The secret to learning PSG

Bo Legg · Post by **Bo Legg** » 26 Apr 2012 9:06 am

Well I coming right out and say it.
The secret to learning PSG is to learn good technique (I suggest Pick Blocking Plus) and after you get that down you will have the ability to learn all the famous and latest licks Intros and outros you’ve heard PSG players Rave about.
If you learn enough of them you will have all the 1 to 4, 1 to 5, 1 to 2 etc runs, all the intros and ending you’ll ever need to play any song on your PSG.
Don’t waste time trying to listen and figure it out from a CD. Get the tab and get after it and you’ll quickly be playing in a band and folks will think you are a great player.
Then you can do all that ear training, theory, mystic mediation, musical correctness or whatever else you are into in between picking jobs.

Joachim Kettner · Post by **Joachim Kettner** » 26 Apr 2012 9:19 am

The first song I learned to play was a very simple version of "Mansion On The Hill" taught by Bruce Bouton on a video casette. If I had started out with anything more difficult or plain technical I wouldn't have continued, I believe.

Rick Abbott · Post by **Rick Abbott** » 26 Apr 2012 9:19 am

And Bo that's just as clear as a harbor horn cutting right through the fog!

Johan Jansen · Post by **Johan Jansen** » 26 Apr 2012 12:25 pm

Maybe the real masters learned drawing this way?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkjXO7gnvWo

And we try to do that with MUSIC?
No, I don't believe in this...
JJ

Dave Hopping · Post by **Dave Hopping** » 26 Apr 2012 1:50 pm

My issue with tab is there are no time values.Although tab is certainly useful,I always learn by ear,albeit often with recourse to the slow-down feature on my Guitar Trainer

Q for the pros and session guys....How often do any of you get called upon to read steel parts written in notation? Is there a Tommy Tedesco of steel guitar?

Bob Hoffnar · Post by **Bob Hoffnar** » 26 Apr 2012 2:29 pm

Doug Livingston is a sight reader. I read a bit and have gotten major work from the doors it has opened for me. More importantly because of my ability to listen to music and transcribe it or at least chart it out on a lead sheet I am able to make a living as a musician. I gained that essential skill from listening to recordings and figuring out the music on my own. Its a sort of practical ear training every musician that I know that plays well can do.

From a purely steel player standpoint there is nothing more valuable for learning the instrument than taking how ever long it takes to learn a lick off a recording. Then learn how to play the same lick in a couple different places on the neck. Then apply that ability to learning how that phrase fits into the melody and chords of a tune. Its a fun journey.

Richard Rice · Post by **Richard Rice** » 26 Apr 2012 3:41 pm

Well, I'm a pretty recent PSG picker, although I am a lifelong guitarist. I tried and tried to learn PSG, but different things always stopped me, then I had to start from scratch again.. over and over.. For me the trick was to have a steel that works properly, and put in the hours to discover stuff. Chords, passing tones, scales, and songs. I can only manage to "practice" for about 15 minutes at a time, but I can "play" for hours on end and lose track of time in the process. You just have to play it every day, and try to learn one good tidbit each day. Play your new trick again and again until it feels natural, and you will remember it. Then toss it in your bag of tricks and learn something else. Techniques should be learned, theory helps a great deal, but nothing beats putting in some serious hours daily. Once the light bulb goes on, it's go, go, go!!!

Try to find great instructional material that is relevant to your desires, interesting, and geared toward your skill level. Watch/listen carefully. Take from it what you want, but don't get hung up on every detail. That stopped me in my tracks more than once. You can always go back and get more info from it, but if you get stumped on one item, you can get hung up on it and miss the forest for the trees like I did. I finally just decided to play the damn thing, and it opened up a new world for me. Right or wrong, I'm making daily progress, and my steel playing is markedly better since I stopped sweating the small stuff..

Remember, seven days without practice makes one weak..

Donny Hinson · Post by **Donny Hinson** » 26 Apr 2012 4:12 pm

IMHO, rule (or skill) #1 is playing in tune. "Fast" isn't always required, and neither is "playing in time"

But if you can't play in reasonably good tune, no other skill will help you very much.

Don’t waste time trying to listen and figure it out from a CD. Get the tab and get after it and you’ll quickly be playing in a band and folks will think you are a great player.

I think learning to play steel by reading tab is seriously limiting, almost like learning painting by "painting by numbers". Firstly, there's so little tab out there that I'd call "enlightening" or useful, and secondly because tab tells you absolutely nothing about expression, which is the very heart of steel playing.

Rick Abbott · Post by **Rick Abbott** » 26 Apr 2012 5:20 pm

Tab is useful to convey a general way of playing a set of notes. But if the player can't interpret the notes into a song it's not really musical. Old Warren Pearson (a kick-asp player) told me once that if a person can't make a song their own, it will be hard for them to be a steel player. His logic was that a player needed to be able to interpret the song, as well as understand the original on some level, theoretically. He meant...music theory. Not like a classical composer, but reasonably within the PSG realm. Chord theory and basic scale theory...plus the imagination to go one's own way.

Fred Glave · Post by **Fred Glave** » 26 Apr 2012 6:57 pm

As a guitarist originally taking on steel as a secondary instrument, the first thing I did was learn chords and the inversions. Moving around using the inversions helped me know my way around the neck. During this phase I developed blocking skills..palm and pick. That will always need work for me. I believe both are needed. I then began to practice scales and runs. First single note and then two notes. Now I use some home-made exercises that incorporate rolls and staggered string runs up and down the neck. That helps my speed and dexterity. I agree with Donny that speed isn't so important. I've jammed on some fast songs, but surprisingly, I can hang in there fairly well without burning up the neck. As long as the riffs and runs make sense and fit the chord progression, you're usually safe. There's always a way to fit in. I have used tab to help figure some songs, but I like to figure them out myself. I wish I could afford a teacher. there is still so much I don't get.

Henry Matthews · Post by **Henry Matthews** » 26 Apr 2012 7:19 pm

I think technique is the most important thing in learning any instrument. If you have good timing and not tone deaf, good technique will put you on top of the game. I play steel and fiddle and have probably worked more on proper technique than I have learning new stuff. That just comes natural once you have your technique and positions of notes or chords down. Even though I know I'll never be a super picker because I started to late in life. I was 45 when I got my first steel and 40 when I started fiddle. I constantly work on my technique and doing so, I learn new stuff and have developed my own style on both instruments. Tab to me is just a helping aid for right places to get the sound or lick in certain song. Been working all afternoon on Connie's , I'll Come Running and have the tab but never could do it from tab. I finally got it real close just by ear but if I hadn't practiced technique, I would never be able to do it.

Fred Glave · Post by **Fred Glave** » 26 Apr 2012 7:38 pm

Henry what is your definition of technique? Are you speaking of grips, scales, or something else in particular?

Dave Grafe · Post by **Dave Grafe** » 26 Apr 2012 8:07 pm

You are a dangerous man, Bo Legg... $:\$

Henry Matthews · Post by **Henry Matthews** » 26 Apr 2012 8:22 pm

Fred, what I' m referring to is everything from how you sit behind guitar, proper hand position, volume pedal and just basically, everything you do to make a note on your instrument. Yes, some people play really well and have terrible looking technique. I just think if you learn the proper way to do something, whether it be playing an instrument or swinging a golf club, everything else comes easier.

Bo Legg · Post by **Bo Legg** » 27 Apr 2012 1:14 am

Hey for you Newbies out there. All this negative stuff about tab is coming from us folks who have a lot of it hidden away.
We learned from it but don’t want to admit it.
We would rather impress you as self taught musical geniuses with perfect pitch and expertise on any matter related.

Sorry I can’t help but laugh about putting my heart and sole into a song and make it my own after 4hrs of a gig with every song sounding like “Your Cheatin’ Heart”

You think I might lose a little sleep wondering “might I have been a little out of tune”

Ransom Beers · Post by **Ransom Beers** » 27 Apr 2012 3:04 am

Do they still make Tab?

I watch a lot of you tube & listen & larn from the best.

Rick Contino · Post by **Rick Contino** » 27 Apr 2012 5:04 am

Once you already have your bad habits tab can help break them. Best way to learn is put on a Buck Owens record and try to keep up with Tom. Usually there's enough slow ones to keep you playing and enough fast ones to give you something to aspire to.

Kevin Lichtsinn · Post by **Kevin Lichtsinn** » 27 Apr 2012 6:14 am

Great thread!! Thanks all for posting!

Fred Glave · Post by **Fred Glave** » 27 Apr 2012 6:40 am

I have nothing against tab. In fact I've always gotten something very useful from learning a part from tab. Tab for me simply unlocks the mystery how a riff or run works and that is a real eye opener. Of course I want to learn to play a song, but in the long run I want to learn to play the steel. From my experience the repetition of scales and harmonic exercises using the relationship between the different strings up and down the neck has given me the roadmap to improvise. I am not what I consider a pro player by any stretch. I'm really still learning as an intermediate player in my opinion. I'm at the point where I usually take a short run or lick that I hear and disect it by ear to get what I need. It takes about the same length of time for me to do that as to learn it from tab.

Bo Legg · Post by **Bo Legg** » 27 Apr 2012 10:04 am

It matters little whether you do it with tab or by ear below is basicly how most do it.
Playing a collage of licks in this manor and mostly borrowed licks like Buddy lick #12 here and Paul lick #16 there etc.

Here it is by popular demand “Your Cheatin’ Heart” the Verse

Stuart Legg · Post by **Stuart Legg** » 27 Apr 2012 10:17 am

If you're a really hot player you'll combine the Solo licks with fill licks in your solo.

Brett Day · Post by **Brett Day** » 27 Apr 2012 12:23 pm

I played keyboards before steel, but when I started playin' steel, I watched so many videos that show you how to pickblock and palm block, I guess I play by pickblocking. As far as songs are concerned, I listen to the steel on the record first, then play along with the record. When I play songs at steel guitar shows, I usually look for the keys to the songs on the internet or sometimes look on the rhythm trackks cd to see if the keys are listed. I learned how to play "Mansion On The Hill" by watchin' and listenin' to Bruce Bouton teachin' it on his video. Sometimes I listen to songs at shows and then after shows I'll play those same songs to see how I sound. Style is important for any steel player or any musician

Roual Ranes · Post by **Roual Ranes** » 28 Apr 2012 7:24 pm

In the order of importance in learning to play pedal steel:

1. Live one on one teacher. (this usually also involves tab)
2. Video with book also involves tab.
3. Book also involves tab
4. Tab
The ear go along with each of these.
Tne one on one teacher will cut YEARS off of your learning curve. There were none in my hometown in my early years.
How could you possibly take tab out of the picture??????

Stuart Legg · Post by **Stuart Legg** » 29 Apr 2012 7:06 am

I couldn't have said it better!

Bill Moore (RIP) · Post by **Bill Moore (RIP)** » 29 Apr 2012 8:16 am

My thoughts, there is really no secret to learning to play the pedal steel guitar. If you actually have the desire to learn, you will learn. You have to really WANT to learn to play it. If you are not motivated to learn, you won't. It's that simple. You can take lessons, use tab, look at youtube, but if you don't try very hard, you won't get anywhere. I certainly have the desire to play well, I just wish I had more natural talent. But after 30 years, I have accepted that. I'm semi-satisfied if I see some gradual improvement in my playing as I keep working at it.

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