The British Steelies Society

Good morning, folks.

I've got a question about the left knee up (LKU) lever on my Sho-Bud Super Pro.

I don't normally use this lever as I find it awkward. But I was watching a YouTube video about chord movement this morning and thought I'd give the exercise a try.

This is when I discovered that my LKU lowers the G# string (5th string) down a whole tone rather than raising the two B strings up to C#.

Is that normal? Or would it be more useful to have the Bs raised to C#? How hard would it be to make this change?

Any advice would be appreciated.

All the best,
Will

I thought the so called standard was to lower the B's to Bb. You probably have B's to C# on your A pedal already.

The 6th string drop to F# is heavily used to get the "Plagal cadence"

David Hartley seems to manage with the vertical knee dropping 6th string to F# https://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=269319
You can see him clearly using it here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OS5XcbJK-Fw (I have it on left knee going right).


As to difficulty, depends on your skill set but not too difficult.

Hope this helps
atb
Pete

U_twelve wrote:I thought the so called standard was to lower the B's to Bb. You probably have B's to C# on your A pedal already
Pete

I believe that this is the favoured change on the vertical lever. It's how my steel is setup and also my previous steel. I use this change a lot in combination with the A & B pedals. A & B pedals depressed gives a major 4th chord, or to put it another way if playing the strings open with no bar on the strings the open chord is E, depressing A & B pedals gives an A major chord.

With A & B pedals depressed then engaging the vertical lever changes the 4th chord from a major chord to a minor chord. So in the above example it changes the chord from an A major to an A minor. I also find it useful for doing harmony scales using the 3rd and 5th strings. For example, bar on 5th fret with AB engaged, play the 3rd and 5th string, bar on 7th fret engage AB & V play strings 3 & 5, bar on 9th fret AB & V, play strings 3 & 5, bar on 10th fret AB play strings 3 & 5.

Essentially it is a run up from D to G. These combinations can be used over the whole length of the fret board to do 2 part harmony runs.

U_twelve wrote:I thought the so called standard was to lower the B's to Bb. You probably have B's to C# on your A pedal already.

The 6th string drop to F# is heavily used to get the "Plagal cadence"

David Hartley seems to manage with the vertical knee dropping 6th string to F# https://bb.steelguitarforum.com/viewtopic.php?t=269319
You can see him clearly using it here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OS5XcbJK-Fw (I have it on left knee going right).


As to difficulty, depends on your skill set but not too difficult.

Hope this helps
atb
Pete

Thanks, Pete.

Yes, my A pedal raises my Bs to C# already.

It seems a couple of my levers are also "non-standard", but as I'm still a relative newbie, I've just accepted that they are what they are and have worked out my chords from there.

I suppose at the end of the day, if I'm playing what I want to, it doesn't really matter. I'm just wondering whether some things might be easier or more musical (flow better) if I had a more standard Eammons setup.

The awkwardness with the LKU is that I'm 6'9" and so have large feet (size 16/17). That means I have to be very careful how I touch the A and B pedals. Sometimes shifting to try to use the LKU means I move my left foot that fraction of an inch and it impacts what I should be playing.

It's probably best if I just keep going as I have been and not worry too much about the LKU lever.

All the best,
Will

Jif wrote:With A & B pedals depressed then engaging the vertical lever changes the 4th chord from a major chord to a minor chord.

That's interesting.

On mine, playing A + B and then engaging the LKU/the vertical lever turns an A chord into a C#m.

Not without it's uses, but I can't help but ask whether it's the best use. It would be nice to be able to turn the IV into a IVm on tap, but I reckon I'd end up having to reconfigure the whole setup, which I can do without.

Many thanks,
Will

It's not always about the chords, sometimes being able to get a single note run/or passing note, without moving the bar too much is useful.
Maybe a study of the copedants of some of the worlds top players may help in the decision to change your setup or not. https://b0b.com/wp/copedents/e9th/

Over my time I have changed my setup on the E lower three times, from right knee left to left knee right to current right knee right (it will not change again) & each time it's been a PITA until the muscle memory was fully re-trained, about a week...

U_twelve wrote:It's not always about the chords, sometimes being able to get a single note run/or passing note, without moving the bar too much is useful.

This is what I'm thinking. But my logical head keeps telling me since I've only been playing informally for about 9-10 months, maybe I just need to see what the current setup can do for me before making any changes. Not that I have any idea how to do that, so there's another factor.

How hard is it to change the copedent on a steel? I'm assuming it's not a 10 minute job for someone with no experience and really large hands (I really should have been a keys player).

Thanks for your feedback and the list of copedents. Good reading material.

ATB
Will

Hi Will,

Modifying your copedent could take way more time than 10 miutes depent on what needs changing around, could take a day or so (don't ask me how I know). Not for the faint hearted...

Whats you current setup? do you just want to alter the vertical on it's own or would you want to swop the vertical & lets say RKL?

Best bet is to run with what you have until your totally convinced what you can't live with it like that.

atb
Pete

U_twelve wrote:Hi Will,

Modifying your copedent could take way more time than 10 miutes depent on what needs changing around, could take a day or so (don't ask me how I know). Not for the faint hearted...

Whats you current setup? do you just want to alter the vertical on it's own or would you want to swop the vertical & lets say RKL?

Best bet is to run with what you have until your totally convinced what you can't live with it like that.

atb
Pete

Thanks, Pete.

Yeah, I'm not really excited about the prospect of making any mechanical changes.

My only reason for thinking about a change is that I've seen a couple of videos on YouTube of licks I'd really like to use, but I can't get them to work with my current setup. That's no biggie, but it got me questioning whether what I've got is the most useful tuning.

I've made a chart of my copedent as well as one for a "standard" Emmons setup that I refer to, but I don't know how to post them here. Can you let me know? I'd be interested in hearing your feedback.

Many thanks,
Will

BUMP

Can anyone tell me how to post an image of my copedent here? I've not been able to find a way to do this.

Thanks,
Will