Messages posted by: mrnefarious

Mike, most guys like the quick-release so that they can leave the head loop and tail piece attached to the guitar when they stow it in the case. Just talk to Martin or Bobby and have them make a strap for you without the clips. One of the great things about going to the custom makers is you can get just about anything you want; it costs a lot more but the quality and customization makes it worth the cost. Good luck.

Art

Levy is decent, but nothing special or particularly great. Another low-cost maker that you can look for is Webb. If you have some money to spend and want top-of-the-line quality and comfort and something that you can expect to outlast you, you can order custom from Bobby Poff or Martin Gross.

http://www.rpoffmaker.com/

http://www.martingross.com/

Lastly, check out Elderly for something that you don't have to wait to be made for you. You will likely find the Webb there and probably some of Bobby Poff's standard plain straps. I have the Poff plain strap and the quality and security I feel using it is unsurpassed. Elderly instruments is in Lansing MI about 300 miles/500 km from you.

http://www.elderly.com/

Hope this helps. Welcome.

Nothing wrong with learning to flatpick a dobro, but you really ought to try putting the finger and thumbpicks on and just getting used to them. Some roll patterns will be very difficult if not impossible with a flatpicking technique as well as playing two or three tones simultaneously.

I have had some classical guitar training and thought when I picked up the reso that I would play without picks, just like I do with guitar. I couldn't get satisfactory tone, and so I just put the picks on and played with them until I got used to them. Now I wouldn't know what to do without them!

John, the Regal is a starter piece. Ask yourself how serious you are about playing this instrument and then consider the following:

1. You could take it to a custom builder for a set-up and he would take the spider and cone out and replace them with top-quality parts and do any necessary upgrade work to the nut and bridge. This work might cost you half the suggested retail price of the guitar and you would have a guitar that would sound better but that you almost certainly could not sell for what you have into it.

2. As above, except that you could get the resonator guitar set-up instructional video and parts from Beard guitars and save some money doing the work yourself. How handy are you, and how long are you willing to have the guitar down while you work on it to get it just right? It might take several attempts to get any one aspect of the work done just right. I wouldn't exactly recommend this, but if you want to look into it here is the Beard web address:

www.beardguitars.com

3. The Regal RD-38BS reso has a soundwell in it. Some of the guitars that you have been playing and listening to may have been the more modern soundpost and baffle designed guitars, and they tend to have more volume and bottom end. Now you're edging into custom-built territory. If you are content to play the Regal until you can save up to buy a better guitar the next level up is going to be either a Gold Tone Beard (be sure that it is set up at Beard guitars--there is a sticker certificate that you can see through one of the screened holes,) a Wechter Scheerhorn, or a Gibson Hound Dog. These guitars are not custom guitars and are factory built, and they cost between $800 and $1600. After that it's pretty much custom, and they are going to be at least that $1600 all the way up to $6000 or so, depending on the appointments and tonewoods you might want.

I bought a Fender Champ lapsteel guitar about 4 1/2 years ago, and a National Tricone a little more than a year later. I barely got to spend any time with the lapsteel for the first year, but when I did start goofing with it I realized that I wanted the acoustical version, and so I put a nut-raiser in the National and then started patiently shopping. A few months later I came into a little windfall, and it wasn't enough to pay for the guitar but it was enough to make me confident putting in an order with Todd Clinesmith. I waited sixteen months and paid $3400 for a guitar with almost nothing fancy on it to boost the price.

I have to date played a lot of different resonator guitars and some mighty fine sounding custom jobs included, and though I have played a lot of them that I really liked I haven't yet played one that made me sorry that I got this guitar from Todd. I'm not a snob about this guitar, but if I could only have one I could be happy with this one.

The advice that I would give you is this: play and listen to as many different guitars as you can, and do this enough so that you begin to become familiar with the characteristic sounds of particular makes of guitars. Find a builder whose guitars you really like the sound of, and save up your money while you are getting to know the various builder's works. Spend as much money as you can figure out how to put together for the upgrade without buying a collectible piece. Be patient and look and listen until you find the right one.

Alternately, a lot of people upgrade a little bit at a time as the deficiencies of their present instrument manifest themselves and they keep practicing hard so that the steady upgrades seem justifyable. I went from a converted roundneck guitar straight up to the top shelf, but I did this with confidence because I have been playing string instruments for more than forty years and I knew that this wasn't some passing fancy--I knew that I would end up there eventually. I couldn't see the logic in buying an instrument that I knew I wouldn't want to keep before I even had it.

My guitar looks very much like the deep red sunburst here:

http://www.clinesmithinstruments.com/clinesmith/maplefinishes.htm

Happy hunting!

Art Kohnke

Some advantages to using a capo:
1. It can make playing in almost any key like playing in the first position, relatively speaking.
2. It can eliminate the need to play many barre chords.
3. It can shorten up the stretch that you need to make for playing a scale or run by one fret.

Some disadvantages to using a capo:
1. You make a certain portion of your fingerboard unusable.
2. You can color the sound of your piece in a less than favorable way. The further down the neck you put a capo the more low end tone you lose.
3. If you are using it and playing mainly with one or two tonic shapes (as above) you may not be learning to play your instrument as completely as will be useful to you, i.e., when you play something outside of the typical folk/bluegrass three or four chords you are back in that unfamiliar territory where you generally reach for your capo (which is already on.) A capo can help to discourage you from learning the fingerboard thoroughly. 4. A lot of capos can't be put on without significant distortion of the strings, i.e., retuning every time you put it on or change position.
5. Tone death--shortening the string length reduces sustain and affects tone.
6. Snobs think that you are cheating.

A capo is a tool--use it judiciously.

I find that I don't really care for the feel or tone of the coated strings that I have found. My hands are kind to strings and I will often put brass wound on my guitar so that they contrast with the tone of the other guitar player in my band. The brass corrodes a lot faster than bronze, but it's tolerable to me. If I'm pleasing myself I often default to DR bronze, either meduim or heavy gauge, depending on whether I am using an alternate tuning or not (I play in a Celtic band.)

I haven't tried the Pirazzi. I'll look into it.

The other player in our band has that killer sweat and funks his strings up in a matter of hours of playing. I slipped him a kit of that GHS Fast Fret stuff and it helps a lot. I use the Fast Fret on my reso and like it a lot better than coated strings, though the feel is similar. I also use stainless strings on the reso, and so string life with respect to corrosion is kind of a non-issue. The stainless lasts at least three and maybe more than four times as long as bronze and they fail mechanically long before they get funky.

Dave:

Don't know how brave you are about tinkering with your instruments, but if you have average mechanical aptitude you can take this guitar apart and get it back together without any negative impact. Just pay close attention to the precise location of everything as you take it apart and get it back exactly the same way when you reassemble the guitar. If the cone doesn't have a mark at the 12 o'clock position before you remove it put one there so you get it positioned right when you put it back in. The top of the guitar should be made of two pieces of wood and there will be a joint right in the middle of the top where they are glued together--this is where you make your mark. If you did take it apart you could get a look at the pickups and then have an idea of what you are working with.

Alternately--and especially if you are not really thinking about changing them out to something else--just plug each one in and listen to it and take note of the different characteristics and tonal qualities of each and see if you prefer one over the other. Note whether you get significantly higher output from one over the other. Play each of them through an amplifier and find out where the feedback threshhold is for the different pickups.

The primary advantage of using a pickup in your resonator guitar is that it frees you up from having to play the microphone for the appropriate volume level. As stage volume levels get louder microphones get to be less effective at fending off feedback, and a pickup will only take care of just so much of this for you, but it will help some. The Jerry Douglas Fishman Aura is probably the best at fending off feedback, but upgrading to this might cost you more than the guitar cost you.

I play a Clinesmith with a Schertler Basik pickup in it, and I like the sound and tone that I get from the pickup, but my band likes the sound pretty loud on our stage and I am constantly fighting feedback issues. Changing my position on the stage by only a few inches can set it off sometimes. I think of the pickup as being a convenience, though I have gotten really terrific sound out of it when running it through a microphone tube-amp before injecting it into the mixer. I kept the monitor speaker turned at a tangent to my position on the stage and the sound was divine.

Have fun experimenting and check back in and let us know how it goes.

Art

It takes discipline, concentration, and lots of practice. I'd say that the priciple cause of accelerating tempo in a band is because the members aren't familiar enough with their part and/or their role to be able to play in a relaxed manner and frame of mind. Somebody slips a little in their passage and everyone shuffles a little to get back in time with everyone else and it invariably leads to upping the tempo a bit. Do this a few times inside a piece and you're playing twice as fast as when you started.

Since you don't have either percussion or a bass then your rhythm section is going to be the guitar when he isn't taking a lead and the mando chopping the backbeat. These guys need to be your anchor.

Windshadow--where in Oregon? I'm in Portland.

Pablo, I think that I picked Salt Creek for dobro up early this year and I have had the opportunity to try and play it with Tab Tabscott's band a few times. They really burn it up, and it is all I can do to almost keep up with them, but I am almost there after a few months of practicing on that one for a while most weekends.

Wow. Never heard of a dog that could play mandolin. Who else is in your band?

Pablo, I'm a fairly skilled musician. I hacked at a guitar for many years, then picked up a mandolin and started playing professionally. Things took off from there. The BGC lessons are easy (though not fast) for me. I print out the tab and review it. I try to play through the tab a few times, and then I cue up the learning track. I graduate myself up to performance level. If I have my sights set on a particular tune I can generally have it up to slow-jam tempo within a couple of weeks. It takes some pretty intense focus to accomplish this, but I do it pretty reliably. This is good stuff here, and the only substitute is hanging out in the weeds until you can catch up.

Oops. Done that on the dobro a few times too, Ha!

Barbie, your avatar doesn't show unless you are logged on. Apparently you can post even if you aren't logged on.

Started out guitar, picked up mando about fifteen years ago, and in the last several years I have been playing bouzouki, bass, and resonator, a Clinesmith. Just last weekend I was hanging in tight with the slow-jam version of Fireball Mail on the reso. After months and months of lullabyes on the thing the wife's jaw was hanging low. Thanks, BGC!

Barbie, your avatar doesn't show unless you are logged on. Apparently you can post even if you aren't logged on.

Started out guitar, picked up mando about fifteen years ago, and in the last several years I have been playing bouzouki, bass, and resonator, a Clinesmith. Just last weekend I was hanging in tight with the slow-jam version of Fireball Mail on the reso. After months and months of lullabyes on the thing the wife's jaw was hanging low. Thanks, BGC!