Behind the bar techniques

[Stanislav Paskalev]

While practicing bends and muting behind the bar (which I find more comfortable to do with the middle finger rather than the ring finger) I found another way to get a sound that I haven't seem mentioned here or in lap steel videos.

Instead of bending the string pushing it down and then releasing it (just as if you're playing a rest stroke on guitar) results in the string hitting the bar from bellow with some shimmer/crashing sound and then sounding the note at the bar. It sounds nice when used as an ornament, e.g. pluck, rear strike (for the lack of better name), pluck due to the very different sound between the plucked note and the one produced in this way - similar to a cut because the behind the bar sound is higher in harmonics and sounds higher.

Behind the bar mutes are also fun. Every tuning becomes a strum tuning when you mute the notes you don't want to play this way and strum it.