E9th FRETBOARD - CHORD LOCATOR CHART

[Ken Mizell]

About 12-13 yrs ago, forumite Brian Kurlychek posted this chart:




PLEASE NOTE: In these charts, the "D" lever is the lever lowering the E's to Eb. The charts have been updated to indicate this. Some may now refer to the lever as the E lever. The rest of the pedals and levers indicated on the charts are standard.

A correction has been made to correct an auto-correct typo concerning the pitch of the 9th string open - D.

I recently used Microsoft Excel and made another similar version or upgrade. This one uses GFI style fret markers. It wouldn't be hard for me to revise it to use Sho-Bud or other style fret markers if someone asked. me. If I can find examples, I can plug them in.

I hope there are some folks here who can make use of a chart such as this, which is why Brian Kurlychek originally posted it. I don't think he is around here anymore, since there are no recorded posts since 2012.

To save these, right click on the photo, open it up in another window, and save it. They are jpg images.

[Ken Mizell]

[Ken Mizell]

[Paul Awalt]

Very cool, how about one for a Mullen G2. Thanks.

[Ken Mizell]

Paul - Working on that. I need to get a clean. Hlare free, photo of a Mullen fretboard WITHOUT strings. I'll get 'er done.

[John Hyland]

Just a thought the chords might be better under the actual bar position (fret) rather than the gap between

[Ken Mizell]

John - I'm using Microsoft Excel, and offsetting the cells from the fretboard for data input isn't too easy. Not even sure if possible.If it is, I don't know how. Not a bad idea though.

[Ken Mizell]

[Ken Mizell]

[Ken Mizell]

The forum watermark obscures the cells on the bottom right corner. In case anyone wonders, they are show in the below clip. Most will know what they are though.

[John Hyland]

John - I'm using Microsoft Excel, and offsetting the cells from the fretboard for data input isn't too easy. Not even sure if possible.If it is, I don't know how. Not a bad idea though.

I thought that might be the case. I use a Mac which allows multiple tables.

[Ken Mizell]

Noted, John. I just noticed, you are a LONG WAYS from Central, FL in the USA.

[John McClung]

Nice work, Ken! It might be more useful if you added a copedent to all the charts, explaining pedal and lever names and what they do. Note that many folks these days call the lever lowering the E's a half step the "E lever".

But plenty of tab material still does use the old name of D lever (I presume it was the first lever added after pedals A, B and C became standards, can anyone confirm that bit of history hunching?), there's no real standard nomenclature for E9 unfortunately.

[Roger Rettig]

I suppose there's not a C6th version of this tool?

As there's no room to add string-grips it might be less effective.

[Ken Mizell]

John M. - Thanks and noted. Everything on the chart is currently standard, except the D vs E concern. Back in '81 when I first started messing with pedal steel, it was common to call the lever lowering the E's the "D" lever. I have the Jeff Newman "Up from the Top - D Lever" course -lowering the E's I certainly agree that the most logical term is "E" lever, since that's what it handles. "F" lever makes sense too, since it changes E's to F. I'll put a note at the top that D = Lowering E's.

Roger - No, sorry.

[Larry Dering]

Ken, is that a typo, or do you have string 9 as a D# for a reason?

[Ken Mizell]

Thanks Larry. That is a typo.

I have these things saved, so I will go through them later today, make the correction, and post all new ones.

IF ANYONE SEES ANY OTHER MISTAKES - PLEASE TELL ME. Thanks.

[Ken Mizell]

CORRECTIONS HAVE BEEN MADE. The "D" lever change has a notation too.

All of the charts above have been corrected and reposted. These are all new.

[John McClung]

I think the chord naming is a bit off, Ken, though it does seem to follow the way many pedal steelers think of and name chords, including myself!

If you look at the vertical columns as chords from the open major chord's harmonized major scale (the POSITION row), those chords should all be either in sharps or flats, depending on the root chord's key signature.

Thus, at fret 2, F# major, the A pedal creating the 6 minor should be named D#m, below that would be C#7, D#, G#m, and A#m. And so on.

My reference I found in this rabbit hole of curiosity is a chart of all the harmonized major scales:

https://tinyurl.com/4zxt7kcw

There arre even inconsistencies in that chart: the A# line should be in Bb, and the D# line should start on Eb! The author chose #s for all keys in between the natural letters for some reason.

The chords in your low E column are correct, but at fret 12 it's different and in error (B+C 2m = F#m, not Gbm).

I'd humbly suggest adding a column outside the left side of the chart, stating the Nashville number of each chord. So just below the open major chord name comes the 4 (or IV) chord, then the 6m (vi), the 5dom7 (V7), the 2m (ii), finally the 3m (iii).

Keep up the great work my man! Pardon the nitpickiness!!

Let the debates and counter-arguments begin!

[Dennis Montgomery]

Thanks Ken, this is a great idea! I'll probably load this into paint shop pro and add a few more rows on the bottom with other pedal/knee combos that I regularly use - and also adjust it to extended D9

[Ken Mizell]

Dennis - If you send me an e-mail, I'll respond and provide you with the Microsoft Excel file. You can use that to add what you need. Then, copy the Excel spreadsheet and paste it into your graphics program (I used Microsoft Paint 3D). You can then scale it, print it in various sizes, etc. Also - Once it is in your graphics program, you can save it as a jpg or pdf file. Mine are saved as jpg, plus the Excel file.

[Ken Mizell]

John M. - Your input is noted. Nitpicking accepted.

As I have time, I'll work through my master chart saved in Microsoft Excel and correct those things you mentioned. I have a good circle of 5ths chart with the # and b info for the various chords, which will help.

We all know that A# and Bb are the same, just different names, but if we want to get this "Musically Correct", things should be as they should. I don't have a PhD in Music Theory, but I'm trying to learn. Obviously the guy who originally came up with this chart was in the same boat as I am.

I also figured out why the 9th string D ended up as a D#. The program I'm using replicates previously entered data in subsequent cells. So, since the 2nd string was entered as D#, it changed 9th string D to D#. It kept trying to do this when I was correcting it.

[Dennis Montgomery]

Dennis - If you send me an e-mail, I'll respond and provide you with the Microsoft Excel file. You can use that to add what you need. Then, copy the Excel spreadsheet and paste it into your graphics program (I used Microsoft Paint 3D). You can then scale it, print it in various sizes, etc. Also - Once it is in your graphics program, you can save it as a jpg or pdf file. Mine are saved as jpg, plus the Excel file.

Thanks! Sent you a pm

[John McClung]

Ken, it takes a village...or an army of proofreaders! I'll be begging for favors from my pro playing pals when I think I have a final version of text and diagrams for my book coming someday soon aimed at beginning and intermediate players, "E9 101: Bandstand Fundamentals." I keep finding little errors in text that I've used for literally years! The more eyes the better.