How to get the "Boo Wah" sound?

David D White · Post by **David D White** » 3 Jul 2017 10:10 am

I would like to improve the "Boo Wah" sound I get from my non pedal steel guitars.
Does anyone have any suggestions?
Specialized tone pots?
A "Boo Wah" pedal?
Special amp or amp setting?
Thanks in advance for any suggestions and help.

Erv Niehaus · Post by **Erv Niehaus** » 3 Jul 2017 1:30 pm

I believe it was done by rolling the tone knob back and forth with your little finger.

Scott Duckworth · Post by **Scott Duckworth** » 3 Jul 2017 2:56 pm

And then there is the "Boo-Wah" pedal on C6...

Lane Gray · Post by **Lane Gray** » 3 Jul 2017 8:04 pm

The boo-wah tone effect was either through a tone pot on the guitar or by using a pedal like the Fender volume/tone pedal, where you swivel the top part.

David Gertschen · Post by **David Gertschen** » 4 Jul 2017 1:45 pm

Some guitars "boo-wah" better than others, due to different value tone pots and capacitors.

I remember reading somewhere Danny Gatton would change all of his Telecaster tone pots out with 1 Megohm linear taper pots. He used the boo-wah effect often, rolling the tone knob with his pinky finger.

Tom Bradshaw · Post by **Tom Bradshaw** » 4 Jul 2017 2:44 pm

Jerry Byrd was the master of this technique. In my many discussions with him I regret not asking him about the tone and volume pots in his Rickenbacker guitars. I do suspect that someone here on the Forum knows the answer to this, but may never read this topic. Did he use a linear or audio taper in his pots, and, what was the ohm values of each pot? I'd suspect they were 500K's, but today's 500K's don't provide those extremes in bass to treble like Jerry could get.

I also wonder if he began his "boo-wahs" with a common "crash bar" routine (while have his volume pedal backed off), then quickly brought it back to the proper volume level, followed by the tone swell from his tone control. It is important to listen to the effect and recognize that he never went from treble to bass; it was always bass to treble.

Any other thoughts about this would be appreciated. ...Tom

Jack Hanson · Post by **Jack Hanson** » 4 Jul 2017 2:57 pm

Beginning about 1956, many of the Gibson pedal steels and consoles featured both "du-wah" and "audio-cut-off" controls. One was a red, and the other a black, momentary push-button switch. Would love to see a circuit diagram for the "du-wah."

Tom Bradshaw · Post by **Tom Bradshaw** » 4 Jul 2017 3:04 pm

I should have included the following in my last post:

Speedy West did the opposite of Byrd. He would voice his crash bar attack with his tone control in the bass mode, lift his bar, crash it again, but with the tone control in the full treble position. He would also do the crash routine up the neck of his guitar (with a root-less 9th chord as the sound), while rapidly moving the tone control from bass to treble. It was truly one of his signature licks. I wonder what the ratings of his pots were?

Lane Gray · Post by **Lane Gray** » 4 Jul 2017 10:53 pm

Tom Bradshaw wrote:Jerry Byrd was the master of this technique.

Amicus brief: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GtuwAJTXvTU

Tom Bradshaw · Post by **Tom Bradshaw** » 5 Jul 2017 7:56 am

Lane: If there is a Youtube of Byrd on Williams' "Honky Tonkin'" that would be one of Jerry's best boo-wah examples.

Garry Vanderlinde · Post by **Garry Vanderlinde** » 5 Jul 2017 10:54 am

The key is to use a Linear taper tone pot. Linear pots come to full effect very quickly, usually the first 1/4 turn.
My Bigsby T/V has a 100k linear tone pot with a .05 cap. (some say a .1,or 1Meg., cap works better). They might be available here on the Forum's accessories store.
Volume pot is 500k audio taper (original ?).

Fender steels used Volume 250K Audio and Tone 1 Meg. Linear w/.05 cap.
and they Boo-Wah very well.

John Billings · Post by **John Billings** » 5 Jul 2017 1:49 pm

I did the Gatton tone knob mod on one of my Teles. The first time I used it, the whole band turned and stared at me! Bwaaaaa!

John Billings · Post by **John Billings** » 5 Jul 2017 2:24 pm

I did the Gatton tone knob mod on one of my Teles. The first time I used it, the whole turned and stared at me! Bwaaaaa!

Garry Vanderlinde · Post by **Garry Vanderlinde** » 5 Jul 2017 10:06 pm

Hi John, what are the Gatton tone knob mod specs?

Tim Whitlock · Post by **Tim Whitlock** » 6 Jul 2017 7:42 am

I've been able to get the boo-wah effect easily with the stock pots on my 56 Stringmaster and 58 Fender 1000. The key is to make sure you have the guitar's volume full on and a bit of gain on your amp. Not so much gain as to cause distortion but enough to give your boo-wah the needed punch.

For some reason the boo-wah was not as strong on my 51 Fender Custom or my 63 Fender 1000.

A boo-wah pedal like the Fender Vol/Tone works great as well. I have both the re-issue and a vintage pedal. Here is a short clip where I demo the bar crash boo-wah effect on my Fender 1000 with the vol/tone pedal:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_A-uh1M5dc

Pat Moore · Post by **Pat Moore** » 8 Jul 2017 1:17 pm

Danny Gatton knew it ALL!!!

Steven Welborn · Post by **Steven Welborn** » 10 Jul 2017 8:40 pm

Tim Whitlock wrote:I've been able to get the boo-wah effect easily with the stock pots on my 56 Stringmaster and 58 Fender 1000. The key is to make sure you have the guitar's volume full on and a bit of gain on your amp. Not so much gain as to cause distortion but enough to give your boo-wah the needed punch.

For some reason the boo-wah was not as strong on my 51 Fender Custom or my 63 Fender 1000.

A boo-wah pedal like the Fender Vol/Tone works great as well. I have both the re-issue and a vintage pedal. Here is a short clip where I demo the bar crash boo-wah effect on my Fender 1000 with the vol/tone pedal:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_A-uh1M5dc

Tim, that pedal sound really good. Do you know what the tone pot/cap values are?

Tim Whitlock · Post by **Tim Whitlock** » 13 Jul 2017 9:58 am

Steven Welborn wrote:Tim, that pedal sound really good. Do you know what the tone pot/cap values are?

Thanks Steve. The Fender Vol/Tone pedal has 250k pots for both he volume and tone and a .047mf cap. It's pretty much the same circuit they used in their steel guitars.

Steven Welborn · Post by **Steven Welborn** » 13 Jul 2017 3:02 pm

thanks for checking

Rich Upright · Post by **Rich Upright** » 14 Jul 2017 7:09 pm

Danny was DA MAN!

Chris Templeton · Post by **Chris Templeton** » 15 Jul 2017 5:09 pm

Thanks for the info all, and especially, Tom.

Andy Volk · Post by **Andy Volk** » 19 Jul 2017 5:18 am

Great info, thanks!

Godfrey Arthur · Post by **Godfrey Arthur** » 20 Jul 2017 4:48 pm

I just posted about this a few minutes ago on another thread.

As Garry already posted here a linear pot and a .05uf cap.

A 100ohm pot would be what you'd find in a wah pedal.

Depends on how dark you want to get but you sacrifice the bright if you go too low in ohm numbers.

Darren Riley sells a bunch of .05uf caps.

http://darrenriley.com/product-category ... tors-wire/

Steven Welborn · Post by **Steven Welborn** » 30 May 2018 7:13 pm

Been using my Fender volume tone pedal with my Dual8 Pro trap. Tone seems a little dull compared to going straight from guitar to amp. I plan to attempt to eliminate as much 'tone suck' factor as possible. Since I'm happy with the pedal for volume control and "booWaa" (I can't get anywhere with the crash bar approach), I can de-solder and bypass the redundant tone and volume on the guitar altogether and go straight out. Also to preserve more naturals highs of the guitar itself, and to intensify the boowaa effect, I plan to swap the tone pot from 250K to 500K, and the .047 cap for something bigger. I believe Fender used audio taper for both volume and tone. I think it best to stick with audio due to fact that the pedal being in neutral position most of the time when not doing the boowaa, hence the tone pot being midway (as opposed to the tone pot on the guitar itself would more likely be full on 10 during normal playing). If my thinking is correct, the audio pot would be more full on (treble side)at midway point than a linear. Does this all make sense? I dread taking this thing apart and back together...

Doug Beaumier · Post by **Doug Beaumier** » 30 May 2018 7:59 pm

I played some tone control boo-wahs on the intro in this video ---> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0642tjWXrg

Set your tone control to full bass, and turn your volume full on. Slam the bar down on the strings and quickly turn the tone control to treble with your little finger. As others have said, it works better on some guitars than others. It does not work well on modern guitars where the bass to treble sweep is gradual. On older guitars the bass to treble change happens very quickly, not gradually. That makes for better boo-wahs!

The Steel Guitar Forum

How to get the "Boo Wah" sound?

How to get the "Boo Wah" sound?

Jerry Byrd

Lest we forget Speedy West

Re: Jerry Byrd

Wah On The Mind