What Was Your Main Instrument Before Steel?

[Mark Wayne]

Guitar

[Chris Templeton]

Bass

[Jack Copp]

Dobro, voted as "other"

[Niels Andrews]

Probably a better way to slice the pie would be stringed instrument, keyboards and other. I don't mean to slam banjo and accordion, but to me I see them as having a limited application, I for one tire of them quickly.
As for the popularity of PSG I think a lot of it is a numbers game. You lack the numbers of players you see in Spanish guitar. The last estimate on Guitar plinkers World Wide I heard, was 50 million, which comes from a study done by the BBC
One thing I see among what I consider the better all time steel players, is flexibility on genre of their music. Look at the range of music people like Buddy Emmons, to name one, has played. That is in part why he is so great. I think you see that flexibility in many of the great musicians. Someday I will tell the story of Pavarotti singing C/W on a hay stack in California, Pretty awesome.

[Mike Perlowin RIP]

[Alan Brookes]

Does the category "bass" mean "acoustic (double) bass", "electric bass", "bass guitar" or all three ?

[Mike Perlowin RIP]

I don't mean to slam banjo and accordion, but to me I see them as having a limited application,

I beg to differ. it's not the instruments that are limited, it's the players. Bela Fleck, and Flaco Jiménez respectively have successfully taken both instrument into new areas ..."where no banjo and accordion player has gone before."

I might add, that's what people outside the country music and steel guitar communities say about the steel. You would not believe how many times I've been told that it's not possible to play classical music on a steel.

I've even been told that the steel isn't even a real instrument, but more of a musical toy, more or less on the same level as a comb and tissue paper.

Getting back to the original question, I started off as a finger style guitarist, got into playing blues-rock lead, and then country lead, and picked up bass, mandolin, Clawhammer style banjo and Maybelle Carter style autoharp along the way. (Mostly mandolin.)

I gave up on the guitar and other instruments when I became a steel addict.

[Niels Andrews]

I will be the first to say I know nothing about Banjo and accordion except a little goes a long way.

[b0b]

Accordion is the portable acoustic keyboard instrument, just as dobro is the portable acoustic steel guitar. I understand that some people don't like the sound, but accordion is used in all kinds of music. It has a great dynamic range, and can be as expressive as a piano.

I have nothing to say about banjo.

[b0b]

Does the category "bass" mean "acoustic (double) bass", "electric bass", "bass guitar" or all three ?

It refers to the fish.

[Wayne Franco]

I played Banjo in a bluegrass band for years before taking up pedal steel. The metal finger picks seemed a perfect match. They were something I didn't have to get use to.

[Alan Brookes]

...The metal finger picks seemed a perfect match. They were something I didn't have to get use to.

Now if you could put pedals on your banjo you would feel right at home.

[b0b]

I once played with a pedal banjo player. It didn't help.

[Niels Andrews]

One must be careful when playing with G-strings, real problems when they break.

[Gord Cole]

Ka-boom crassshhh!

[Alan Brookes]

Didn't someone once write "Hair on a G-string"?

[Damir Besic]

I played Banjo in a bluegrass band for years before taking up pedal steel. The metal finger picks seemed a perfect match. They were something I didn't have to get use to.

same thing here, I started on banjo because steel was too expensive to get, I figured I can start using finger pics and get used to it, so it would be easier for me when I get my steel. In the process I fall in love with a banjo, banjo, as any other instrument, is limited only as much, as the person playing it. I had a Deering Crossfire, electric banjo, and it was an awesome instrument, you could run it thru all kinds of effects and play anything you want on it, bluegrass, classical music or heavy metal. As far as accordion goes, I would suggest finding some master accordion players from Serbia on You Tube, those guys can tore up some serious stuff on accordion....


Db

[David Farrell]

I played guitar, bass, blues harmonica, mandolin, ( just a lil bit of banjo), then finally, pedal steel. I'm obsessed withe PSG.

[Larry Jamieson]

I see this is an old thread... I played baritone horn starting in 4th grade in school. Picked up a uke at 7 years old, moved to guitar about 11 or 12. Started a rock band at age 15 and learned and played string bass in the school orchestra starting at about age 13. Didn't get my first steel until I got out of the service in 1971.

[Ian Rae]

Indeed an old thread. The trombone is still my main instrument, in that although I play it less than PSG, I still play it better!
I also plead guilty like Larry to playing baritone at school, which gave me the bug for playing in any band that's going!