I know its been done so many times before but Help! E v D

[Mr W]

Hi John As you know I play the Day set up and its all your fault for selling me my first pedal steel. There I feel better now that's out. I don't know how any of the top pro's do it. And as for music theory haven't a clue. most of the time I don't know what key I am in let alone what the Chords Called. Have made chord charts over the years spent days perfecting them then never look at them again. I think you need to learn to read music at the same time you learn to play the instrument. I Play by ear, also very lazy so don't like to work to hard at it. I do sometimes get the urge to learn to read dots but it soon goes away zzzzz! I don't even have the A pedal F or B Pedal Eb lever rock anymore as my Eb/F levers are on my right knee with the forward moving Bb lever because I Play a Uni. Dave

[JohnDavisStringsHere]

Good or bad I always get the blame on here! Anyway, Day set up does not appear to have done you any harm......I would like to be able to get the sound you get from your guitar.

[Ken Byng]

If you look in the tunings section in the back of Winnie Winston's book, written in the 1970's, the amount of top players who played Day was very significant in those days. Many of those Day players are no longer with us. Today, the best Day player is Tommy White - so good that Buddy Emmons used to call him 'Killer'. John Hughey and Weldon Myrick were both Day players, and two of the best who have ever played the instrument. I was in Bobbe Seymour's store once when he frogmarched me over to an Emmons push pull and ordered me to play for him. I asked him if he had any guitar set up in Day mode, and he shrugged his shoulders and said "Why?" He told me that very few (if any) of the younger players in Nashville play Day. I played his Emmons guitar for him with great difficulty, but he was very kind about my playing which surprised me.

When Sarah Jory was a youngster and a pupil of mine, she wanted my pedal setup on her first good pedal steel (an LDG Sho~Bud). Watching her play at Dallas this weekend on various YouTube clips, I was somewhat surprised to see that she was still playing Day. If she played Emmons, she would not have had to take her guitar to the USA, as various manufacturers would fall over themselves for her to play their guitars. She is very fluid on the pedals and levers on her Day set up Mullen, so she has obviously stuck with it. If I had my time over again, I would have started my playing life as an Emmons player. However, Gordon Huntley and Eric Snowball were responsible for setting up the new ZBs and Emmons guitars that came through their hands. I find playing Day very comfortable, which was the view of Tommy White when I asked him why he stuck with that set up after all these years. Plus I think he likes the fact that he rarely gets asked by other players if they can have a go on his guitar.

There is method in his madness.

[steveman747]

As an Emmons player, I use my B and C pedals a lot for minor chords and other riffs so the pedals don't really throw me on a Day setup. That being said, after trying Dave Wheelhouse's personal Sheffield (The Beach) a few years ago, the knee-levers took some getting used to.

I think as with anything, it's what you get used to. Plenty of British people started with Day and stuck with it. Some people say that Day is more of a natural rotation of the ankle but I don't see any real difference. If anything, I prefer the movement of rolling my A and B than B and C on Emmons. Every physique is different.