Alternate Dobro Tuning - Same Gauges

[b0b]

First of all, I'm not a bluegrass musician, so I don't have to duplicate any of the standard tunes. I just got my first squareneck resonator guitar (a cheap POS) and strung it up with John Pearse strings.

After about 10 minutes of stumbling around in the G tuning, I decided I needed something a little more familiar to me. My solution was to lower strings 2 and 3 to give me a D major chord on top. Since I play D6th on pedal steel, this works well for me.

Here's the tuning: G B D F# A D. Does anyone else here do this?

My first lap steel tuning was A C# E G# B E - same intervals - so this feels like going home.

[b0b]

No responses? Maybe it's a new idea. I thought that all of the tunings were known by now.

[John Mulligan]

I assume that's low to high. That looks like a nice tuning. I spent years in open D on my reso this looks familiar but with more voice, if you know what I mean. I'll have to try it out!

[Brad Bechtel]

For some reason I didn't see this yesterday, or else I would have responded. That is a fascinating variation, b0b. I will have to try tuning to that and see what I can get out of it. I'm used to playing in open D tuning but I've been mostly playing open G tuning for the past year or so. This could be interesting...

[b0b]

I like that it has a minor chord (Bm) on strings 5, 4, 3. Also the GM7 is surprising to hear from a dobro.

[L. Bogue Sandberg]

b0b,

Although I play resonator exclusively, I'm not a true bluegrass musician either. In fact, my band mates debate whether I'm a musician at all. I've fooled with G9, dropping the upper B to A, and straight D, dropping both B's and both G's, but your idea is new to me. I'll certainly try it out. Trouble is, I have too much to learn and too little time with the tunings I already "know." -- Bogue

[Mike Neer]

b0b, try raising the second string to B. If you are familiar at all with the C#min tuning or even the E tuning, like you said, it should make some sense to you.
You can get lots of nice dominant sounds with this tuning--which on strings 1-4 is the same as Sol Hoopii's tuning, only 1 step lower.

At that point you will have a GMaj7 tuning, and you are only 1/2 step away on the 3rd string from a G tuning. Nice for minor chords, too, with a bass player, of course.

[Jouni Karvonen]

Here is Stacy Phillips playing in Gmaj7 tuning:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZEtkYN_tVI&feature=plcp

[Mark Eaton]

I've ran across one or two guys who have used the tuning b0b is trying, but I like Mike's suggestion of simply dropping the third string down to F# from the usual GBDGBD dobro tuning. And the demo from Stacy was great.

What's cool about a six string instrument like dobro or six string lap steel is how one can learn a popular tuning "backwards and forwards" like GBDGBD and by altering only one string now the instrument has a completely different "voice," but you're already comfortable with the "home base" tuning like GBDGBD. Or you have a G6th-oriented tuning by changing the the 4th string from D to E or in the case of Greg Booth, he tunes the sixth string down from G to E.

I like Open D a lot as well, but to me the strength of that tuning is the bottom three strings, as in the DAD portion - it's like a built in acoustic power chord.

[b0b]

Here is Stacy Phillips playing in Gmaj7 tuning:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZEtkYN_tVI&feature=plcp

Nice. What key is he in?

[Mike Neer]

Here is Stacy Phillips playing in Gmaj7 tuning:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZEtkYN_tVI&feature=plcp

Nice. What key is he in?

Eb

[rodger_mcbride]

Here are some interesting variations I've been fooling with; all high to low, trying to stay within 2 half tones of the same gauges as high G. Low base G (Taro Patch) is also fun and may be a favorite. For a combination tuning A11 is great (A triad on the bottom 3 strings and G triad on the top strings, but requires re-stringing.)

Gm
D
A#
G
D
C
G

B (with a 2 on top)
C#
B
F#
D#
B
F#

D6 (inverted)
D
B
F#
D
A
F#

Low base G
D
B
G
D
G
D

rodger

[D Schubert]

Noticed several things about that tuning. Must try it out soon. It's like a b***o with the scruggs tuners in the low position. The 5 highest strings make a D6. If you tune the F# back up to G, and bend the 2nd string behind the bar, you have a faux-PSG A-pedal sound.

[Greg Gefell]

I switch back and forth between standard G (GBDGBD) and open E (EBEG#BE) without changing gauges. Some of the other ones listed here look interesting though, I'll have to try them.

[L. A. Wunder]

I use the "standard" guitar tuning, but lower the top string from a "E" to a "D". It looks like this:

D
B
G
D
A
E

I don't know exactly what you would call the tuning, but the "A" gives me a 2 or "add 9" chord, and the "E" gives me a 6th. I play in church, and being able to play the "relative minor" chord in whatever key I'm in, is important.

[Jerry Tillman]

I play the G tuning most of the time but I lower my 6th string to e and play it like an E minor 7th.You can play take 5 pretty easy with it tuned that way.

[Jerry Tillman]

I don,t use that R tuning on my dobro.

[Jim Sliff]

I use "Dobro G" for bluegrass, Hawaiian and country-rock on my '42 Tricone and Wechter-Scheerhorn square necks, and D or A6 on my Dobro (every once in a while high bass A or low bass A for older Hawaiian stuff).

"Dobro G" isn't "locked in" to bluegrass - Stacy Phillips first Art of Hawaiian Steel Guitar is almost entirely in G, as many players used it or tuned up to th same inversions in A. It's so logical I've taught some guys basics on the phone, plus there's so much free material out there (not just bluegrass) it is very "accessible".

[Andy Volk]

I use open D as my home base. With a tweak of one string I can get Dmaj7, D7, Dmin, D6th, DADGAD, El McMeen's DADGAD variation, plus regular G tuning - which I usually tune to Greg Booth's low E version -n making it Emin7th tuning. Greg Leisz used to us an A major/E major combo similar to yours, b0b.

[Peter Jacobs]

On my reso, I use "low bass" G tuning (D G D G B D low to high), so I can get the aforementioned power chord on the low strings. Plus, I was always skipping the low B string in "standard" Dobro tuning.

One of these days I'll spend some serious time in D tuning...

[b0b]

Since starting this post, I have recorded an entire album in this tuning on my Harmony Stella guitar. I like it!

https://b0blee.bandcamp.com/album/stella

[Andy Volk]

Just realized it was a 2012 post!

[Peter Jacobs]

Zombies!!!!!!!!!!!