Talk:Steel guitar

This entire page looks like a potential copyright violation, taken verbatim from this site:

http://www.well.com/user/wellvis/steel.html

I'm working on rewriting it, and I'm also making separate pages for "lap steel guitar" and "pedal steel guitar." they're related, but different from one another, enough, i think, to justify separate pages.

African Example

"The idea of creating music with a slide of some type has been traced back to early African instruments." I think this needs a link to another wiki entry with an example of such an instrument. The idea of a string instrument with portmanteau capabilities by lengthening or tightening a string can also be traced to east Asia in the Vietnamese đàn bầu and Chinese dúxiánqín. Surely there is an example of an instrument of African origin that can be linked to here? Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 119.26.16.82 (talk) 16:59, 29 February 2024 (UTC)

Request for History section
It would be nice to see a subsection of this article document the invention of the steel guitar method, as other articles pertaining to musical technique tend to have. 72.95.184.97 22:50, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

There's a request for a picture of one of these types of guitar. I am in the process of taking other pictures for Wikipedia and could take a picture of my dobro like guitar (wooden body with large metal cone in the middle and two smaller ones at the top). It isn't a lap or pedal steel though. --KayEss 12:31, 26 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * I've completely re-written the page (hopefully no copyright problems now) and added a picture to it too --KayEss 07:06, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Rem text
Metal-bodied guitars (commonly nickel-plated brass), although frequently played using a metal (or glass) slide, are not properly called steel guitars - they are 'resonator' guitars, which, instead of the more common soundhole, utilize a kind of internal metal (usually spun aluminium) passive loudspeaker, to amplify the sound.

''The Dobro guitar which features a metal cone where the sound hole would normally be. The term 'Dobro guitar' is sometimes used to describe any resonator guitar, of any brand or style. Versions of this type of guitar, by Dobro and other manufacturers such as National, may feature the entire body made out of wood, painted steel, plated steel or plated brass (a 1937 Style 'O' National resonator is shown on the cover of the Dire Straits album Brothers in Arms).''

''Basically, the resonator guitars fall into one of two camps either Dobro or National - the difference is how the cone is activated. In the case of the Dobro by means of an aluminium 'spider' which transfers the vibrations from the saddle to the cone and in the case of National single cone models, by the saddle acting directly on the cone. Just to confuse matters National also produced a Tri-Cone guitar, which as the name suggests has three small cones connected by an aluminium 'T' piece.''

I think that's already covered in resonator guitar, and/or belongs there.

There seems some variation in terminology. I'm assuming that steel guitar includes Dobro played steel fashion, but others may disagree. Andrewa 20:46, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

From pedal steel guitar
The lap steel, dobro (often played with a steel or slide) and pedal steel guitars are most closely associated with country music, western swing and bluegrass, although some players have used them in jazz, blues, jùjú, (a form from Nigeria that uses pedal steel extensively) and other musical genres.

This seems more relevant to the this article. Parts have been removed from pedal steel guitar. Andrewa 21:53, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Doug Jernigan School Link
I removed this link because it is purely commercial with no additional information about steel guitar playing..... Jim, K7JEB

Steel Guitar VS. Bottleneck guitar.
I changed the wording in the section regarding the relationship between Steel Guitar & Bottleneck (or "slide") guitar. Steel guitar does not descend from bottleneck guitar. If anything, it is the opposite. Bottleneck guitar appears in Blues music AFTER the explosion of Hawaiian music (in the mainland U.S.)in the late 1800's. Some have claimed that bottleneck guitar descended from the Southern Black "Diddy Bow" (or a one-string instrument, consisting of a wire strung between two objects & played with an object slid over it), but there's no evidence pointing that way (and, if so, then why doesn't bottleneck style appear earlier in writings & recordings than it does?). There were many blues artists who also played both Bottleneck & Steel Guitar in hawaiian tunings. Either way, They are separate the Hawaiian guitar style did not originate in the blues bottleneck style. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.172.73.213 (talk) 18:02, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Best one
this explains the subject. the related articles are unclear re: style, instrument, application,...thx to the writers. Romanfall (talk) 07:47, 17 June 2010 (UTC)

External links modified
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Splitting sections of "Pedal Steel guitar" to "Steel guitar"
The primary article, Steel Guitar is an overview topic about this type of guitar. Secondary articles (about subtypes of steel guitars) include: Pedal steel guitar, Slide guitar and Lap steel guitar. I believe, in this case, the secondary article (pedal steel) has a much more comprehensive discussion on the history of the instrument and it belongs in the primary article. So does its “Electrification” section which follows, so I'm thinking about splitting these to "Steel guitar". Both these sections seem better in the primary article and their loss wouldn’t hurt “Pedal steel” because "history" and "electrification " is common to all of these guitars. I am the principal author of “Pedal Steel” written a couple of years ago, and I may have erred by putting the history of the instrument in the wrong place to begin with. The articles Slide guitar and Lap steel guitar also repeat the history to some extent. Another article. Electric guitar has a similar description of the Electrification history.

Does anybody want to weigh in on this? --choices might be: Eagledj (talk) 16:26, 10 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Move the "Early history and evolution" and "Electric amplification" section from “Pedal steel” to “Steel”
 * Rewrite the history in different words, essentially duplicating it in both articles
 * Make some link from "Steel” saying “for history of the instrument see “Pedal Steel”
 * Leave it as is
 * Having heard no objection, I have copied the "History and evolution" section of Pedal steel guitar to Steel guitar with the intent to delete it in the donor article if no objection. Eagledj (talk) 22:44, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Tunings!?
Nothing about tunings?

172.251.69.173 (talk) 04:55, 4 August 2021 (UTC)