Difficulties in slanting

[Mike Neer]

One of the most difficult things I find in slanting, particularly in reverse slants, is keeping the note on the top string steady. I find that sometimes I have to plant my middle finger right against the string to make sure the bar stops and stays right where I want it to be. This is for when I want a really clean slant a la pedal steel, where it is often a V-I cadence or I-IV.

How do you deal with this particular issue and what are some of the issues you have?

Another thing I find difficult is keeping track of all the damned slants! I feel like a have a ton of them and it takes a second or two to process them or remember them...so much that I've actually been keeping written notes on them.

[Joshua Clements]

I don't think I will ever learn what you have probably forgotten Mike. I only have a couple of slants that I can pull off and they aren't perfect. I like slanting from a I forward into a V or reverse into a IV. I practice that a lot. Or slanting from a I into a IV and sliding to a higher I. I don't know if I have explained this correctly. I see a lot of sliding from a V7 slant into a I slant, i.e. C7 into F, in the older music. I play A6 non pedal, so I try to hit a few of the faux pedal licks. It is definitely a challenge. Seeing you post about this problem lets me know that I am not alone.

[Jerome Hawkes]

i do it just has you have discovered mike.

if you think about the mechanics of it, on a reverse slant, you want the highest note to stay still while the lower moves up in pitch. the only way to get that high note from wobbling is to plant the middle finger at the tip of the bar while your thumb goes back and grabs the butt of the bar. and the whole hand pushes forward to execute the slant. i will actually plant the ring and pinky right against the middle for more control - where normally they are spread slightly for regular behind the bar damping. the index finger plays a big role here to as its the pivot and pressure point to keep it all from falling apart and believe me i have had the bar shoot out of my grip often attempting reverse slants - unlike forward slants, you don't have any "grip" on the bar at all - you are using opposite movements to push and pull. (there is a word for this i can't recall)

I got this tech from JB's video - which is aimed at raw beginners. i think its important to hold the bar correctly to achieve this. i know people just "hold the bar how its comfortable" - and thats fine, but if you start doing forward and esp reverse slants, you can't "move into position" smooth enough as the whole hand now has to readjust. from the "classic" hold position, either slant is one complete movement INTO the slant and this is key, BACK to normal - its gotta be 1 smooth moment. i notice a lot can get into the slant ok, but can't get back to straight bar position very efficiently.

[Andy Volk]

I'm just a living room hack but my experience has been there's another aspect to keeping slants in tune and one that I can remember siting in a chair typing but tend to forget when actually playing: string flexibility and downward pressure. For some slants, I've found that a little downward pressure is necessary to intonate them. Having too much flex in your strings can mess things up when the natural pressure of the bar comes into play. A tighter action is the remedy.

How Jerry Byrd played so completely in tune with never a question of ever being out of tune is a bit of a mystery but I think his near constant vibrato was a big factor. JB said that having a curved index finger on top was essential to execution of slants.

[Rick Barnhart]

I imagine a pivot point near the tip or the the heel of my bar, depending on which slant I'm going for. The imaginary axis helps me keep the string underneath the point in tune while I find the other note with the opposite end. I never really considered down pressure, I'll have to try that.

[Andy Volk]

I recall seeing a photo of some guy's wacky invention that involved rubber bands on the bar to flip it back into proper portion after a slant. Guess that's why they invented the pedal steel!

[George Piburn]

Herb Remington teaches a great practice method for slants.

During the practice time Play the Stationary Note while pretending to play the motion note.

Move the bar - use all of the suggested means and any others too - remembering to only play the stationary note.

For the most part the Stationary Note is played with a Finger Pick and the Motion Note is the Thumb Pick.
Raise the thumb Pick above the strings During this Practice Procedure and continue to pick above the strings with the thumb.

Obviously the opposite is done for slants where to lower note is the is the stationary note.

Once you can Keep the Static Note in tune and move your bar all over the place , Presto !

[Doug Beaumier]

Sometimes when practicing slants I'll place a small chromatic tuner on the lap steel, or use a clip-on tuner. Then I pick the two strings separately and make sure each one reads 440 on the tuner. Then I'll do the slant by ear, and then check each string separately on the tuner to see how close or how far off I am. The slanted notes should read 440 on the tuner. It's a good way to see the exact angle that the bar should be.

Play the Stationary Note while pretending to play the motion note

George, yes, that's a great way to practice slants. I was just about to mention that! But use a chromatic tuner on the lap steel when playing this exercise. Pick the upper note with the finger and make sure it reads 440 on the tuner... and do a reverse slant motion (slant the rear of the bar up one fret but do not pick the lower string). Just watch the tuner and make sure the string at the nose of the bar continues to read 440 as you do the slant. Then do the same thing while slanting the rear of the bar down one fret. Only pick the upper string, not the lower string, so the tuner will only "hear" the upper string.

[Chris Templeton]

Use the thumb to push the rear end of the bar out and don't use the wrist or arm.

[Mike Neer]

Use the thumb to push the rear end of the bar out and don't use the wrist or arm.

That is the technique I use. But one must fight to keep the nose of the bar perfectly in place!

[Doug Beaumier]

All I can think of is apply more pressure with the finger on the nose end of the bar and concentrate on keeping that note in tune as you slant the rear of the bar up. You'll need to adjust the position of the nose end as you do the slant. You may need to move the nose back or possibly toward you slightly to compensate for the angle of the slanted bar. That will help keep the constant note at 440. Try it with a tuner, as mentioned above. Just pick the upper string, not the lower (slanted) one.

[Gary Meixner]

Mike,

I don't know if the will apply in your case but I have observed in my own playing that whenever I am dealing with a matter of technique I need to remember to look at my whole arm position. More often than not my elbow is too close to my body restricting the movement and control of my entire arm and hand.

I know this sounds counter intuitive and the more joints you can lock up the better control you will have, but the body is so interconnected that this isn't always true. I kind of compare it to casting with a fly rod. You control the tip of the rod from the action of your entire arm, wrist, fingers and the rod itself.

The other thing I have noticed about reverse slants is your line of sight is obscured even more by the bar than when playing straight, and my eyes seem to want to automatically adjust the bar for better viewing. I have to concentrate to override this natural tendency. Sometimes I even practice slants with my eyes closed.

Maybe these two ideas will help. Best of luck.

Gary Meixner

[Stefan Robertson]

I use my left palm to limit the movement of my reverse slants. This helps for those three note slants tremendously.

[Stefan Robertson]

I am now discovering as Mike said there are so many chords in my tuning that are already in the straight bar position. Over 100 easily. I now have to learn how and when to apply them.

[Chris Templeton]

Pushing the heel of the bar out with the thumb, for reverse slants, is Jerry Byrd's technique. Also, If one is lowering or raising the bottom note of a three note chord and the top two notes are on the same fret, the round nose bar can keep everything in tune.

[Jerome Hawkes]

way back when...as a violin student learning double stops (2 notes/interval played together) it was taught to concentrate on the intonation of the lower note of the 2 as the ear naturally hears the higher pitched note and wants to adjust that as a priority. i think in this case, really concentrating on the stable note staying stable as others have mentioned.

totally off the topic, but related to slants...
i've been learning a lot about slants recently as i've dived into more of JBs repertoire - i've noticed, at least in forward slants, to aim slightly behind the "fretline" (where you would usually play right over the fret) and then compensate with a small bit of vibrato seems to suit the ear better. i havent experimented too much with this idea, but my WAG is in slanting I may tend to overshoot the note because the nose of the bar is no longer giving me a true point of reference. i dont know...

[Doug Beaumier]

Here's a real slant-builder. A forward slant, up 1 fret on string 1 and up 2 frets on string 2. Jerry plays this in Golden Earrings. Bar on fret 5. Pick strings 1 & 2, and then reverse slant to frets 6 & 7 and then back to fret 5, straight bar. Finish off with a healthy dose of vibrato and volume pedal to draw out the sound. For this slant to be in tune, the bar will be almost sideways! Almost parallel with the strings! Check it with your tuner. It's a beautiful sound if you can nail it. It's a fill over a I chord. 3rds... the root and the 3rd are moving up to the 2nd and 4th, and then back to the root and 3rd. If you have a long scale steel guitar this slant may be difficult on fret 5 (F). On a long scale it would probably work better on the upper frets, 9 (A), 12 (C), etc.

[tab]

Reverse slant

E -----5~~6~~5--------
C -----5~~7~~5--------
A --------------------
G --------------------
E --------------------
C --------------------
[/tab]

[Jonathan Lam]

What is wrong with using the middle finger behind the bar where it sits normally?
Listening to the bottom not is a real interesting thing, i am going to work on that!!
moving from the forward to reverse slant my thumb always seems to lose grip.
SLANTING IS HARD.

[Jonathan Lam]

What is wrong with using the middle finger behind the bar where it sits normally?
Listening to the bottom not is a real interesting thing, i am going to work on that!!
moving from the forward to reverse slant my thumb always seems to lose grip.
SLANTING IS HARD.

[Tom Snook]

Notice in the picture of Jerry that Jon Lam posted,how short Jerrys bar is?The longer the bar,the harder it is to do rev.slants.The Man himself told me that.And like a dumby,I traded my shorter bar,the one I took my lessons from Jerry with,the one he's played all of my lessons with,he would play my guitar to show me the exercise then give it back to me.I traded to Todd Wedger for a little longer bar cause I thought it would be better for eight strings,I'm still regreting that one

[Clyde Mattocks]

I have always been comfortable with slanting, forward or reverse. Some guitars are just easier than others, the hardest being the Fender Stringmasters. I had a great teacher, the late Kenny Dail. The main things are, do it with your ears rather than your eyes. Like harmonics, go for it with the attitude that you're never going to miss it, being timid will trip you up. The biggest mistake I see is underslanting. If you're going to err, overslanting is much more forgiving. If you underslant, you never reach the correct pitch, but if you overslant, as you return you will pass thru the correct pitch, and glissing to a pitch is really the essence of steel guitar.

[Doug Beaumier]

Some guitars are just easier than others, the hardest being the Fender Stringmasters.

I agree. The string spacing seems very narrow and close on a Stringmaster. Tight spacing means harder slants, especially on adjacent strings. Wider spacing makes for easier slants IMO. The Sierra 8 is a good example of that. It's a fairly long scale, but slants are comfortable on the lower frets due to the wide string spacing. My favorite steel guitar for slants is the Guyatone. It has wide spacing and I can usually nail the slants... most of the time. Same thing with the Gibson Century 6.

[David Mason]

I quit playing slide guitar for nearly a decade when I got a pedal steel, which was time well spent - but then that dastardly Sonny Landreth caused a return, and I did have a quarter-century in on it... The difference with Landreth was, there's now an abundant source of VIDEO to combine with his few lessons in the mags and whatever guesswork. I was surprised to see how much he manhandled the strings, all wrong-like. Like if he needs two notes separated by two strings (like the 5th and 2nd string) he will just CRAM an extra right-hand finger in between the 3rd and 4th strings - no precise, polite "blocking" needed.

Getting to the point (oh goody) as I try to apply this idea to the left hand, it comes to dropping some anchors there - just pick an arbitrary spot where a string will be crossing under your thumb, and another under your ring finger, and then always do it that way using those points. I'm pretty sure the Cool Guys don't need this, but it helps me a bit. Our ears can only do so much, and when you double the number of notes, hitting two of them correctly is more than twice as hard.

It's kind-of maybe a bad habit, and I can envision that to (eventually) break the habit I will first need to introduce some secondary anchoring ideas. And it's slow, but then how long does it take to hit them both exactly right not anchoring? And I think that "near-constant vibrato" and just zipping through them quick with the idea that nobody (?) can hear them anyway are probably performance ideas useful to the point of salvation, but practicing is about getting better, not just learning how to fake it. I think.

[Ray Montee (RIP)]

As an early day beginner......I worked my way thro' A, C#min and E7th tunings in a step by step process.

Slants NEVER WERE a problem for me.

I'm having difficulty in understanding the problems noted herein. I'm confused how one could have a couple of slants that could be played while others cannot. I see no need to REMEMBER anything related to slants..........Perhaps I'm missing something glaringly obvious but.....

In C6th tuning, as an example: Using the first and second strings starting at the first fret....you have a straight bar position and the same when you move directly up to the third fret.

Now the next move is to the 4th & 5th frets with a reverse slant. Next move up to the 6th & 7th frets still using a reverse slant on those two strings.

Now this is repeated all of the way up the neck. Each of those positions come in pairs. The reverse slant is merely raising that second string as you would with an "A" pedal, right?

Same logic applies when using the first and fourth strings, with slants, on up the neck.

Now when playing the second & third strings, the slants still come in pairs however, they are all forward slants and straight bar positions.

I'm attempting to write out something I never have to think about and I have no guitar to manipulate as I speaketh.........