Bobby Boatright – fiddle, Curley Hollingsworth – keys, Greg Hardy – drums, Mark Abbott – bass, and Snuffy Emore, mandolin.

More Tom Morrell

What the heck–here’s another: the great tune, “Farewell Blues”

Happy New Year!
Mike

That has not stopped me from wanting to play like a pedal steel player at times; there are times when nothing but a pedal steel sound will do. When I say pedal steel sound, it goes a lot deeper than just the usual sound of A and B pedal mashing or the knee levers; it’s almost a state of mind in addition to the obvious physical nature. Even the tone is markedly different, so I tend to find ways to achieve a different tone by using my right hand a little differently than I might in a non-pedal setting, even though I am playing non-pedal. Picking closer to the bridge, picking more cleanly and fluidly, employing a lot of blocking, and utilizing the bar to emulate pedal movement, either by slanting chords or doing very quick moves to mimic the sound of a quick push and release of a pedal. I tend to think of Ralph Mooney as an example of the quick push/release sound. I’ve spent quite a bit of time transcribing and absorbing some of my favorite pedal steel tunes and adapting them for non-pedal. It has made a big difference for me.

Ralph Mooney and Mike at the TSGA 2010

One of the conundrums of trying to adapt non-pedal steel for pedal sounds is that it is extremely difficult to get some of the classic sounds without making some kind of sacrifice. When you hear the sound of the A and B pedals raising their respective strings (generally to turn an E chord into an A chord), you may notice that there is a note that stays constant while the notes below it change. This is perhaps the most difficult attribute to sacrifice, since it is an integral part of the sound. I will give an example: if you are tuned to an E tuning with your top 3 strings tuned E B G# (high to low), the A & B pedals would raise B to C# and G# to A. If we were doing this by slanting, we could achieve the 2 changes, but we would end up with either an F# or a G on string 1 (depending on the position of the bar, i.e., using the nose or not). Definitely not what we want, although in the case of the B and C pedals, it’s perfect (B pedal raises the G# to A and C pedal raises the B to C# and the E to F#). I’ve thought long and hard on this and had come up with a few solutions in the past. Let me elaborate:

My first attempt at this was to formulate a tuning which reversed the order of the strings at the top, so that string 1 was a B (usually the 2nd string) and string 2 was a G# (usually string 3), while string 3 was my E string. I have to say, this worked pretty well, as I could either slant to make the change or even do a behind the bar pull (the string gauges had to be meticulously worked out to ensure a perfect pull every time, but depending on where on the neck I was playing, this could present it’s own set of problems because of the varying tension). The real downside was that, apart from achieving that most basic of moves which every beginner pedal player overuses, I had sacrificed the ability to play anything else on an out of whack tuning. I don’t remember entirely what the other strings were tuned to, but I believe strings 4, 5 and 6 gave me half of an A6 tuning (B G# E C# A F#, high to low). It was far too much to get accustomed to with very little in the way of reward.

My second attempt was to just use a straight E tuning with strings 1, 2 and 3 tuned E B G#. What I did was use string pulls behind the bar–strings 2 and 3 to be precise–and I worked out string gauges to accommodate this. It worked nicely, although there is always the danger of not getting the pull precisely in tune like the pedals would. I still use this on occasion, but not as much since I have managed another way.

The third and most successful attempt, by far, has been a new tuning I formulated about 2 days before a recent recording session. I was playing on a Country recording that really had a 50s/60s sound and all I could hear in my head was some Lloyd Green and Tom Brumley-type sounds. I figured out that the only way for me to really get the A/B pedal sound was to actually put the whole triad on top. So, for an E tuning with a high G#, the A/B pedals would render high A E and C# from G# E and B. I knew that I could make this work, but only if my right hand was coordinated enough to grab the triads quickly and cleanly. I worked hard on it for the 2 days prior and, while I would have liked more time to become comfortable on the tuning like I subsequently have become, it worked on the session.

The tuning is spelled, from high to low:

(high)A (.011)
E (.014)
C# (.017)
(high) G# (.011)
E (.014)
D (.018)
B (.022)
G# (.026w)

This is still evolving–in fact, since the time I wrote this article 2 days ago, this has already undergone changes. I have just gotten enough confidence to use the D in the 6th string position and it really gives me some other wonderful options. Again, it is of the utmost importance that I play carefully with the right hand, so with enough practice (which I’ll admit, I don’t really have enough time for) it should come together. Palm blocking is extremely important in the triad playing, but pick blocking is what I use mostly for the single note stuff, unless I am looking for a more staccato sound.

It is not incredibly exciting to look at, but after having played it quite a bit, I can really get some interesting things happening on the first 3 strings, as well as being able to move through the inversions pretty easily. Also, I really love the tone. I play this tuning on the 3rd neck of my Fender Custom T-8. I have found that on the 3 or 4 gigs I’ve used the guitar on since, I spend a lot of time on that neck. I’m not sure what to call the tuning, as I’d rather give it a name rather than a spelling-based name. If you can think of anything interesting let me know….

With regard to playing this tuning and in this style, I find myself using the volume pedal for ballads only and straight picking with no volume pedal on the up-tempo numbers. I incorporate a bit more staccato-type picking with tight blocking, just because I love the way it sounds. Listen to some 60s era Lloyd Green and you’ll hear what inspires me, whether on his own recordings or with Johnny Paycheck or Charley Pride.

I would like to post up some samples of this tuning and I will as time allows. Until then, have fun playing and always keep an open mind. Yes, it is good and beneficial to focus and stay regimented, but at some point you may need to use your creativity. Just look at how inventive and creative Jerry Byrd was with his arrangements–much of the things he’d done hadn’t been done before or since. Necessity is the mother of invention, and with non-pedal steel guitar you may find yourself in that position. It’s important to note that pedal steel playing has evolved significantly and the harmonic choices available today are staggering, but for those classic sounds a little can go a long way. The less thinking we have to do, the more we can concentrate on our feel and expression. These things should never be overlooked.

All the best for a great holiday season.
Mike

This is a pretty straightforward example of what the block chord style is all about–just about all of the melody notes have chords underneath them. To my ears, it is an extremely pleasing sound and a great way to get inside the inner workings of harmony. Once you are inside, you can explore reharmonization–that is really where a lot of the fun is. It is very liberating to take a tune to places that you really want it to go harmonically, as long as you keep the melody intact. On this particular arrangement, I didn’t do any reharmonizations but it is challenging to play, nonetheless. This arrangement is for a 6 string steel tuned to C6/A7, my favorite tuning.

One of the difficult aspects of playing in this style is trying to make it all sound smooth. You end up picking a lot of the chords, but it is nice to find places where you can slide from one chord to the next or even slant into it. Another note: I very often use 4 fingers in my right hand to play this style, sometimes with just a thumb pick and bare fingers, which is the way I played it on the recording included herein.

The first time I tried recording this, I had a different arrangement, but as I played through it, I made changes that made it more practical to play. Some of these changes made it easier to play, but took away some of the really cool chords–that’s OK, I think it’s more important to be able to play a piece nicely than to just dazzle with harmonic prowess. After about 4 takes I could feel this starting to come together, so my advice is to take your time with it and learn the arrangement in little 2 or 4 bar segments at a time. I hope you enjoy this one.

BTW, I try as often as possible to comp the chords on a lap steel rather than using a guitar, as I am trying to get to a place where I am completely comfortable with doing this. So, what you hear on this recording is the chord melody played over the bass and drums from an Aebersold play-along volume (Volume 78) and the chord comping was added later. I tried to stay out of the way of the lead instrument, but as you hear, it can get tricky.

It’s important to note that in measure 21 I used a string pull to get a B7 with a b9 in the melody following the F#mi7b5.

Have a listen here:
Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

Don is a very interesting and down-to-earth man, and he’s the kind of musician you have to ply in order to get him to speak of his achievements, which are many. The Henrys have been featured performers in numerous festivals around the world and also appeared on the BBC several times. Don also performed with Mary Margaret O’Hara on “Night Music,” which was one of the finest music programs to appear on network TV in the US, and they have released 5 CDs, as well as 1 compilation. Don has also appeared on recordings with Mary Margaret O’Hara, Sylvia Tyson, Holy Modal Rounders, Vance Gilbert and others, as well as having released a solo recording, Atlas Travel. Don is a member of Three Metre Day, which has just released its first recording, Coasting Notes, featuring singer/songwriter/musician Michelle Willis, violinist Hugh Marsh, as well as Don’s considerable playing and writing, to very favorable reviews.

Three Metre Day is currently embarking on a mini-West Coast tour (November 1-6) in support of their new release and, for those lucky enough to live in the Bay area, Don will be conducting a seminar at Gryphon Strings in Palo Alto on Nov. 5 from 2-5pm (click for more info). You can listen to a live broadcast of Three Metre Day on November 5 at 10am (PST) on West Coast Live.

Mike Neer: I listen to your music quite a bit and I hear so many different sounds in your music—it’s almost like a musical geography lesson. It seems like you’ve managed to incorporate sounds from around the world without being too traditional about it. How much do these sounds factor into your writing?

Don Rooke: Well, there’s no conscious World music attempt, that’s for sure. I wouldn’t feel qualified to do that. For me it’s more textures and tone. As far as the writing is concerned, one of the main things that I try to achieve is to be non-idiomatic. If it goes in a direction that’s obvious, then I don’t love it. After the song has taken shape, then I try to get some textures happening. For instance, one of the effects I use—and it’s the cheapest effect in the world—is to take a piece of foam and put it under the strings. This gives it sort of a kalimba sound–or even use it with a ring modulator and it gives a texture that’s pretty hard to define. It’s kind of primitive sounding.

MN: I just get the feeling that your music is very free-spirited and nomadic—it’s very centered and grounded, but yet it wanders and paints different landscapes.

DR: One of the benefits of living where I live, where there’s really no history of slide playing, like Texas or Tennessee or California, there’s really no idiom that is natural to me as a slide player; it’s more just standing on the outside, just picking things that I like and trying to blend them to come up with a mix that’s a little bit different. I think that’s a bit of an advantage in terms of finding your own voice.

MN: Well, you may have touched on the sole advantage of growing up in New Jersey. [laughs] I think we can relate in that respect. I hear things in your music that really hit me because I’m open to them without any expectations. It almost reminds me of how I feel when I listen to Ry Cooder, who was very influential for me. I hear a tune like Maria Elena, and it just has an earthiness to it—a Latin feel, but not completely. I was wondering if you were influenced by the same things.

DR: Oh, for sure. I recorded that song on Joyous Porous (The Henrys, 2002). I did it in 3/4. It was one of those things—I based it on Don Gibson’s version, his arrangement. I had the usual palette, with the pump organ, but I did something that I kind of got into and did a few times, which is to record things and then start stripping it down. I remember Dave Piltch (bassist) getting that record and saying, “It’s the first record I played on where there’s less on the record than when I played on it!”
It’s really fun to arrange by taking things away, where suddenly there’s a duo where there was a quintet. And a solo doesn’t have to be 12 bars; somebody else takes over part of the way through. I find that to be fun and fascinating, too.

MN: Let me ask you about your composing: Are a lot of your ideas generated by playing the instrument or do you write them on guitar?

DR: I wish I had a good answer to that. Sometimes it’s chord changes and I write a melody to it. I try to avoid writing what you might call “lick driven” songs. I really want to have melodies rather than have a lick and base a song on it. That’s what works for me. So sometimes I write chords and then sing or hum a melody over it—find some way around the vocabulary of the instrument. You know, you’re doing things that you don’t naturally fall into because you’re a slide player.

MN: When you think of your instrument, do you think of it in terms of being a dobro, or a steel guitar or a slide guitar—as if it makes any difference—but you mentioned “lick driven” tunes, and I know exactly what you mean, as so much of the repertoire for each of the respective instruments is lick driven. I’m wondering how you see the instrument….

DR: Over the years, probably my main ax has been the Kona, and I see that as more of a primitive thing. I’ve got it tuned just like my dobro is tuned, but the sound of it—maybe the little less sustain or the more natural woody thing, whatever it is—I think it dictates a different style of playing which is different from dobro or steel guitar. I use them all and I love them all—metal-bodied National, all these things—and I love pulling all these things out and finding a place for them. But my centerpiece is probably the Kona, even though I decided not too long ago that it was too quiet to be a stage instrument; plus, it’s uncommon enough and rare enough that you have to be careful with things like that. So, I look at that instrument a little bit different, as a slightly more delicate thing. I probably look for melodies and chords on it more and just play more simply on it.

Don Rooke and his 1920s Kona

MN: I love playing those. I have a friend with a Kona and I find the range of tones I can get out of the instrument to be much wider than most other instruments (acoustic) that I’ve played–I think maybe it’s a bit more….

DR: Touch responsive. You know, Cooder, he said–talking about acoustic versus electric—“the acoustic has a lot more information.” The tonal qualities are so much more complex, including noises that you may not necessarily want to hear, such as scratching. Those are available on the electric, but there does seem to be a bit more info, like he said.

MN: Yeah, that’s a really good way of putting it. I tend to embrace all those extraneous sounds. I’ve never been hung up on the idea of having a bar that would eliminate the sound of sliding on a string. If I didn’t want to hear that, then maybe I shouldn’t be playing the instrument.

DR: Sometimes it’s nice to turn it on its end and scrape it down the string, too.

MN: Exactly. You like to play around with sounds and get a lot of extra texture, but I can just hear you alone sitting down and playing the songs without hearing all the other instruments…

DR: Knocking and wheezing… [laughs]

MN: But that’s what makes your compositions so strong. With all the other elements stripped away, there is still the song. I think what is unique is that no one else has written for and recorded the instrument in the way that you have. It is interesting that a lot of the younger Bluegrass musicians are starting to embrace that compositional element in their music, such as the Punch Brothers.

DR: Well, it’s not lap style, but David Tronzo is pretty ridiculous, too. I love watching that guy play. He’s been up here (Toronto) and we opened for him once. We played OK and then he came on with a trio and I felt like I’d just been in a boxing match–not that it had anything to do with me—but he had that whole New York intensity. This was before he moved to Boston to teach.

MN: I enjoy him very much, too. The one time I saw him play was with John Zorn and he had a really in-your-face style. I was really struck by what he doing.

DR: I mean, talk about a voice…between him and Derek Trucks, I could feast on 2 those styles for years.

MN: They’re tapping into a whole other range of expression.

DR: There’s also the steel being using in ambient ways, too—long note kind of stuff, with reverbs—it’s nice to have that kind of opportunity, which I don’t get very often, but every once in a while I play on a soundtrack or do that kind of thing.

MN: I don’t get many opportunities to do that, either, although that was what I did when I first started playing the instrument. I wasn’t looking to play any kind of traditional music, and I’m still not, but it’s part of the process for me. I was always into what Daniel Lanois was doing and I was trying to figure out a way to get there.

DR: He just had a concert up here yesterday, not too far from Toronto, with Emmylou and Ray LaMontagne and a few other people.

MN: I take it you didn’t go….

DR: Your correct [laughs]. Actually, there was nobody in the house yesterday and I went downstairs and turned my amp louder than I normally can and worked on my sound and played along with some drum loops and had a blast. I played for hours, which I rarely do. My practicing regimen is nonexistent.

MN: So when you do play, you’re trying to create music every time you touch your instrument?

DR: I have a few things that I practice; one of the things that I do, probably for 5 or 10 years now, I’ve practiced acoustically on a lap steel that I’ve screwed down black cardboard over the fret markers. It occurred to me—it must have been 10 years ago—that I was too visually oriented for pitch and it didn’t make any sense. So, I covered the frets and, as you can imagine, it was pretty abysmal. But I’ve done it for so many years now, and I still don’t have the guts to do it onstage, to just look away and play, but I can do it here. I think what it’s given me is the ability to correct a note without thinking about it—I’ll just go up or down without thinking about it.

But as far as practicing, lately I’ve been practicing with a metronome set really slow, because my job in Three Metre Day really is rhythm playing, which is uncommon on slide guitar, for one thing, and I’m glad that I don’t use fingerpicks because I can use the tops of my fingernails to simulate strumming. I wouldn’t call myself a great timekeeper, so I started practicing with a metronome incredibly slowly. I set it around 18 or 20. The advantage I’ve learned is that it’s up to you to fill in the gaps, whereas if you set it fast it’s kind of doing all the work and you’re just playing along with it. If you cut that into 4 or 5, then you have to try and arrive at the same time as the next beat, which seems about an hour away. I’m glad I discovered that because it seems to have made a difference.

MN: I think it’s great to get into the groove element of playing the lap steel. It’s one of the things I enjoy doing the most. I love playing backup and coming up with little rhythmic figures. I think the instrument is very capable of being expressive in that respect.

DR: Yeah and kind of funky because you can bend the notes not perfectly—you know when you’re playing an E7 chord on guitar and you hammer on with your first finger on the G string to G#. Well, if you do that by bending the steel, say you’re in C at the 8th fret and you just twist it up to simulate that—it’s kind of funkier because you get all that in-between stuff.

MN: In some ways you can really get away with a lot on steel.

DR: Yeah, and if the player’s relaxed and good then it just sounds even better. Personally, I love hearing those notes that aren’t right on.

MN: Yeah, I really enjoy those elements in your playing, as well. It’s great compositions, but also great playing and the two go hand-in-hand perfectly.

What got you into playing the hollow neck guitars?

DR: You know, what actually made me have to have a Weissenborn or a Kona was David Lindley’s solo on “To Know Him Is To Love Him” on the Trio record (Parton, Ronstadt, Harris).

MN: No kidding, that’s fantastic. You get the feeling that the instrument had never sounded better than it did on the record, such a beautiful recording.

DR: I just listened to that over and over and said, “I’ve got to get that!” Then I was talking to a friend of mine who knew a guitar dealer in upstate NY and he had something. So, I took this Martin 000-28 down there, a nice guitar from the early 80s, and I didn’t know what he had, and I was sitting there waiting and I was hoping it was a deep-bodied Kona, and it was. No strings on it, and it was all dusty. When I went home, my wife thought I was out of my mind. This was way before Weissenborns had become a thing.

MN: Which tuning are you using on the Kona?

DR: The same one that I always use, which is a dobro tuning with an A on the 6th string, one octave higher. That’s another story: that was because I was listening to Pontiac (Lyle Lovett) and there was this dobro solo and I’m thinking, “God, how does he do that?” and I’m trying all these things, slants and this and that. It was a thing going up in 2nds—alternating strings, whipping up the neck. I couldn’t do it, so I thought, “What is expendable on my instrument?” [laughs] And I said, “I play with a bass player, I can get rid of the bass string, I don’t want to mess with the configuration.” So, I just tried putting that higher A on the bottom and I got into it and it gave me another interval. It opened a lot of doors—just fretting that string, I could play a Gmin if I fretted the Bb at the 1st fret. Eventually over the years I found a ton of things.

The punch line of the story is that I found out it was Paul Franklin who played that solo and he played a Peda-bro. [laughs] I didn’t even know it existed, but it changed my whole approach.

Listen to The Henrys – Avenues Of Forgiveness

Click on the image below for the tablature/notation:

Click here for full tablature in pdf

MN: That’s great! And thinking about it, you can even get some of the more nebulous chords, like sus2 chords.

What kind of bar do you use?

DR: Stevens—hung in with the Stevens.

MN: It’s not a rounded tip or anything like that?

DR: No, just the old traditional Stevens, although, I like the old ones with the patent on them, the new one by Dunlop, I think 925, is kind of nice–I like it better than the new Stevens. I just like the coating on the old ones, I think it’s better.

MN: So most of your writing is done in this tuning?

DR: Yeah. I have a thin Weissenborn-style distributed by Madonna and I have that in C tuning. There’s a video of the tune VF61 with The Henrys on YouTube with that guitar.

MN: It’s funny, the G tuning is probably the most common tuning in existence for slide and yet, by retuning that one string, you’ve turned it inside out and given it a new face, even though you still have all of the other stuff available.

DR: It’s kind of flexible that way. The other thing, in retrospect, this kind of dumb epiphany I had—being a guitar player—the strings 2, 3 and 4 are the same as 2, 3 and 4 on guitar, so what it meant was that visualizing all those b5s and all those things, I could easily go to those 3 strings and know what I was doing.

MN: Did you study music?

DR: No, not at all.

MN: But you’ve been exposed to probably an immense amount of music from classical on down, I’m sure….

DR: Well, the classical was forced because, in my house, I was the youngest and the others had to take lessons—for some reason I didn’t want to and didn’t have to. But my sister played constantly and my brother played a bit, so I heard a lot. My parents put up with a fair bit—I used to put on “Live At The Fillmore” (Allman Brothers) at dinnertime pretty loud and I’d sit there and listen to Duane. [laughs]

MN: Well, the youngest can always get away with stuff like that. Did you listen to a lot of Jazz, particularly the composers, like Monk or Wayne Shorter?

DR: I wouldn’t pretend to know what was going on there. I listen to less Jazz than I used to, but like you, I like to listen to Monk and stuff like that. I actually listened to more rootsy music, generally, and growing up, slide-wise, it was Duane and Cooder and Lindley and Kottke.

MN: I can hear all of those influences in your music, but in the big picture it sounds like Don Rooke. Some players are never able to get beyond that and develop their own voice.

DR: Well, you know what that really is: it’s a testament to how I failed to be able to sound like any one of those guys.

MN: Which is the way you want it to be. I can really relate—I’ve gone my moments where as a guitar player I tried to copy people, like Allan Holdsworth. I would get one little thing, though, and just give up on the rest, and I’d be happy with that. For hungry musicians, give us a little breadcrumb and we can make a feast out of it.

DR: My attempt at that was probably Lenny Breau, who was based in Toronto and a local hero and spectacular player. There were things he did, like playing the melody with his 1st and 4th fingers (his left hand) and comping with his 2nd and 3rd.

MN: The thing about Lenny is that the more choruses he took on a tune, the deeper and deeper he got, like peeling layers off like an onion, the further away he could take the tune. He was so brilliant.

DR: One thing that I love about him is that he grew up playing Country in his parent’s band and he’s one of the few guys who I love to hear playing, for instance, Hank Williams’ songs with extended chords. They don’t sound like “Oh, here comes a jazz chord,” they sound beautiful. I have a tape of him from a TV show where he plays “Red River Valley” and there’s nothing about it that you’d think he shouldn’t be playing those chords. He’s using that extended vocabulary and it all makes perfect sense in a Country context.

MN: I admire your work ethic–you’re prolific. I know the kind of work that goes into making those records, to an extent, and you really get it done.

Don with Michelle Willis

DR: Well, I spend my time at home composing and recording music. Definitely on Is This Tomorrow?, it was fun, but I worked too hard on that. [laughs] That was a big project that took years. And this one (Coasting Notes), the three of us worked hard for a year and a half.

MN: I was listening to Joyous Porous (The Henrys) and I could hear the level of detail that went into the production in terms of the rhythms and arrangements, but what struck me was how patient you are in your playing—you never try to say too much, but what you do say counts.

DR: I find it more difficult to do live; it’s easier in the studio. It takes a lot a confidence to do that live—sometimes you feel like you’ve got to keep the thing going, and I end up saying, “Why did I play so much?” I’ve got a friend who’s a trumpet player, he’s on Joyous Porous, he’s so comfortable with tacet it’s unbelievable. He could just stand there and play very little and be happy and I find that so difficult to do. It is an odd discipline trying to play less.

MN: Well, I think if you’re really in touch and trying to improvise melody or maybe doing a call and response type of thing it’s a different kind of thing. But I feel like I can hear you adding little colors here and there to the painting.

DR: That’s a nice notion.

MN: On the Joyous Porous record, what is that interesting sound on Walk West (‘Til Your Hat Floats)?

DR: That’s a piece foam under the strings. Depending on where I set the foam under the strings, I can get different harmonics—I think I had it somewhere around the 15th fret.

MN: Was the ring modulator added after the fact?

DR: I used to do that kind of thing with an Electro-Harmonix—no, I think I would have printed that.

MN: When you do go in to make a Henrys record, do you have an overall kind of sound or vibe in mind?

DR: The first few records we did, everyone was in the studio at once for a few days, but after that it became more like a science experiment and then I’ve tried to get away from that. Is This Tomorrow? was like that. It’s like I was constantly playing with it. The new one we did with Three Metre Day was all of us playing together, or as much as we could, depending on the track.

MN: Was the whole group involved in every aspect of the record, in the mixing?

DR: We hired an engineer outside of Toronto to mix it, but, yeah, all three of us were involved. It was nice to spread it around.

MN: Usually with a Henrys record it sort of ends up in your hands?

DR: Right.

MN: That’s tough. I always have a difficult time removing myself from what I’m working to become objective.

DR: Oh, I know. Sometimes I put the CD on in the car in a self-deluded attempt to decide whether it’s a good record or not. “I’m just gonna check this out to see if it’s any good.” Impossible.

MN: Me, too. There’s a fine line between crap and incredible and I can never decide where I stand. [laughs]

I experimented a lot with playing this head and came up with at least 2 ways of playing everything; however, the version that I’ve included here proved to be the most comfortable and musical for me, so that is what I am posting. You may find some passages difficult and want to seek out other ways to play them; that is totally cool and encouraged, because we are not all the same.

Hope you enjoy playing this. I really believe there is a lot of potential out there still for this instrument and I’m hoping someone comes along with the ability and desire to take this instrument where it has never gone before.

Spain for C6/A7 (head only)

This is some good old Bakersfield style steel guitar playing.
Here is the link:

http://www.steelinfromthemasters.com/?p=550

I wasn’t certain what I would post about when I started the blog, but I think one of the things I was interested in doing was having a venue to sort out a lot of information and document my own progress on the instrument, both in playing and conceptualizing. For me, the latter is really the most important thing because I am constantly considering possibilities and weighing the untapped potential against the established and proven traditions. It is very difficult to be a steel player without embracing the history of the instrument–this is one of the things that is so unique about it.

For a while I ran out of gas and couldn’t think of anything to write about for fear of being too self-indulgent, but then I had the idea to conduct a few interviews with some players whom I admire and respect. This turned into something even cooler when I was led to some unsung veteran players who have a lifetime of stories and information to share, and who shared their stories so openly with me. I am currently working on a few stories that are very special and I hope to have them see the light of day some time soon. The one thing that I didn’t anticipate was exactly how time-consuming the entire process would be. So, in the avoidance of burnout, I will continue to conduct these conversations and interviews but at a more reasonable pace. After all, I’ve got to play a little steel guitar myself!

Thank you for all the support and I hope this blog has contributed in some way to fueling your steel guitar journey.

“Jeremy Wakefield is more like Speedy West fused with Jerry Byrd. And a little bit of Noel Boggs.” Those are the words used by Wayne Hancock to describe Jeremy Wakefield’s playing, and he isn’t far from the truth. Throw in a big dash of Joaquin Murphey and Jeremy’s own unique sensibilities and you’ve got one of the world’s best non-pedal steel guitarists.

In the 20 years that Jeremy has been on the scene, he has played with and contributed to some of the finest Western Swing and Rockabilly music made this side of 1960. His credits include Wayne Hancock, Deke Dickerson, The Hot Club of Cowtown, The Horton Brothers, Biller and Wakefield, The Lucky Stars, Bonebrake Syncopators, Dave Stuckey and the Rhythm Gang, Smith’s Ranch Boys, Richard Cheese, and many others. Listen to any one of those recordings and you’ll hear that even at his earliest he had it together with a great touch beyond his years. He’s developed his playing today to a frighteningly articulate and fluid level, and he has a musicality that is natural and unpretentious.

His 1999 recording with Dave Biller, The Hot Guitars of Biller & Wakefield, gave a taste of the influence that Jimmy Bryant and Speedy West left behind to a whole new generation of listeners. Not only did the record capture their great picking on a program of all original music, but also the joy and humor that embodies Hillbilly Jazz. His 2005 instrumental recording, Steel Guitar Caviar, is a recording that every steel player should own. You get a sampling of everything that JW is about musically, from Bebop (Tiny’s Tempo) and Swing to Hawaiian (Hawaiian Creeper) to moody Surf music (Mudslide) to even some Lounge and Burlesque (The Red Garter) flavors.

Jeremy keeps busy making music with several bands in the Los Angeles area, including The Lucky Stars, The Bonebrake Syncopators, and Janet Klein’s Parlor Boys as well as contributing to the mega-hit Nickelodeon cartoon, SpongeBob SquarePants, which he has won an Annie Award for. He is also an artist who has lent his talents to movies, TV, CD artwork, Disney installations, and even the Clinesmith logo!

Musically, I’ve admired Jeremy for a long time and have listened to many recordings of him. When we had the following conversations, it was the first time that I’d ever spoken with him, and I found him to be engaging, open and extremely humble with a good-natured sense of humor.

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MN: Tell me a little about your steel guitar genesis….

JW: I played guitar growing up—I played in the church band and had a Ska band in high school, some cover bands playing Rock and Roll and all kinds of stuff. I grew up in the suburbs and in the 80s and 90s culture wasn’t global like it is now. It was what you could find at the record store. I feel like when I went to New York to go to school, it opened up a lot of things for me in terms of finding different music. I’d had an appreciation for Country music just because of my mom who grew up in South Dakota, where that was all that was on the radio.

I heard Hank Williams Sr. probably about the time I graduated from high school and I thought, “Wow, that is a crazy sound!” and that renewed my interest in it. I started looking for more records like that and started getting into Delta Blues–Skip James, and things like that—and Old-timey music, like Roscoe Holcomb. I remember buying a lot of records at the bargain bins at Tower Records. I found a lot of great Blues and Folk records there. But it seemed like—and it’s still true—the best discoveries are the stuff people turn you on to, where they make you a tape and say, “Check this out.”

MN: I’d spend 3 or 4 days a week just combing the record stores in that area. A lot of discoveries came from the sheer volume of stuff I bought (a lot of crap, too).

It seems like you were attracted to certain periods of music, like the older stuff appealed to you….

JW: At that time it did. And then I had this record that I found in a thrift store in Denver: “50 Great Country and Western Artists” or something like that on one of those cheapy labels. It had Crazy Arms and You Win Again, I Fall To Pieces, Your Cheatin’ Heart and man, I just wore that record out. My ear started tuning in to steel guitar, although I really didn’t know what steel guitar was. I remember listening to Hank and saying, “I know that’s a steel guitar, but exactly what that is I don’t know.” I couldn’t remember ever seeing anyone play one. It’s not like you could go on YouTube. It was such a mystery to me.

After I moved to Los Angeles in 1991, there was a cool record store there called Novotny’s Antique Store where you could listen to stuff—they had 78s and LPs. At that point, it was late ‘60s Country music that was interesting to me. Lloyd Green was all over that stuff, as I later found out.

MN: We kind of fall in the cracks not having steel guitar as part of our culture and being able to see it with our own eyes. And even in the ‘80s steel guitar wasn’t necessarily something you’d see every day anyway. I didn’t even know what a pedal steel was.

JW: No, it really wasn’t. My dad bought me a pedal steel for my birthday—a really early MSA called a Semi-Classic. It was a 10-string student model—3 pedals, 1 knee lever. That was my first foray into the steel guitar and I remember just being utterly at a loss. I had the Winnie Winston book and a Mel Bay book—the Winnie Winston book especially had a lot of helpful stuff, especially like the palm blocking and even some tab and whatnot. But I also started trying to learn these tunes that I’d been hearing. Then I went backwards and starting playing the lap steel because I was playing E9 with the pedals down to give a 6th sound and somebody said, “Maybe you should try the C6.” [laughs]

I picked up a little Fender Champ lap steel—I traded a Guild electric hollowbody bass to a friend of mine for it. So I started messing around with that. I had a 6th tuning that I had gotten from one of the instruction books, and that was when I really started learning the swing tunes, Bob Wills, Hank Thompson, things like that. That was around the time I met Lee Jeffriess and he obviously turned me on to a lot of great stuff I’d never heard before. And my friend Rick Quisol–he had a band in San Francisco with Susanna van Tassel, Suzanna and her Golden West Playboys, and they invited me up to play a few shows. That was my first time playing steel guitar on an actual gig. I could barely keep ahold of the bar, I was so nervous. I’d learned all of her material, which was a wide variety of obscure Country tunes and some Western Swing tunes. Rick had made me a cassette of his favorite steel guitar tunes and it was the first time I’d heard Vance Terry and maybe the first time I’d heard Oklahoma Stomp (Joaquin with Spade Cooley).

Another record I listened to a lot was called Country & Western Bulls-Eyes–kind of bargain basement. The one tune that I’d just listen to over and over trying to wrap my head around was Ida Red with Bobby Koeffer from the Snader Transcriptions.

MN: The internet has opened up that whole world of music for many of us. It wasn’t until I got turned on to this stuff through a few internet acquaintances that I even knew the music existed. Someone even gave me a copy of a Joaquin Murphey compilation that you put together.

JW: Oh, yeah [laughs]…there is one floating around out there.

MN: That was my introduction to Joaquin.

JW: No kidding…is that the one with the Deuce Spriggens record with the skip on it? That’s how I can tell it’s the one.

MN: Yup, that’s the one. I swear, hearing those records completely changed the course of my musical direction. I was stuck with the steel guitar, but hearing those records and the Hawaiian records really gave me some direction.

JW: I ended up putting a second one together that was from some records, but I put on stuff from VHS tapes I had with soundies and movies where you hear Murphey. There’s one that I love that’s a blown take from a Merle Travis session. He plays this awesome solo on a pretty well-known Travis tune, No Vacancy, and right at the end of his solo he does this funny effect where he drags his pick across the strings in the high register so it makes this hammering chimes sound and Travis comes in to sing and just cracks up and makes a remark like, “what the hell was that?”

MN: It seems like you had a pretty firm direction as to where you were going musically.

JW: I did. I met up with this band that I saw by chance—I went with a friend to this show and saw The Lucky Stars playing. At that point it was Sage Guyton and a few of the original members. There was no steel on this gig, but he had had Leo LeBlanc in his band—they actually did a couple of recordings with Leo. I actually did get to see Leo perform at the Palomino and talked to him a few times, he was such a nice guy. I never saw him with The Lucky Stars. I’d first heard about him because I had a Red Simpson LP that he had autographed. His name was written right across the front: “Leo LeBlanc – steel guitar.”

MN: He had a very unique sound and style and sometimes it’s hard for me to tell him from the guitarist. I love those Red Simpson records.

JW: He told me that George Jones let him go—fired him, basically—because he said, “You’re always looking at me, quit looking at me.” [laughs] I don’t know, I guess he was so thrilled to be playing in that band and he just couldn’t hide it.

MN: I think it would be hard not to be looking at George, to tell you honestly.

JW: Yeah, he was always looking at him just grinning.

As soon as I hooked with The Lucky Stars we started rehearsing a lot and that’s when I really started having a direction with the C6. I started listening to a lot of Murphey and had that Columbia collection and just tried to learn every one of those solos, and then got turned on to the Plainsmen stuff and those Coast records and just poured over those trying to learn every note. It was a long time before I knew about his C#min11, so any of those chord solos, I had no idea.

Stay Out Late – The Lucky Stars

MN: At this time were you playing a single neck or a double neck?

JW: I had a double neck. Right after I started playing with The Lucky Stars I got a Rickenbacker double neck that I still have, late-50s, ’58 or ’59, the solidbody with three legs—a great-sounding guitar.

MN: To me, the Rickenbackers were always the top of the food chain with regards to sound. All the steels I love are all approaching that kind of sound—the Bigsbys and even my Fender Custom with the trapezoid pickup is closer to a Rick sound than a typical Fender sound.

You get a great sound—one reason, I think, is because you use these amps with these inefficient speakers and you hear every little movement of the cone.

JW: That’s a nice way to put it, because I do like amps with inefficient speakers.

MN: You used the old Epiphone Electar amps for while, didn’t you?

JW: Yeah, my Electar is actually is in need repair right now, but I love those amps—great sound and they are loud. Billy Tonneson came to see me with The Lucky Stars once and told me that a lot of players used to use 2 of them.

I had always wanted to get my hands on one those Electars because it was what Murphey played—evidently. At least I thought so, because there’s that lobby card for The Three Stooges Rockin’ In The Rockies where he and Johnny Weis were sitting there. Anyway, I was in this music store and I saw this one and it looked really beat up, but I looked at the back of it and right there on the cabinet below the controls were these cast aluminum letters pressed into the wood, JM, and I just had to have it. Lee Jeffriess would always say, “Is that James Mason’s amp?” [laughs] JM could be anyone, but I thought, “You never know…”

MN: I’ve seen pictures of Dick McIntire and some of the Hawaiian guys playing through those. Did you start getting into Hawaiian music at all at this time?

JW: Yeah, like the Arhoolie and Rounder collections that were driving me nuts, especially Sol Hoopii. It wasn’t until later that I really started appreciating Dick McIntire—I think after meeting Joaquin and hearing him say his name so many times, that was really a big influence. McIntire’s stuff was always so hard to come by unless you found the 78s. Those Cumquat CDs are really just beyond compare—I listen to that stuff probably more now than anything. A lot like Joaquin Murphey, his playing just seemed like perfection: the beauty of the tone and the dynamics of his playing, the sound of one note and the way it’s shaped, the vibrato. It’s like a study in how to pluck a string.

MN: I agree. You’ll never hear a bad note out of Dick McIntire—every note counts. One of the fattest sounds I’ve ever heard on a steel guitar.

It’s interesting that you said Joaquin mentioned Dick so much—you can hear that in his playing, and I don’t really mean as a direct influence, but more the way he approaches playing up and down the strings like a Hawaiian player, rather than just playing across the strings.

JW: Yeah, it’s funny because Joaquin didn’t tend to talk a lot about steel players that he liked—you know, there’s that famous quote of his: “Who’s your favorite steel player?” He would answer, “George Shearing.” He was into Art Van Damme and Ernie Felice—accordion players and piano players—but he did talk about Dick McIntire. He studied with Ernie Ball’s dad, but he must have seen McIntire perform or in a music store.
I always found it interesting that Oklahoma Stomp was kind of based on a Leon McAuliffe solo—especially the earlier transcription from ’45 or ’46—listen to it next to McAuliffe’s Corinne, Corrina. It’s remarkable. He gets overlooked because he was so ubiquitous and people want to look to other sources, but everybody was listening to him and, before him, Bob Dunn.

On Improvising

MN: When it came to improvising what was your approach?

JW: I always felt like I was just piecing together what I’d copied from other solos. One that I felt went a long way in particular was trying to figure out Vance Terry’s playing on the Decca “San Antonio Rose” with a vocal by Lee Ross. Vance’s comping is so great behind the vocal and I remember playing that over and over and because of the progression it lent itself really well to whatever I was trying to do. Long story short, to play a solo I just felt I was trying to stitch together fragments of what I could play based on recordings that I’d heard and poured over and studied.

Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys – San Antonio Rose

MN: You seem to have an unending stream of melodicism like all of the great improvisers have and you don’t do a lot of gratuitous playing—every note you play has a purpose. I was wondering how you developed that sense of melodicism and are there any things you do to build it?

JW: Well, I feel it’s still my goal to play like the way you’re talking about. You know how it is when you’re piecing together the same fragments over and over…rarely do I feel like I’m approaching that kind of level where it’s just flowing out of me. You know, I feel like after trying to learn as many different solos as I could over different changes, at some point some of those things get ingrained to a degree. I need to think about that one, Mike!

MN: I know where you’re coming from—the more that you do transcribe solos and work on them and put them to use, the more they do become a part of your vocabulary.

JW: Yeah. I think one thing that has a lot to do with it is your internal musical thought—“do you have a song in your head?”, as people say. I’m afraid that’s me all the time. I have melodies running through my head—they may be simple melodies, but they’re stuck in my head—and I’ll sort of be improvising in my head over changes sometimes. I remember one time it occurred to me: it was around Christmastime and I had the Chinatown changes in my head and “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” came on the radio and I thought, “Hey, it would be something to play that over the changes!” and it almost worked except for one spot.

MN: You know what? You discovered what millions of keyboard players have known for years. They are the kings of quotes! [laughter]

JW: But, you know, I only came to that because it was cycling over and over. I feel like that has as much to do with it as practicing and learning scales and chords and learning where the notes are on your instrument. That’s a whole other aspect of it, being comfortable finding the notes once you know what the relationship is and where the notes and the chords are that you want to hear—getting to them when you want them.

MN: The melodies that you talk about…they may be simple melodies, but they are like seeds. They are planted in your head, but they grow. It’s amazing to me sometimes where an idea an idea can go or what it can lead to. Sometimes I may be listening to a tune and I’ll have to shut off the music because my mind has already run away with its own melodies.

Are you totally within yourself when you’re playing to the point that when you’re finished you’re not really sure what you’ve played? Like what you’ve played just happened and it’s gone? Does that happen to you when you’re really on?

JW: Yeah, sometimes. Sometimes I rely on a structure that I’ve been using in the past. If it’s a song in the setlist, then sometimes I’m more adventurous than others. So, it really does depend on a lot of factors—what kind of mood I’m in, how it’s sounding, how my own instrument sounds. When all the elements are falling into place, suddenly you’re not thinking about anything but the song. And once, man, once you get in that spot, it seems to come much easier. And that’s when I start making a lot of mistakes, too. [laughs] It’s like trying things when you don’t really know where it’s going to lead or how it’s going to resolve, so then it’s “whoops” and then find your way back. But I like that, too.

In the age YouTube, sometimes it’s like, “Oh boy, I hope that’s not going to be broadcast on the internet forever!” There seems to be always someone there with a video camera.

MN: Well, that really is the beauty of playing live music and being with other musicians. Sometimes it’s out of your hands where the music is going to end up—you’re just one part of something bigger. That’s when music is at its best, I feel.

As far as YouTube, I realized a long time ago that once I played something, I was going to have to live with it. It’s out of my hands and I have to let it go. I try not to let it stop me from taking chances.

JW: It’s the same with recording, too, even to a greater extent. It’s etched in stone in a way and you can’t change it.

MN: I’ve read the Lee Konitz book and he talks about how—Lee is just such a pure improviser—a lot of jazz musicians didn’t purely improvise, but relied on a lot of the same bag of worked out stuff and didn’t always put it out there on the line. I guess there could be a tendency to fall back into that kind of thing if we’re afraid that somebody is recording us, or whatever–we could lose that adventurous spirit if someone is standing there with a little flip cam…

JW: Yeah, I guess at a certain point there are degrees of improvisation. And, really, it’s all the same—if your vocabulary is as big as Art Tatum’s then you have more freedom to improvise fully. Even though he’s using his vocabulary, mixing it up and changing it every note or every bar is a new experimentation with his vocabulary, maybe it’s all the same in a way. Do you understand what I mean?

MN: Yeah, I do. You’re not completely playing something that you’ve never played before….

JW: You know, Joaquin Murphey, being such a virtuoso, you do hear him repeating phrases but they work and he is improvising. And there are known phrases and you start them in where they work and where they fit the best. It’s improvisation even if it’s made up of predetermined elements.

MN: Do you have an awareness or knowledge of music theory?

JW: Only what I’ve tried to teach myself. My dad showed me how to read guitar chord tablature on sheet music when I was a kid and I took piano lessons and at one point learned how to read notes. I played tenor saxophone in elementary school and I remember at one point I was in band class and we were working on a new song and the girl next to me—I mean I was having trouble with the tune, not being good with reading—she got frustrated and looked at me and said, “Can’t you read?” [laughter] I just said, “No, I guess I really can’t!” I was waiting until I know how the song goes, waiting to hear how you’re going to play it.

MN: That’s when you said to yourself, “I must be a guitar player….” [laughter]

JW: Yeah. It did have something to do with me throwing in the towel on tenor saxophone—you know, I rue that decision now.

MN: I was talking with Ray Noren and he mentioned to me Neuro-Linguistic Programming, which has been his bag since he left music, and it’s all about communication and he talked about how individuals are visual, auditory and kinesthetic in learning. Maybe that’s the case, where you were more auditory and it’s easier to listen than to look at a sheet of paper—after all, it is music.

JW: Definitely. I’ve been playing with this group recently, Janet Klein and her Parlor Boys, and I’m sitting next to this cat, John Reynolds—I think he’s one of the greatest living guitar players. The guy is amazing. It’s a real challenge, it’s a lot of new tunes. She comes up with new material all the time, there’s a lot of stuff that you haven’t played before and may not play again, but everybody in that band is a seasoned musician who can improvise and read. I realize when I’m in the middle of one of those gigs how much it would help me to be able to look at a page of music and not just draw a total blank. If I look at it for long enough and say, “OK, Bb minor, I can find where that is,”—by then the song is over. It’s something I would like to eventually get a better grasp on, definitely.

MN: You’re using your ears to get you through the changes?

JW: Well, pretty much. You know, once I’ve heard it I’m much better on it. Also, playing on an A tuning after playing on C and E for so long—I’ve been playing it for a about 2 years—it’s hard for me, at my age, to make that leap where I know automatically where Bb is, where on a C neck or E neck it’s no problem. I do feel the older I get the more difficult it is to get accustomed to new tunings. [laughs]

MN: Oh, so you’re playing on an acoustic with a raised nut or something like that?

JW: I’m playing a resonator, a new one, a Republic square neck. I’m hoping someday soon I can own a made in the USA version. [note to Don Young and National Reso-Phonic: Get this man a tricone, yesterday!]

MN: That’s how I learned, playing that kind of stuff. To be honest with you, I couldn’t wait to get away from it. But I learned a bunch of Sol Hoopii stuff and it was a blast.

JW: Oh yeah. That and like we were talking about, that Dick McIntire stuff. There’s so much there.

MN: So, you use an E13—is that the McAuliffe E13?

JW: Well, I’ve got the McAuliffe E13 with the 5th and the 3rd on the bottom, I don’t have the low E.

MN: So it’s like Vance Terry’s E13?

JW: I guess more like the Vance Terry E13, yeah.
E
C#
B
G#
F#
D
B
G#

I use that and I use C#min11.

MN: What is the C#min11 tuning?

JW: It’s basically like Dick McIntire’s tuning, but with chromatic strings on the bottom, like Murphey used. I think I first got it from Bobby Black. I think Lee Jeffriess had it figured out from talking to Joaquin. It’s Murphey’s chord tuning that he uses on all that Spade Cooley stuff.

Remington had a similar one, Billy Tonneson had a similar one—this one is from the high strings:
E
C#
G#
E
C#
Bb
D# (upper octave)
F# (upper octave)

That one is tough for me to get around with single notes much; Joaquin could do it like crazy, but you do hear him switching a lot between his 6th tuning and that one.

MN: Is your C6 tuning a straight C6 or is it C13?

JW: It’s sort of like a standard C6 with a G on top, but for string 8 I’ve got a high B, like another chromatic string on that tuning.
G
E
C
A
G
E
C
B (upper octave)

MN: That’s also like Joaquin thing.

JW: Yeah, but he had a C# down there instead of the C (G E C A G E C# B).

MN: I’ve gotten accustomed to the C# there, but I don’t use the high G and I like to play around with the bass string. I can’t live without it at this point. These days I play a more chordal kind of style, almost like a Shearing thing.

JW: Speedy is another guy who used a variation on that Joaquin Murphey tuning. And he’d have been the first to tell you, because that was his idol. It’s a little bit different, though. That’s what he used on that “I’ll Never Be Free” recording.

MN: I just love Speedy West. The one record he did, Guitar Spectacular is one of my favorite records in the world. For the mood, the compositions…he really came into his own as a composer.

JW: I agree with you, although I don’t I’ve ever heard anything he did that didn’t sound fresh and full of invention.

MN: Who are your favorite improvisers, on any instrument?

JW: Coleman Hawkins. If I could play steel guitar like Coleman Hawkins, I’d die happy. Man, I think that guy, from his very earliest stuff on up until he died, he was doing the same thing. You listen to some of those Fletcher Henderson records and his playing pops out so much—tonally, for one thing. His tone jumps off the record. You can just about hear his horn in the ensemble because his tone is so distinctive. And his style, it just seems like, “What!?” Some crazy stuff. He seems to really be stretching and testing the limits melodically. It’s the perfect blend of flowing melody and rhythmic punch—everything is there.

MN: His recording of “Body and Soul” is amazing.

JW: Yeah, I’ve never learned how to play that. I’ve got that in my mind as a goal some day.
Django Reinhardt is one and Charlie Parker I spent a lot of time trying to figure out his stuff but it’s impossible. I have learned a lot trying to figure that stuff out.

MN: I think the thing with those names you mentioned is that they all have such strong voices and personality. Especially Django, he had such an adventurous spirit in his playing.

The following transcription is of the song, Mudslide, composed by Jeremy Wakefield and appearing on his Steel Guitar Caviar CD.

Mudslide clip (head only)

The first is Speedy West’s dreamy and beautiful, “Afternoon Of A Swan” for 8 string C6 tuning. This is a difficult one to play and I adapted it from pedal steel to lap steel. I’m very proud of this one. It employs some difficult techniques, such as behind the bar string pulls.

The second lesson is Gabby Pahinui’s “Chloe“, from Ry Cooder’s Chicken Skin Music. This one is for both C13 (8 string) and C6 (6 string)–both tabs are included.

If you’re looking for a new challenge or if you want to become more intimate with C6 and its variations (C13), these lessons might be just what the doctor ordered.

Frank Kuebelbeck was born before the first electric guitar was ever made, in 1930. By the time he was in high school, Frankie Kay (as he would become known) was already a bandleader in his native Kansas City, Kansas, playing steel guitar. In 1951, he was a studio musician at KCMO radio, playing morning shows and then playing 6 nights a week in the clubs, when he was offered the opportunity to join Cowboy Copas’ band in Nashville.

When Frank got to Nashville, Dale Potter (fiddle player) suggested he take up residence in a rooming house for Opry pickers. His roommate was none other than Thumbs Carlisle. “One of the funniest things I remember about Thumbs—he played a Bigsby solid guitar—he’d wake me up in the middle of the night sitting in the room in his BVDs just playing up a storm for 2 or 3 hours.” Thumbs and Frankie became close friends and when Thumbs grew tired of the road work (he was with Little Jimmy Dickens at the time), he called Frankie and was offered a job in Kansas City playing in Frankie’s band. “We had a 5 piece group at this Western Swing club and we had all kinds of fun.”

“I’ll tell you one little story about Thumbs—when he first started, he started on the steel guitar. He played the open E tuning and he said the bar drove him nuts. So he pulled the nut off the end of the guitar and he used his thumb. So, anyway, I said, “Can you still play the steel guitar?” he said, “Oh, hell yes!” My steel guitar friends would stop in to see us and I kept one of my necks tuned to E for Thumbs, and he just played the living hell out of it. He’d play stuff like Steel Guitar Rag and he played it just as well as he did on guitar. It would amaze my steel guitar friends.”

Frankie worked in package shows while working with Cowboy Copas in Nashville with artists like George Morgan, Ernest Tubb, Hank Williams, Hank Snow, Bill Monroe and Jerry Byrd. “Jerry Byrd, I admired that man so much but he wouldn’t give me the time of day. He was working with Owen Bradley as studio band man up in WSM. We were road people and they all worked for WSM (as we did) but didn’t hobnob with the road people. I was fortunate to know Hank Williams, Sr. and talk to him. I knew enough about horses to talk breed lines with him. He was kind of reclusive and just sat over by himself in the corner, but he was very nice and I’d go over and talk horses with him and he’d talk with me as long as I wanted to talk. And his boys, Don Helms, Cedric Rainwater, Jerry Rivers and Sammy Pruett, lead guitar player, were all friends of mine and were super nice. But I had to get back to Kansas City and make some bucks.”

Frankie went to Riverside, Missouri where a club called the Riverside Rancho was opened and he became the house band. “My brother-in-law ran the place and they allowed me to name the place. When I was with Copas, we went out to the west coast and we just had to see Riverside Rancho, the big place where Noel Boggs, Joaquin Murphey, Tex Williams and all the big boys played. We booked in big bands—we booked Leon McAuliffe and his Cimarron Boys, Bob Wills. I had befriended Leon when I was at KCMO. Leon was coming up to Carthage, Missouri and an engineer friend of mine said, “Do you want to go and see Leon?” I said, “I really do!” We went down there and I met Leon and I got to know the band personally by name and, you’ll never believe this…Leon asked me to sit in! Well, all steel guitar players carry their bar and picks in their pocket if they’re worth a hoot. I sat in and played a blues and I was out of place as a you-know-what! But they tolerated me.”

Curly Chalker is another musician Frank befriended and hired when he was in need of work. Curly was once asked if he knew Frankie and Curly’s reply was, “Frankie Kay is one of the best steel players in the world.” Of course, Frankie says it’s not true. “I became friends with Curly just out of pure guts. I knew that guy had some talent that I’d never ever seen. So I went up and introduced myself and he tolerated me. Next thing you’d know, he’d play himself out of a job and he’d call me up and I’d help him try to find another job.” Phil Sperbeck, pedal steel player, was a protégé of Frankie’s. Phil went on to play with Bob Wills.
“Anyway, Curly was out of a job again, I believe 1954, I said come on out. I’m short one horn man this week. You can work the opposite end of the stage. He said, “What are we gonna do? Two steel guitars?” I said, “That’s been going on a long time with the Western Swing bands. I’ll play it straight, and you just go play anything you want. And he did. At this period of his career, he was HOT! He was a musical athlete when it came to single notes—he would just rip them off—brrrrrrt! I was in steel guitar heaven.”

“I’m really a chord man when it comes down to it. I love good chords—I can’t stand it when somebody plays a wrong one. I don’t mind alternate chords, but I don’t like wrong ones. When I started my Western Swing bands, the Country drummers and piano players were too damn dull for me. They didn’t swing—neither did the bass man. So I hired a jazz piano player, a jazz bass player and a jazz drummer and we took off. The rhythm section was just a swingin’ son-of-a-gun!”

Frank, you are man after my own heart! From one chord man to another, I hope I’m still swingin’ at 81 years old like you are!

*****************************

Mike: You hail from the home of so many wonderful Jazz musicians through its history, such as Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, Ben Webster, Count Basie–just so many wonderful musicians….

Frankie: Yardbird! He was a Kansas City, Kansas guy!

MN: Who was the one who really caught your ear the most when you first got hip to Jazz? Was it Charlie Parker?

FK: I would say it was a local jazz horn man by the name of Jimmy Keith (note: a member of one of Kansas City’s superb big bands). He was a helluva good tenor sax man. He and I got to be real good friends—he’d be playing in a black club and I’d be playing in a white club and we’d meet after hours and have a drink or go downtown and have a little sandwich of some sort. He and I just hit it off real good and he steered me toward a lot of happenings and recordings and everything like that. Even before that, I had a disc jockey friend of mine that turned me on to a lot of jazz and I really hadn’t heard much of the different guys, but he started me out on Red Rodney, the trumpet player. I thought, “Oh hell, there’s a lot more out there that I’m hearing than I know of!”

Jimmy Keith, front row, 1st on left

MN: When you first heard it you must have been like the rest of us who just can’t help but wonder, “What the heck are they doing?” Harmonically, it’s just so different, a whole other language—it’s a mystery.

FK: I know it—I did. I would just grasp bits and pieces of it. Another thing, Mike, I was lucky that I always had a good jazz piano man in my Western Swing band. I stood right next to the piano and I really gleaned a lot of the chord formations from him, especially if he was on top of things. We had a lot of good jazz men that just weren’t doing anything in my early days in Kansas City and I, being a leader, I was fortunate that I could hire who I wanted. Even though I might have a Western Swing band or a Country type, if I had piano player who was a jazz player, he could play anything.

MN: I guess that’s the way that the jazz language crept its way into Western Swing—because they would hire players with that harmonic knowledge and they would bring that kind of stuff to the Western Swing.

FK: Absolutely. Like Tommy Morrell and all of the players he played with—they’re all jazz players with cowboy suits on.

MN: Right. But I mean you can even hear it in the earliest recordings—little elements of jazz finding their way into the music little by little.

FK: Oh yeah, Bob Wills and Spade Cooley and all those guys had musicians that were capable of playing whatever in the hell they wanted to play. [laughs]

MN: When you looked at the piano player, you could actually look at his hands and see what he played? Do you play a little bit of piano?

FK: No, I’m not a piano player—I wish I were. In those days, in the ‘50s and ‘60s, we only had one microphone on the bandstand. It was really primitive. I would just be close enough where I’d hear all those nice chords that he was playing. I couldn’t play them, but I could substitute maybe 2 notes out of the chord, or 3 if I was lucky.

MN: I remember Lee Jeffriess telling me that you had a piano player who studied with Dodo Marmaroso and he was helping you out with some of the voicings and things like that?

FK: Yeah, he was very patient with me and he showed me voicings and substitutions and he told me, “You don’t have to have 3, 4 or 5 notes to make a chord. As long as you get the voicings right in your lower register…” I play a lot of 2 string things. I love the last 5 strings on my E13 tuning. I’m not one of those steel players who play with the first 4 strings and never utilize the bass strings.

MN: I think we have a lot in common! I’m really into playing chords and rhythm stuff on the steel guitar and focusing on the lower register.

FK: Yeah, I focused on playing in the lower register. My tuning is actually E13 tuning, but there are at least 4 different E13 set ups.

MN: What are the notes in yours?

FK: The first string is E, C#, B, G#, F#, D, G# and E.

MN: So you don’t use the B in the lower register…

FK: No, and by doing that a lot of times I can start off…I’m hooked up and I’m sitting by my steel—would there be any problem of me showing you what it sounds like?

MN: Oh, it would be fantastic!

FK: OK, I’m gonna be in the key of G and I’ll just walk a G with 2 notes, an Ami7 with 3 notes and Bmi7 with 3 notes and then I’ll go back down. [Frankie plays a walk up through the cycle back to I--tab to follow]
Could you hear that?

MN: Yes, I did. It sounds similar to the way I like to approach it—you have the 10th interval between the low G and the B and then you played Ami7, Bmi7, Cmi7, Bmi7, Bbdim, Ami7, Ab7. Excellent.
Rhythmically do you like a Red Garland comping rhythm or anything like that?

FK: Yes I do. The way I got to comping was I had a piano, guitar, bass, drums and me. When I didn’t have the piano player, I started playing the piano part behind the lead guitar player. I’ll play you a few bars of that if you’d like….

MN: Sure….

FK: I stay in the same key—I like the lower keys and I’m not one to play up above the 17th fret. It hurts my ears [laughs]. It’s a matter of personal taste….

MN: And it’s a little hard to navigate up there, too.

FK: Yes, it is. [Frankie plays a 12 bar blues using rhythms similar to a pianist’s left hand][tab to follow]

MN: That’s really wonderful. I talk about this stuff so much because of all the things I hear players talking about, I don’t hear people talk that much about play rhythm steel guitar. I don’t mean backup steel where we play high stuff behind a singer, I’m talking about becoming part of the rhythm section. I’ve written some articles about it on my blog. [For a related article, click here]

FK: No kidding! I’m happy to hear that there’s somebody else out there that feels the way I do about it. That’s great.

MN: A lot of guys don’t realize how simple it is to change just one note, for instance, in the C6 tuning making the lower C a C#–sure, you lose the root down below, but you gain so much. In thinking chordally, it’s a no-brainer.

FK: The reason I’ve stuck with this E13 the way I have it, I can get a straight chord: a 6th, a 7th, a 9th, a 3 string diminished and I can get a 3 string augmented with a reverse slant. Then, when I need it I can throw in a 2 note b5 (tritone). It’s what you get used to.

Frankie Kay playing Blue Monk [For a related article, click here]

MN: You play a double-neck Stringmaster, right? What other tuning do you use?

FK: Yeah, I have a double-neck, but I’ve had 4 necks, 3 necks and then I came down to a double. At one time I had a combo with a guitar player who had a double neck with bass on one and lead guitar. And so on my triple neck I had 3 tunings: the E13, probably an A6 or C6 and then I had bass strings that I bought and I doubled on bass when he was playing lead guitar.

A year ago I went to Joaquin Murphey’s tuning on my second neck and it was C6 with an A9 on the last 4 strings.

MN: So you had the B two octaves higher for string 8?

FK: Yeah, that’s it, but it didn’t please me; it was too shrill. So I dropped it down to a Bb6 with a G9 on the last 4 strings. It sounds good, but I’m really not at home on it. I’ve had it on for a year and I’m still learning. It’s an experimental neck and I just play with it for fun.

From l to r: A friend, Frankie, Russ Wever, Bill Dye (standing), Lee Jeffriess

MN: Where did you hear about that tuning?

FK: I think I heard about it from Bill Dye, a friend of Lee Jeffriess who lives in Kansas City. He’s an experimenting son-of-a-gun. He’s a very fine jazz guitar player/blues guitar player; he’d love to play steel for a living, but he has to play with blues and jazz bands on lead guitar to make any bread. But I got that tuning from him, ‘cause he’s wilder than anything. [laughs]

MN: That’s what they say was Joaquin’s tuning. I can hear a few different tunings that he used in different periods. One of my favorites is the one he used on Spade Cooley’s “Dance-A-Rama”. It was a 10” record with maybe 6 or 8 songs on it. His playing is out of this world on that one—he started to play more chords. He really ripped up the single note stuff, too, but he played more chords and added some more altered sounds. He played with a C6 (high G), but he raised the low C to C# and the low A to A#. That recording signifies a big change in his playing.

FK: Yeah, he was growing up, musically. Oh boy, I knew there was a lot more to steel when I heard him playing. [laughs] As a teenager, I heard him playing on the west coast.

MN: Well, one of the common threads between most of the great players is that they got hip to jazz. I think once those colors are available to you as a painter, you can’t paint a painting without them. As soon as you hear those chord qualities, you become drawn to it. Curly Chalker had those sensibilities, too.

FK: He was astounding. I heard him so much growing up and then he worked with me a time or two, although I had to use him on bass because I was playing steel. He didn’t give a damn! He wanted to work, he was hungry.

He was a nice guy. You had to take Curly like he was—he was a genius, but he wasn’t too loving. Tommy Morrell’s lead guitar player said, “He’s a wonderful musician and all that, but you wouldn’t want him for a house pet.” [laughs]

MN: Yes, I’ve heard similar things about both those guys. Neither one of them suffered any fools gladly. But like you said, there was a lot going on upstairs.

Curly, as most people know, didn’t have too many kind words for other players, but apparently he did for you….

FK: I can’t believe that he ever said that, because I knew him pretty well. I liked him, but he never had a kind word for me. [laughs]

MN: I’m sure that your kindness went a long way with him.

FK: First time I met Curly I was 19 and he was playing the straight steel then. He developed into a pedal steel player in his 20s, late 20s.

MN: Did he have all that harmonic sense together back then?

FK: Oh yeah, he was a helluva straight steeler. Tommy Morrell said that he was the best non-pedal steel player in the world.

Curly Chalker, left, on bass, Frankie, center on non-pedal steel, Phil Spurbeck, right, pedal steel.

MN: You told me Tommy Morrell was your idol….

FK: He’s my idol, 100%.

MN: When you listen to Tommy, at times it feels like he’s opening up so many other layers of his playing—he was a deep player….

FK: One of the things I really like about Tommy Morrell is that he didn’t play a thousand notes per second; he played what I could hear and understand. Some of these guys that are rally hot Nahsville players, they just play [emulates machine gun sound]. I can’t get anything out of it.

MN: I can go either way with that, as long as I feel that, whatever the person is playing, it’s part of what they are trying to say and not just gratuitous.

FK: I admire them and wish I could do that, but my mind won’t pick up on a lot of what they’re trying to throw out at me. [laughs]

MN: Did you start playing guitar first?

FK: I started playing steel, but I wish I would have started on guitar, to tell you the truth. If I started on guitar, though, I may have never gone to steel—that’s a possibility.

I had a guitar studio for 40 years and I taught regular guitar. Anyway, I played a job one night with a jazz snob over in Kansas City, MO and he was a saxophone player. He said, “Which guitar you gonna play tonight: the steel or the real?” [laughs] That pissed me off—I never hired him again.

I started playing steel when I was 10 years of age. 60 steel guitar lessons, you get a free wooden guitar. I was the dunce of the class—really, I didn’t take to it too readily. But my Dad was persistent and he enrolled me in private lessons. When I was about 13, I started my own group and I had old guys playing with me.

MN: This is right around WWII. Were you playing any Hawaiian music?

FK: Yeah, I played some Hawaiian stuff, some Cowboy stuff. I was lucky—one of my teachers taught all of those good swing tunes, Sweet Sue, All Of Me—the good old tunes.

MN: Were able to tune a lot of that Hawaiian stuff in on the radio?

FK: Oh yeah, and Alvino Rey, I liked him. He was playing the homemade pedal steel and I loved it. Boy, he was a chord artist. And he had a helluva big band. I liked him and then I gravitated into the west coast players and all that.

MN: How old were you when you moved to Nashville?

FK: Let’s see, I was about 19 when I started playing 6 nights a week. I was working at an insurance agency when I got out of high school. I didn’t want to get a job, but my Mom took me around for interviews and all that. I was an office boy at the insurance agency and I was also playing 6 nights a week making $90/wk as the leader of a 4 piece band in a nightclub. I had to have a special permit because of my age.

After that I got a job on the radio as a staff musician. So, when I was about 20, the disc jockey and program director—Cowboy Copas’ booking agent was his cousin. He wrote a letter and recommended me—I wanted to go to Nashville. I got there and I spent about 9 months and went to the poor house by way of Nashville, because they didn’t pay the guys anything and I was making a couple hundred bucks a week in Kansas City working 3 jobs. We didn’t make any money–$75/wk down there. I gave Copas a month’s notice because he was really a nice man and a wonderful boss. I said, “I’ve got to get back to Kansas City and make some money!” He said “I understand.” He worked me the whole month! [laughs]

One of my good buddies in Nashville was Hank Garland. He kind of moved toward the jazz direction, too. He used to be lead guitar player for Cowboy Copas before I got there. Copas always had a good, hot band.

MN: Who was your favorite steel player then?

FK: Leon McAuliffe was my idol at that time. Besides Leon’s steel playing, he had a helluva good band, the Cimarron Boys. I loved his orchestrations and everything. He was a really early steel guitar player playing hot stuff.

MN: He was a very exciting player, doing it before Speedy and those guys came along. I think he gets overlooked a little bit in that regard.

FK: I think he did, too. Boy, those people in Tulsa, OK—when Leon would go on the road, I had a Western Swing band at the Riverside Rancho in Riverside, which is a suburb of Kansas City, and he would call me before his road date and I’d go to Tulsa and play for him while he was on the road. If you had a steel guitar in the band in Tulsa, you were set. And I played all of Leon’s stuff, I aped him and loved all of his songs. He had a wonderful place called the Cimarron Ballroom. It was an old opera theater and they transformed it into a Western swing ballroom. Those people in Oklahoma and Texas really know how to dance.

MN: It seems you really have taken good care of yourself—you have a great memory….

FK: No, I didn’t, I was just like all the other wild asses around. I’ve got good genes apparently. I’m 81 and I’ve been married to the same wife for 59 years.

MN: You don’t hear about 60th anniversaries too often….

FK: Not very much, especially when one member is a full-time musician. [laughs]

MN: She must have an element of saintliness in her.

FK: Well, that and she is powerful, let’s put it that way! She knew I was in the music business when I met her and she tolerated it.

MN: Do you like to improvise when you play?

FK: I’m an improvising son-of-a-gun, but when you get away from the melody, you might as well pack up and go home. I like to start off with the melody, like Morrell did, but I’m not satisfied, I like to improvise all the time.

MN: Do you have a certain approach to improvising?

FK: I think I play off of the chord changes more than I do the melody. I really don’t like to play the same ad lib every time; I like to expound and play beyond. I like to play something different.

MN: Well, Jazz is music of the moment, you know—it’s spontaneous composition. Do you find it hard to find other players coming from the same place?

FK: It cramps my style when I’m playing a 3 chord blues and I start to wander off and throw the other guys. That’s pretty bad. My favorite player on earth is the bass man. If I’ve got a good bass man, I don’t need anybody else. How about you?

MN: Yeah, I’d have to agree. I think you can have a steel guitar trio—bass, drums and steel—and it would work great. One of my personal dream situations would be to play steel in an organ trio, just steel, drums and organ player—someone who played the bass pedals.

FK: Oh, yeah, that would be great. B3 organ? I never even thought about that.

MN: Frank, I really appreciate every moment that you spent talking with me. It’s quite an honor.

FK: Well, I’ve enjoyed talking to you—you talk the lingo I understand, as the song goes.

Special thanks to Lee Jeffriess, Russ Wever and Nancy Kuebelbeck.

Notice the tuning: It is a C6 tuning for 8 string guitar, with the 8th string tuned down to F. This gives me another pair of tenth strings–strings 8 and 3–and enables us to extend our range in order to play this tune.

Again, right hand blocking is essential–pay close attention to the note durations (if you read music–if not, listen to the audio file).

Here is an audio file (unfortunately, I did not have time to record this with my steel, so it is a recording of the MIDI playback).

Blue Monk

Note: there is a typo in measure 6 that got by me. The chord should be Edim7, not Ebdim7.

"I’ve always just kind of followed my heart."

Lookie, Lookie, Lookie Here Comes Cookie – The Midnight Serenaders

M: There is a pretty good scene in Portland, right?

H: Yeah, there’s a big acoustic scene here—it’s more old-time Country music, Bluegrass is really big. There are a lot of young people interested in playing traditional music. I met this guy, Doug Sammons, who was a Bluegrass player and he wanted to bridge the gap between old-time Country and Jazz, like Jimmie Rodgers did. So we started working on that and about 6 years later we’ve got 3 CDs (The Midnight Serenaders). Now it’s time for me to move on.

M: You mentioned to me that you are now interested in learning to play the tres….

H: I’ve always wanted to know something about Latin music but all the stuff I heard I was put off by, which I think was more of the later music, like Salsa—once there’s a bunch of horns in it and timbales and congas and percussion, it just doesn’t do much for me. Matt Munisteri sent me some CDs of Puerto Rican string bands, so hearing the Cuban and Puerto Rican string bands of the ‘20s and ‘30s is the most interesting thing I’ve heard in the last couple of years.

M: I’ve always had a deep connection to Latin music. I’m 1/4 Spanish and I can remember as a kid seeing my grandmother and her sister listening to Mariachi music and other Spanish music all the time. They lived in the same house, and they had the velvet paintings of the matadors. [laughs] I feel close to that music when I hear it.

H: It’s totally amazing—I wish I’d heard it sooner. All that Cuban Son and even Changüi—that is some of the weirdest music I’ve ever heard, the rhythms. Once I started hearing the tres and how it fits in a band…I love the fact that you can just do whatever you want to do. They’re just soloing over the entire tune.

I wish I was interested in this music back when I was living in New York. Mario Hernandez is kind of the guy I freak out over and he was in New York that whole time.

M: Obviously, your desire to stretch and learn these different styles of roots music extends a bit beyond what the typical musician who transitions into roots music does. The stuff you’ve gotten into is a bit more sophisticated and even exotic….

H: Well, I’ve always just kind of followed my heart. And that’s always led me to good places. It doesn’t always seem to make sense. I mean, I quit a band that was touring the world and I was making a decent living and I didn’t have to wake up at 7 in the morning and trudge off to work in the rain. But what I really wanted to do was putz with the steel guitar and see where that led me. It was a tough decision, but it was definitely from my heart. The same with the Cuban stuff; it just the music that’s moving me and what I’m listening to and I pick up the tres 100% more than I pick up my steel guitar.

A lot of people who are making a living playing a certain style of music don’t have the freedom to just go off and do something completely different. I’ve never relied on music to pay the rent. Playing music like this, it’s hard to make a living unless you hustle and that’s not me. It’s hard for me to play with pick-up bands and read charts—most of my solos that sound good are worked out in advance.

M: There’s nothing wrong with that, they’re still your ideas….

H: I would say they are musical ideas but I would say that it’s been a big frustration for the last 7 -8 years by not knowing the notes and the math of music. It’s really held me back in terms of playing better and playing an actual solo that sounds like you’ve got some ideas in it instead of just treading water.

M: I’ve always advocated for learning all that stuff, but it’s not for everyone and obviously there’s a lot more to making music than just that. There are some people who really ‘get it’ in other ways.

H: For a long time it didn’t really bother me, but the second half of my steel guitar career, it’s definitely held me back and I’ve got a lot more respect for people who do that. I didn’t rebel against that stuff; I wanted to know it. But it seemed like it would go in one ear and out the other. I’ve spent hours and hours and hours thinking about it, wondering “How could some guys get really good and some guys don’t?” Being lazy also is a big part of that. [laughs]

M: I sat in my classes in school writing out all my scales and chords instead of paying attention to the teacher….

H: I’m sure I would be a much happier musician if I had more of that kind of stuff….

M: Well, I kind of wish I would have spent more time paying attention to the English and Math—I’d probably have a good job. [laughter]

The Moonlighters – Twilight In Flight

When David Hamburger suggested that you check out some Hawaiian music, you didn’t have anyone to say, “Here, check this stuff out!” You had to go out and hunt for it yourself?

H: Absolutely, I didn’t know anyone who was interested in any kind of steel guitar. I didn’t even know that the steel guitar came from Hawaii. Being kind of a guitar geek all my life, I always thought that it was amazing that nobody knows that the steel guitar came from Hawaii. How could that slip through everyone’s consciousness?

M: So true.

H: I guess I should mention I got to sit down with Jerry Byrd for an hour. When I was still in Helmet, we played in Hawaii and I somehow finagled his phone number from this guy at Harry’s Music. So I called him up a month before I was going to be there and said, “I’m on tour and I’d love to meet you,” and I talked him into an hour lesson. Probably the biggest thrill of my life–because I was still at the peak of my Jerry Byrd fan worship.

I walked in there and he was leaning against this glass counter, with a big Panama hat, tacky Hawaiian shirt. He goes “Follow me,” and led me down to this tiny little space–an ancient Ampeg amp–we both plug in and he says, “OK, Henry, why are you here?” It was a total thrill. I could barely play at the time.

I will say this about the lesson: I had this little tune–I could kind of get through it, but he wouldn’t even let me get past the third bar. He was just like, “No, no!” I’d play a note or two and he’d say, “Nope, nope, nope. Not like that.” He was so into the music that all those little minor things, all the great stuff happens between the notes–how you go into the next note, how you slide up to it, how you dampen it. He wouldn’t even let me play the tune and I thought that was so amazing. His skill level was so intense, he saw all the little minor things that even great players don’t pay attention to.

And he did help me with my slanting–I like to say Jerry Byrd taught me how to slant, which he really did. I was having a hard time with it. He said, “Think of it as a car turning around the corner. You don’t want to cut too close to the curb–you want to go out and then make your slant.” He also showed me how to keep my index finger off the bar, to arch my index finger and not have it flat on the bar. You want to keep just the tip of your index finger on the tip of your bar and push with your thumb against the rear of the bar.

Jerry was very good with writing letters. I would write him and ask what tunings he used on certain tunes and he would always write back. He told me to use E13 tuning–he didn’t like C#m7 tuning–he said it wasn’t very playable.

M: How did you get into C#m7?

H: It was all Sol.

M: Did you get it from the liner notes of that CD?

H: Definitely. The 9th slant on the top 3 strings–that’s the shit. I can’t play without that. When I moved to Portland, I changed my tuning. I lowered it a whole step and changed some of the bass strings around which I wish I would have done earlier. My tuning is: D B F# D B A (hi to low). It made it a lot warmer. And much more playable.

One of the big drags about the instrument is that there weren’t a lot of people to talk to or take lessons from. If you play guitar or saxophone you can always walk down the corner and just watch somebody. You couldn’t just walk down the street and watch somebody play steel. It was a big drag to not to have a steel guitar buddy.

M: Do you think it’s ever going to take off again?

H: My gut feeling is that there seems to be sort of a peak right now. I don’t know why I feel that way. I think there’s definitely room for people playing and getting better…and even playing it in some sort of a modern context, in avant garde.

There are always guys that can play, but I don’t always hear people that pay attention to the feeling. That’s why I dug guys like Jerry Byrd so much. He really knew how to hang on to a note, which is what’s so great. Making all the music between the notes–that’s what this instrument does so well!