Was there ever a time in your playing career when

Chuck Hall · Post by **Chuck Hall** » 5 Sep 2009 1:58 pm

it felt like a switch was thrown and everything seemed to suddenly become clearer. Like the pieces of the puzzle started to come together revealing the bigger picture?

I've been at this for 16 years and I'm still waiting for that moment. I just wondered if it ever happened to anyone.

Hope that made sense.

Mike Spaeth · Post by **Mike Spaeth** » 5 Sep 2009 2:46 pm

Chuck for me I had at light switch moment 5 years into starting on steel. I am currently trying to learn lead guitar but so far no light switch $:\$

Paul Sutherland · Post by **Paul Sutherland** » 5 Sep 2009 3:36 pm

Yes. Twice.

First when I took a private lesson from a guy in Denver, whose name I have forgotten. He explained why I wasn't supposed to pick up the bar to mute strings. He introduced me to palm blocking, to get clean tone.

Second time was when I attended Jeff Newman's college in Nashville and he clearly explained how to play scales using chords, how things connected up and down the neck, and why it all worked. He was a great teacher.

Georg Sørtun · Post by **Georg Sørtun** » 5 Sep 2009 4:17 pm

Two decades ago, when I straightened my picks.

Charles Davidson · Post by **Charles Davidson** » 5 Sep 2009 8:37 pm

I'm still in the dark,never found that light switch. YOU BETCHA,DYK?BC.

Dave Hopping · Post by **Dave Hopping** » 7 Sep 2009 12:01 pm

I was working on the steel rides to B&D's "My Next Broken Heart",Miranda Lambert's "Jack Daniels" and "Don't Rock the Jukebox" and realized that having hybrid-picked six-string since long before I took up pedal,I never used my right index finger to pick notes.So I started to.Big improvement right away.I also started taking a few baby steps into bar slants.

chas smith R.I.P. · Post by **chas smith R.I.P.** » 7 Sep 2009 5:11 pm

There was a moment when the neighbors stopped throwing their garbage in our yard, after I practiced. True story.

Buck Reid · Post by **Buck Reid** » 7 Sep 2009 5:34 pm

Chuck... I'm afraid I don't understand. Could you please elaborate?

Roual Ranes · Post by **Roual Ranes** » 8 Sep 2009 1:41 am

I keep hoping.

Paul E. Brennan · Post by **Paul E. Brennan** » 8 Sep 2009 2:06 am

With me it was more like a dimmer control than an on/off light switch. Over the years, as I tried to make sense of what I was hearing on records and continued to work hard on the steel, the light started shining brighter.

Bill Dobkins · Post by **Bill Dobkins** » 8 Sep 2009 4:00 am

Since I could remember I ate slept and dreamed about playing the guitar. At age 12 I finally got an old Silvertone archtop.I learned my basic chords. I practiced till my fingers bled. Nothing made any sense. Then after about a month I was practicing C,F&G and this feeling hit me and all the sudden I was playing.It all came together. I'm 65 now and I've yet to experience anything like that day.
BD

Jack Dougherty · Post by **Jack Dougherty** » 8 Sep 2009 8:12 am

Yes but it wasn'nt the steel.

Is this the right forum

Stuart Legg · Post by **Stuart Legg** » 8 Sep 2009 9:10 am

That light switch moment usually comes right after you hit the wall with your playing and it becomes painfully clear that you have hit the wall.

basilh · Post by **basilh** » 8 Sep 2009 4:20 pm

Paul E. Brennan wrote:With me it was more like a dimmer control than an on/off light switch. Over the years, as I tried to make sense of what I was hearing on records and continued to work hard on the steel, the light started shining brighter.

That light was Pascal Mooney and Donie Cassidy looking for a replacement for me.. I think they found one, so when you play "Country Startime" you know where half the royalties will be going.. "Green Grass Music.." Then RTE then somewhere down near the bottom of the pile will be 'mise'

Cal Sharp · Post by **Cal Sharp** » 8 Sep 2009 6:02 pm

I think you reach a series of plateaus, if you're serious about the steel guitar, where things start clicking.

When I played my first steel guitar gig, I learned a whole lot about working with a live band.

Sitting in with players who were much better than I turned on a whole lot of lights.

Staying up all night playing along with Ray Price albums was, of course, a great learning experience.

Artist gigs taught me a whole lot, especially working with Jimmy Dickens. He told me to listen to him, the singer, and to make him and the song sound better. A good lesson.

Faron Young's drummer told me to play with more authority. Ya gotta play like that.

Hanging around good steel players here in Nashville and germing them to death was a good thing, for me, at least.

Listen to a lot of music. Do it a lot. Like, all the time.

After all this, and playing hundreds of gigs, I realized that I could kick off almost any song if I were given the numbers - 1511 or 4511, for instance - and the tempo. Even if I didn't know the song - and there weren't very many of them - and play a decent solo or turnaround. I saw Buddy do that one night - well, lots of nights. Yeah, a switch clicked. It's mostly experience and dedication to the point of obsession. I was now a good bar band musician.

W. C. Edgar · Post by **W. C. Edgar** » 8 Sep 2009 8:29 pm

For me, being a former steel player if I have to tell who ever is playing steel for me on my road show to "TURN UP" there's gonna be trouble. Take it from the GREAT CAL SHARP stay up all night long and play with Price records and learn all those Emmons licks. It will serve you very well in the future. Thanks Cal for showing me Hughey's intro on Conway's "I Just Destroyed The World" cut. You have always been a big inspiration to me my friend.

Remember "Look at the Rack on that"!?

Don Drummer · Post by **Don Drummer** » 10 Sep 2009 11:51 am

In the book "Outliers" by Malcom Gladwell the moment is usually achieved after 10,000 hours of endeavor. That is roughly 3 hours a day for ten years. YMMV. I know mine did

Don D.

Cal Sharp · Post by **Cal Sharp** » 10 Sep 2009 1:51 pm

Remember "Look at the Rack on that"!?

Yeah, that wasn't an effects rack, either. Although it did have an effect on us.

10,000 hours of endeavor. That is roughly 3 hours a day for ten years.

I put in a whole lot more time than that. How come I still can't play "Billie's Bounce"?

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 10 Sep 2009 3:41 pm

It hasn't happened yet. Wait a moment, I think something is happening... was that it ? No, that was just my testicles dropping.

David Doggett · Post by **David Doggett** » 10 Sep 2009 9:05 pm

There are times when I suddenly realize I am playing stuff I couldn't in the past. But by then the goal posts have moved, and I still feel like a klutz trying to play what I hear better players doing with apparent ease. They should call this instrument the Sisyphus. $:\$

Herb Steiner · Post by **Herb Steiner** » 10 Sep 2009 9:35 pm

David Doggett wrote:They should call this instrument the Sisyphus.

David, please explain. That's Greek to me.

Alan Brookes · Post by **Alan Brookes** » 11 Sep 2009 6:12 am

Sisyfus was condemned to roll a big rock up a hill, but each time he neared the top it rolled back again, so he had an impossible task which would never go away.

Cal Sharp · Post by **Cal Sharp** » 11 Sep 2009 7:09 am

Sisyfus was condemned to roll a big rock up a hill

Yeah, I read a book about that. Camus apparently thought it was a myth, so maybe it's not impossible to keep the analogous rock from rolling back upon our
steel guitar efforts. Unless the realization of the meaninglessness and absurdity of life requires suicide. So... pick or die, I say.

Chuck Hall · Post by **Chuck Hall** » 11 Sep 2009 8:43 am

Thanks to all for your responses. This was not a trick question and there will be no test. lol

However, since I was a young'un of 13 all I wanted to do was play guitar. I finally got an old Silvertone flattop. The headstock was broken and my mother did not want to spend $8.00 on it because she believed I would not stick with it and learn to play. She finally bought it for me and my neighbor helped me fix it. Three tuning pegs were still on the guitar and three were broken off. We wrapped in in sheet metal and screwed and nailed it down. Of course it would not stay in tune more than 30 seconds but I kept hammering at it. It had big old Black Diamond Strings the size of telephone poles and made my fingers bleed. But, I kept on. Once my mother saw I was going to stick to it, she said if I learned the Wildwood Flower, she would buy me a good guitar. In about two weeks, I could pick the song and we went to Western Auto and she bought me a new red Truetone solid body electric.

I learned my basic chords. I practiced till my fingers bled. Nothing made any sense but I kept at it. Then one day I was introduced to an E barre chord and the ability to move it up and down the neck. Another whole world opened in my playing and when I found out I could do it with an A barre chord and learned what the fret notes were and the Nashville numbering system then the light went on and this feeling hit me and all of a sudden I was playing anything I wanted.Want a minor? Just pick up an index finger. I guess you can see what I'm talking about. It all really came together.

I'm 60 now and and have been playing steel for about 16 years. Like one of you said, I believe it has been a series of small plateaus (like with the guitar) But I have yet to experience anything like that day with my guitar when it all seemed to come together. Sure I can kick off most anything I want. Chords are not much of a problem. I practice every day and play a dance at least twice a month. I don't think I will ever be satisified with my level of playing and I wish I could do better.

I once told a student (yes I teach too) that there is always something to learn. When the day comes that I think I know it all, I'll quit playing because in my estimation no one knows it all even the Greats such as Big E and Paul Franklin have something to learn.

So I keep struggling with it and keep practicing. Still going one step at the time.

Chuck Hall · Post by **Chuck Hall** » 13 Sep 2009 9:53 am

So is it little plateaus along the way or the big bang? I still don't know.

Did a street dance Friday night. Had a blast but my guitar (6 string) did not sound right all night. Sounded like the strings were streched over a tin coffee can.