Pedal Steel Guitar

Thanks for the western swing fix, got carried away and listened to some Time Jumpers too.
 
Time Jumpers recently lost their singer, Dawn Sears, to cancer. But they're back every Monday night at 3rd and Lindsley in Nashville with Dawn's husband, Kenny playing fiddle. The band members change weekly--according to who's off the road that week from touring with "the stars." Vince Gill continues to be their most famous member.

http://www.3rdandlindsley.com/featured.html
 
I'm in Pennsylvania, posting through VNC. Three of us loaded into the car early this morning and came up to help a friend move his home that has been in the family forever.

On the way up, I heard over the radio the sad news that Buddy Emmons died yesterday in Nashville.

I was going to post this video closer to Labor Day, when the St. Louis steel convention happens, along with some (supposedly) interesting anecdotes about what it's like to go to that show, especially when the Big E was on the schedule that evening. But that would be boring.

So, I'll let his performance speak for itself. It's the full set (so it's long). It's not a personal loss to me, but a loss for everyone who loves steel guitar. It's no overstatement to say he was a giant of the instrument.

 
People who post YouTubes know that sometimes the links you post disappear for whatever reason. The video goes private or there's copyright issues or who knows what. That's disappointing. But sometimes those same videos reappear elsewhere and that's a little something to give thanks for!

Here are a couple that I'd posted previously in this thread (posts #29 and #53). I'd already commented on them in the earlier posts, so no need to repeat myself. Right now, you still can't see the embedded version of the second one ("Ooh Las Vegas"), but the YouTube version is live. They're followed by another that I'd posted in some other thread on e-r.org, but I've since had a chance to chat with that video and it promised me it'd come home for Christmas, and here it is.

All three are live performances by Emmylou Harris and The Hot Band and are excellent, in my opinion. Not much to add except the following: most Emmylou fans probably know where she came from but something I didn't know until recently is that she studied drama early on, at the University of North Carolina-Greensboro. Secondly, I showed the last one "Luxury Liner" to a good friend of mine (a guitarist). Towards the end of the video, Emmylou removes her guitar (you might notice she's got one of those whales that give you that big sound) to place it on a stand. My friend watched it, then commented, "I thought she was going to get a fire extinguisher so that she could douse Albert Lee on the guitar!". :)



 
I was out of action for a while earlier this year and during that time my email piled up (sort of like when you go on vacation). I've sorted through them; one was a pointer to the NPR program from which I learned that Buddy Emmons was gone (but definitely not his music and artistry). The link had been sent to me by an old friend who was and is a huge fan. This guy took the train all the way from Long Island to St Louis to attend the annual steel convention and showed up with a Sho-Bud steel he'd bought from another guy he'd met on the train. :cool:

He was the first person I called when I learned of what had happened, and he said his wife had heard the same program and had told him already. But he sent the link to me later and here it is:

Buddy Emmons, The Pedal-Steel Guitarist Who 'Taught Everybody To Play,' Has Died : NPR

And here's a nice video appropriate to the season as 2015 nears a close. It's from 1991 and is the Big E with a tune from Meet Me In St. Louis: "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas".

 
Here's something I'd tried to find a while ago on YouTube, but couldn't find a version that wasn't part of a medley mixed in with other songs. But I think it's a good one, a tune called "Won't Be Long" by Arlo Guthrie.

I'd heard it a lot and always thought it was a good tune but didn't really pay attention until one time I listened closely and realized, "hey, I know who THAT guy playing the steel must be". It was Buddy, and doing a great job showing how it's done by the best. Tasteful, clean and not at all overpowering, but rather complementing the tune.

I was happy to come across this and here it is:

 
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Recently came across this 1960 recording by the great Ralph Mooney, which illustrates his innovative style of the "rolling" pedal steel guitar:

 
Been a while since I posted in this thread! I notice several people have liked the new Ken Burns documentary on country music.

You might like this set by always-fun Asleep At The Wheel from 2016. The (non-pedal) steel player is Eddie Rivers, a very nice guy!

https://youtu.be/5xyYIwO5_OU
 
A discussion on another thread this morning reminded me of a YouTube of a Flying Fish album that I really like. It was one of my earlier exposures to steel. The album is called Buddies, by Buddy Emmons and Buddy Spicher (two of the Cherokee Cowboys). It shows what happens when you have Nashville session players getting together to do jazz.

https://youtu.be/mp5lB3W5sGo
 
I was pleasantly surprised to find an article dated Aug 3, 2022 in The New York Times entitled “The Pedal Steel Gets Its Resurrection”.

Can’t post a link because of paywall but if you subscribe and like steel it’s worth a look.
 
Pete Finney accompanies one of my favorite musicians, Robbie Fulks, on this one.
 
Very nice!

I decided I might not violate any rules if I just copied a short excerpt from the NYT article wrapped in quote tags. This bit made me smile. I would like to avoid sounding like a German hausfrau. :D

Despite the pedal steel’s manual demands, this rush of applications and ideas is a result, in many ways, of digital accessibility. The Danish guitarist Maggie Björklund, 57, stowed her pedal steel in a closet for two years when she first tried to learn around 2000 because its mechanics proved too difficult and she knew maybe three men in Denmark who played it. She ultimately flew to Nashville to study with Jeff Newman, a beloved instructor who informed her she’d been doing it all wrong.

“I thought I knew a little bit about pedal steel, but he said, ‘You sound like a German hausfrau,’” she recalled by phone from north of Copenhagen, laughing. “He ripped all that away from me and gave me the basis I still play.”
Click to expand...
 
I was curious about the Danish player mentioned in the NYT article (Maggie Bjorklund) who I’d never heard of and found several clips on YouTube.

She has an interesting style, not trying to overpower. I’d give a thumbs up if I knew how to do so in Danish!

 
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