Instantly Recognisable Styles

[Paul Brennan]

I was doing a session the other day when the engineer asked me to play on a version of "If You Should Come Back Again". He asked if I could play in a style similar to an old version he had been given. After the first two bars I said, "Oh, it's Basil........". The young engineer was intrigued and wanted to know how I knew who the steel player was. Especially so when I told him I'd never heard that version before. To me it was perfectly obvious from the tone, technique, note choice, etc that it could only be our dear friend Basil.

Can you all think of any other players from this side of the Atlantic who are so easily identified with just a few bars of their playing.

Basil - do you remember playing on that track? I didn't recognise the singer although I think it may have been TR Dallas.

[Basil Henriques]

Dear dear Paul, I thank you for making a happy man feel old, or is that an old man feel happy ?
Either way thanks.

The track you refer to is lost in the subterranean caverns of my vinyl vault somewhere.
Post me a clip to refresh my memory (Memory ? what's that, I forget).
Probably was the Singing Hat, but you never know, I DID record for a few others !

It's quite easy to recognise me on other peoples records, If I produced it the steel is LOW in the mix and somewhat pitchey, and if others produced the track, the steel would be too high (IMHO) and still questionable re the intonation. The absolute opposite of my persona conversationally.
BTW I'm working on Country Startime in standard E9th.
It's only in the past 3-4 years that I've been satisfied (Sort of) with my intonation and general grasp of pitch.

[Paul Brennan]

I'll contact the studio and ask them to send me the track. The steel was well forward in the mix so, from what you're saying, it was produced by somebody else.

Interesting to hear you say that you're never totally happy with your intonation. The search for perfect intonation seems to be a lifelong quest. You're saying it here. I've read an interview with Buddy Emmons where he said he was not especially proud of his intonation. I've even read an interview with Jascha Heifitz (fiddle player) where he said his intonation was not especially great. He went on to say that what he was good at was immediately adjusting his finger placement to fix the intonation before anybody noticed. (I've also read that tests involving slowing down his recordings have borne this out). All us steel players should take careful note of this. There should a constant feedback loop going on as you play - pick note(s), listen, adjust bar. The more you do this consciously the more it becomes an unconscious habit.

[Basil Henriques]

So correct Paul, it's the one thing that can alienate the steel guitarist from the rest of the musicians in the global community.
The day you become completely satisfied is the day you should hang up your spurs, self analysis is CRUCIAL to development as a player.

I must point out though that "The more you do this consciously the more it becomes an unconscious habit." is a pretty tricky feat to achieve, I've not yet mastered the art of playing whilst unconscious.. LOL


I jest a little, but I think you mean SUB-consciously, just below the cognitive level ?
Yes ? You've been indoctrinated by the constant misuse of the terminology by those "Trasna an díog mór".

I concur with Freud's momentous discovery that consisted of revealing the subconscious and unconscious processes in a person's affective life, the affective unconscious, so now we must go below the surface and reveal the subconscious and unconscious processes in a person's cognitive life that are called the cognitive unconscious. Since the cognitive unconscious is just as allusive as the affective unconscious, its exploration opens up a new dimension both theoretically and from the point of view of psychotherapeutic technique, up to quite recently uncharted and all but ignored by psychoanalytic theory, but I also take on board the assertion by William Sidis when he recalls

Again, in August, 1913, I was walking through a square in which there was a book-store. This book-store was at some distance from where I was walking, so that I could not reasonably notice what was in the show-window without looking quite hard. That night I dreamed of seeing a book with indistinct lettering on the cover. In the morning, passing the book-store at closer range, I found in the show-window a book with exactly the same sort of cover as the dream-book. This shows that I must have seen that book the preceding afternoon, but I certainly did not notice it. I must have seen it subconsciously, and my "unconscious intelligence" remembered it at least till two o'clock in the morning, when the dream occurred. The appearance of the book in the dream shows moreover that the memory was not only of the fact of having seen the book, but that it was also of the way the book looked: even the indistinct lettering in the dream was probably due to the fact that I had passed the store from a distance.

Methinks one would also recognise my distinctive style of waffle and meandering sprinkled with liberal amounts of implied literary flotsam and jetsam.

[Basil Henriques]

Bet you didn't know I was into Psychology ?
Enough of deviation from the OP's point, I find that I can recognise the styles of most of the pre 1990 US players and some Europeans.

As for the Irish ones, Gerry Madigan, Wishy Quinn, Gerald O'Donaghue, Percy Robinson, Aidan Cunnigham, Chuck Owens, Paul Sheerin, Kevin Sheerin and some I can't readily recall, I recognise their playing instantly, but find it difficult to differentiate betwixt the current UK players.

I suppose it's the environment you're in that determines your familiarity with the differing styles. (When they do differ enough from the cliche'd to be individually recognisable)

[Paul Brennan]

Yes Basil. That was a "Freudian" slip on my part.......! I did, of course, mean sub-concious habit rather unconscious habit. However, I must admit I have, in my earlier learning days, fallen asleep many times late at night while practising the steel. I agree that the sub-concious mind has remained largely unexplored by the conventional psychoanalytic establishment. It's the last great unexplored frontier I think. Maybe it's the only frontier worth exploring. Once you start thinking about the sub-concious, super-mind, whatever you want to call it a whole realm of strange, other worldly phenomena start appearing. Such as the example you quoted from William Sidis. I guess the established so-called experts don't wish to be branded as "weird". "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,than are dreamt of in your philosophy". To quote Will Shakespeare (or whoever wrote those plays. It's hard to believe they were the work of an illiterate actor from the sticks). Oh dear............... this is really bad topic drift, isn't it. Who cares, there's hardly anybody else reading this anyway!

Of the Irish players you mention while I've heard of all of them, I'm only familiar with Percy, Chuck and Kevin. Percy is so unique he stands out easily. Kevin I suppose is distinguished by his simple yet effective licks and a certain twangy tone. Of the current two reigning session champions - Richard Nelson and Martin Cleary. Martin has a certain clucking sound caused by his picking technique (using plectrum and picks and snatching at the strings a bit). Richard is distinguished by his technical brilliance.

Of the UK players - I don't know too many of them. BJ Cole of course is quite unique. Mr Hartley's technical brilliance stands out also his ability to stay within the melody while improvising. This is something I greatly admire.

[Basil Henriques]

Such an interesting conversation, especially for those who often wonder about Schrödinger's cat !

CLICK THIS to view and buy——>

[Basil Henriques]

I found the track Paul.... Brian Coll..

[Uncle Roy]

Great thread Paul.

[JohnDavisStringsHere]

Who cares, there's hardly anybody else reading this anyway!

I think you are wrong Paul, there would be lots reading this but they lurk at the side and just do not jump in..... My style is easy to recognize ...no less than ten bum notes in anything I attempt to play