I'm new to steel guitar, and to guitar as a whole (so those lessons that say "you can apply all the stuff you already know..." have no particular value for me). I play clarinet and have done a fair bit of music theory, so not a music beginner, but obviously you don't play chords on a clarinet, and the theory I have done has all been in the context of classical music.
I've had a lap steel guitar for about 2 months now, and one of the things I've been doing is trying out different bars. I tried a Shubb SP1 which I quite liked but holding it hurts my hand. I then tried a Shubb GS bar (the one with the wooden handle) and I found that much more comfortable than the SP1 but more awkward to use as the tips are quite pointed and catch under the strings. I then tried a bullet bar, which I liked, and following a recommendation from another thread on this forum, I've just taken delivery of an Ezzee-Slide polymer bullet-style bar and this is great, easy for me to hold (and sounds good too!). What I need now is to work out the best way to use it, which is part of the reason for this post.
I was first tempted to try a bullet bar rather than a Stevens-type bar by a youtube video I watched by Ethan Shaw (as in Texas Swing Revival) who has a little series about getting started on lap steel with one video specifically about the bar. He strongly recommended a bullet bar over anything else: he says lots of people do use Stevens bars, particularly those playing resonator guitars where pull-offs and hammer-ons are a big part of the style, but that bullet bars are better for lap steel where less lifting of the bar is involved. I enjoy this style of playing.
I looked at various posts on this forum about lessons and the two most obvious choices were the Georgeboards lessons or Troy Brenningmeyer; I went with Troy because my primary aim is to be able to play some basic blues, probably in Open D. I've enjoyed the lessons and I think they've got me off to a good start but feel I'm running out of steam with them a bit. This is partly because I've reached the end of the most obviously structured part of what he offers, and partly because his style seems to involve a huge amount of bar tilting, pull-offs/hammer-ons, etc, that work well with the Shubb bars but not so well with the bullets.
I'll be continuing with Troy but I'd like to start something else as well. My wish-list would be:
- slow blues played solo rather than with backing tracks
- continuing with Open D or, at a pinch, low bass Open G (instead or as well), but not switching to C6
- some sort of steady progression I can follow: master this, move on to that which is a little bit harder, and so on
- learn some songs I can play rather than assorted licks and scales that I don't really know what to do with
If anyone can suggest any resources that tick as many of my boxes as possible I'd be most grateful.
Thank you!
