The lap steel guitar, also known as a Hawaiian guitar or lap slide guitar, is a type of steel guitar without pedals that is typically played with the instrument in a horizontal position across the performer's lap. Unlike the usual manner of playing a traditional acoustic guitar, in which the performer's fingertips press the strings against frets, the pitch of a steel guitar is changed by pressing a polished steel bar against strings while plucking them with the opposite hand. The steel guitar's name is derived from this steel bar. Though the instrument does not have frets, it displays markers that resemble them. Lap steels may differ markedly from one another in external appearance, depending on whether they are acoustic or electric, but in either case, they do not have pedals, distinguishing them from pedal steel guitars.
The steel guitar came from Hawaiʻi and gained a foothold in mainland American popular music. It originated in the Hawaiian Kingdom about 1885, popularized by an Oahu youth named Joseph Kekuku, who became known for playing a traditional guitar by laying it across his lap and sliding a piece of metal against the strings to change the pitch. The instrument's distinctive portamento sound, characterized by a smooth gliding between notes, became popular throughout the islands. American popular culture became fascinated with Hawaiian music during the first half of the twentieth century – to the degree of becoming a musical fad. Americans were curious about the lap steel instrument featured in its performance, and came to refer to it as a "Hawaiian guitar", and the horizontal playing position as "Hawaiian style". Hawaiian music began its assimilation into American popular music in the 1910s, but with English lyrics, a combination Hawaiians called hapa haole (half-white). In the 1930s, the invention of electric amplification for the lap steel was a milestone in its evolution. It meant that the instrument could be heard equally with other instruments, that it no longer needed a resonance chamber to produce its sound, and that electrified lap steels could be manufactured in any shape (even a rectangular block), with little or no resemblance to a traditional guitar.
In the early twentieth century Hawaiian music and the steel guitar began to meld into other musical styles, including blues, jazz, gospel, country music and, particularly, the country music sub-genres Western swing, honky-tonk, and bluegrass. Lap steel pioneers include Sol Hoopii, Bob Dunn, Jerry Byrd, Don Helms, Bud Isaacs, Leon McAuliffe, Josh Graves, Pete Kirby, and Darick Campbell.
Conceptually, a lap steel guitar may be likened to playing a guitar with one finger (the bar). This abstraction illustrates one of the instrument's major limitations: when strummed it is constrained to simple transpositions of its tuning. This is why slide guitars are usually tuned to an open tuning and more complex changes, for example from major to minor, require re-tuning the instrument. An early solution was to build lap steel guitars with two or more necks, each providing a separate set of differently-tuned strings on a single instrument. The performer's hands could move to a different neck at will. Although in the early 1940s, elite players recorded and performed with these multi-neck guitars, most musicians could not afford them. The problem was addressed in 1940 by adding pedals to the lap steel to change the pitch of certain strings easily, making more complex chords available on the same neck. By 1952, this invention revolutionized how the instrument was played, in many ways making it virtually a new instrument, known as a "pedal steel". An overwhelming majority of lap steel players adopted the pedal design, and, as a result, the lap steel became largely obsolete by the late 1950s, with only pockets of devotees in country and Hawaiian music remaining.
Early history
Spanish guitars were introduced into the Hawaiian Islands as early as the 1830s. The Hawaiians did not embrace the standard guitar tuning that had been in use for centuries. They re-tuned the guitars to make a chord when all the strings were sounded together, known as an "open tuning". This was called "slack-key", known in Hawaiian as "kī hōʻalu", because certain strings were "slackened" to achieve it. Hawaiians learned to play fingerstyle this way, creating melodies over the full resonant tones of the open strings, and the genre became known as slack-key guitar. About 1885, after guitar strings made of steel became available, Joseph Kekuku, on the island of Oahu, developed and popularized playing an open tuning while seated with the guitar across his knees while pressing a steel bar against the strings. Following Kekuku's lead, other Hawaiians began playing in this new manner, with the guitar laid across the lap, instead of in the traditional way of holding the instrument against the body. Once the horizontal style became popular throughout the islands, the technique spread internationally, and was referred to (typically outside of Hawaii) as "Hawaiian style".
Hawaiian music, with the sound of the steel guitar as a marked feature, became a popular musical preoccupation or fad in the United States in the first half of the twentieth century. In 1916, recordings of indigenous Hawaiian music outsold all other U.S. musical genres. This popularity initiated the manufacture of guitars designed specifically to be played horizontally. The archetypal lap steel guitar is the acoustic Hawaiian guitar. Despite incorporating a resonant chamber in their body, these early acoustic versions of the instrument were not loud enough relative to other instruments. However, in the early 1930s a steel guitarist named George Beauchamp invented the electric guitar pickup. Electrification not only allowed the lap steel guitar to be heard better, but it also meant that their resonance chambers were no longer essential. The result was that steel guitars could be manufactured in any shape – even in the form of a rectangular block bearing little or no resemblance to the traditional guitar shape. This led to table-like instruments in a metal frame on legs called "console steels".
Types of lap steel guitars
There are three categories of lap steel guitars: Acoustic lap steel guitars: These are traditional acoustic steel-string acoustic guitars modified to be played on the performer's lap. The modification is to raise the strings higher off the fingerboard than a traditional guitar, which can be done by inserting an adapter on the instrument's bridge and its nut. This prevents the steel bar from hitting against the frets. Dobro-type guitars or National guitars: These are typically acoustic steel guitars with a large aluminum cone under the bridge, called a resonator, that increases volume output. Wood-body resonator guitars are called "Dobros" and steel bodied ones are called "Nationals". The types do not sound the same — the Nationals are brassier and are usually preferred by blues players. Either type offers round necks (Spanish) or square necks (Hawaiian). Square necks are sometimes necessitated both by the use of thicker strings and by the increased force the instrument is subject to as a consequence of its raised strings. Electric lap steel guitars: Describes instruments that are specifically designed to be played horizontally and feature an electric pickup so that they do not require any resonance chamber. Guitars in this category may differ markedly from one another in external appearance, and include instruments made from rectangular solid blocks of wood. Some may be small enough to be played on the lap; others may have more than one neck (making the instrument heavier), and may be built on a frame with legs, which is then known as a console steel.
Tunings Over centuries in Western countries, the traditional Spanish guitar developed a near-universal tuning of ascending fourths (and one major third) consisting of E–A–D–G–B–E; however, no such standard existed for the Hawaiian "open tunings" (guitar tuned in a chord). The Hawaiians simply tuned to a chord that suited the singer's voice. Beginning in the days of slack-key guitar in the 1850s, Hawaiian tunings came to be as closely guarded as any trade secret, handed down in families. Many players de-tuned their instruments when they were not playing them to keep others from discovering their tuning.
The tuning chosen for these instruments is a crucial foundation on which steel guitar style is built. The tuning used determines the notes that the player has available in a chord, and affects how notes can be played in sequence. Experimenting with different tunings was a widespread practice of the Hawaiian music of the 1930s and provided templates that became a foundation for the playing style of later musicians. Scores of tunings are available for lap steel players. The addition of a sixth interval into a tuning had a dramatic effect on the steel guitar because it created numerous positions and playing pockets which were not accessible in a simple major chord. The C6 was a common tuning for six string lap steels in the 1920s and 1930s. Tunings with a sixth interval are popular in Western swing and jazz, while tunings containing sevenths are often chosen for blues and rock music.
A fundamental challenge of lap steel guitar design is the inherent constraint it places on the number of chords and inversions available in any given tuning. To address the meager array available to them, some early players would simply have a second lap steel at hand, with a different tuning, ready when needed. Another strategy was to increase the number of strings on the instrument (the more strings available, the smaller the pitch intervals between them, and therefore more notes available when the bar is placed straight across the strings). A third strategy was to add additional necks to the same instrument, thus providing separate sets of strings that could each be tuned differently.
The Hawaiian "craze" in the United States In the U.S. Mainland in the early 20th century, after the 1898 annexation of Hawaii, the Hawaiian "craze" was in full force, as evidenced by radio broadcasts, stage shows, and motion pictures featuring Hawaiian music. Hollywood films perpetuated the musical image of an idealized island lifestyle. Hawaiian guitars and lessons for youth were widely available. For example, the Oahu Music Company sold their Oahu-brand guitars and lessons to young people by door-to-door sales, canvassing nearly every city in the United States.
The steel guitar was the first "foreign" musical instrument to gain a foothold in American pop music. Pioneer lap steel players between 1915 and 1930 included Sol K. Bright Sr., Tau Moe, Dick McIntire, Sam Ku West and Frank Ferera. Ferera was the most-recorded of any lap-style guitarists in that time period. Hawaiian music began to meld into American popular music in the 1910s – a combination Hawaiians called hapa haole (half-white) – which was essentially Hawaiian music, sung in English, intended for white audiences. As an example, Honolulu-born Dick McIntire and his Harmony Hawaiians recorded Hawaiian songs sung by American pop crooner Bing Crosby in 1936. Tin Pan Alley obliged the demand for Hawaiian songs by publishing a large supply of hapa haole music. Many amateur and professional musicians throughout America formed Hawaiian combos in the 1930s and 1940s. The introduction of electrified guitars in the 1930s had a profound effect, boosting commercial Hawaiian music.
Lap steel pioneers In the development of lap steel guitar in the early twentieth century, many innovators contributed; among the most prominent were: