anyone play a dobro?

[volsball]

Just curious- does anyone here play a dobro? I have been thinking of trying to learn to play lately, but I know nothing about what to look for when buying one. Any suggestions?

[guitar junkie]

they have some great video out on the subject...

I find that you have to have a decent ear to really get much out of it, also be able to hold a steady hand when needed, otherwise your notes really blur up a lot....

A good dobro from the start is MUST!

do not buy anything sloppy or it will never stay in tune as much as you slam them around while playing slide (this is mostly true if you are a Jerry Douglas style player)

Also check out some stuff from the band Union Station....

Great slide work!

are you looking at square neck or round?

[volsball]

Yep- I have heard Union Station and I think that they are great. I visited my aunt and uncle in Arkansas last year, and there were people there who make dobros themselves. I think I may try to go back there and buy one of those.

[phangeaux]

Technically I think a 'Dobro' is a brand name for a wood body single cone resonator, made by a company formed by two brothers who had formerly worked for National Guitar Co. National patented the resonator guitar in about 1926, their first one marketed was a Tricone (three resonator cones)

Anyhow, the name 'Dobro' has been used loosely to describe single cone resonator guitars, even the metal bodied ones, but technically it is a brand name for the wood bodied resonator by that company, which was later bought out by Gibson. I think the word best describes the wood bodied single cone resonator guitars. These wood bodied single cone ones have a unique characteristic sound that is different from the metal bodied resonators.

Dobros are played either in a conventional position with a bottleneck slide, or in lapstyle position, and I think the best dobro players use the lapstyle position which is more versatile and more can be done with a slide in the lapstyle position than in conventional position.

Conventional position with bottleneckslide: There are some fundamental techniques that are used in order to get a good clear sound when using a slide. String damping behind the slide is essential to eliminate unwanted noise from the strings behind the slide (between the slide and the headstock), so if the slide is on your little finger (pinky finger- some calkl it) then you just lightly drag one of your other fingers behind the slide with just enough pressure to dampen the strings and eliminate the unwanted noise This is pretty easy to learn.

REMEMBER that each scale note or chord is played directly above the actual metal fret, not behind the fret like you do when fretting with fingers. Think of your slide as a moving fret, because that is what it actually is. One of the awesome things about slide is that the slide works as a universal moveable fret you can slide through or to any semitone which otherwise you could only get by stretching a string. In blues work there can be quite a few unique semitones and you can chose where to use them, such as where you place the slide when plucking a string and sliding into your desired note.

How to slide into the notes and vibrato techniques are very important too and again these are not difficult to learn.

You will also need to learn palm damping with the right hand, which is pretty easy and eventually how to damp individual strings so those strings don't sound out as you move the slide up or down the fretboard- for example if you only want a couple of strings that you are picking to sound out with the slide and the other strings to be quiet. That takes some practice to learn.

One of the complexities of playing slide is learning and remembering different alternate tunings and remembering where the notes are in those tunings, as well as where the fretted chords are (yeah, you do some fretting with fingers too, it is not all with a slide, although you can play complete songs with just the slide.

It is probavbly best to pick one alternate tuning and stick with that for long enough to learn quite a bit in that tuning, then try another tuning.

Open G tuning is a good one to start with, drop your E strigs down a full step to 'D', which should then harmonicly match your 4th 'D' string. Then drop your 5th string one full step from 'A' down to 'G' and this string will now be an octive lower than your 3rd G string. You'll use the third fret alot, sliding into and out of notes in G. and you'll be using a I-IV-V pattern, (open, fifth and seventh frets).

Open D is another good tuning. It is like tuning to an open E chord except it is down one full step to a D chord.

Here is the bottom line on playing slide- bottleneck style. You must learn the fundamental techniques to get decent sounding slide work. If one doesn't learn those techniques the result will be sloppy noisy, dissapointing and one is likely to become discouraged and give up. Learn these fundamental techniques and you'll be on your way to some very rewarding guitar playing.

See my comments in TAlderson's topic on resonator guitar.

I will be posting again there very shortly with a cool sample of some resonator slide work on a tricone- Voodoo Chile recorded by a guy in Australia named Adam Hole.

Lapstyle: some awesome stuff can be played lapstyle, like I said it is more versatile than conventional position and alot of people who get serious about slide guitar eventually move to that style. Kelly Joe Phelps is a great example of some excellent lapstyle work.

If you haven't heard Kelly Joe Phelps, you should! Some very beautiful slide and fingerstyle work! Alot of his work is done on a standard wood body acoustic guitar, and it sounds great!!!! I think he is using Gretsch and Gibson acoustics, although he has lots of different guitars I'm sure.

You don't need a resonator to play slide, it can sound beautiful on a standard acoustic guitar. ALSO, heavier guage strings sound better than light guage, they get more sustain and a better tone. Medium guage like 12-56 are probabl;y fine for a standard acoustic guitar but remember to select tunings that are tuned DOWN instead of up because the added string tension from heavier guages might be hard on your standard acoustic guitar. Resonator guitars are built stronger to accomodate more string tension. ALSO for slide work you want

Finally, I think that the best way to learn proper technique for playing slide is through video instruction. I bought Bob Brozman's 3 part blues series on DVD and he teasches these fundamentals very well. These fundamentals are essential to playing slide, acopustic or electric.

Slide is not as easy as it looks, that is FOR SURE, but after you learn the proper techniques, thewn you areone your way to creating some really good music. IT IS FUN, I love it and that's what I work on about 95% of the time.

Check out TAlderson's resonator guitar thread.

BY THE WAY, BOTH of these topics belong in the GUITAR PLAYER forum, NOT in 'Other Instruments" I think Brandon should move them if he agrees and can find the time. Some people are missing these good topics. These are guitars. just different type of guitar and ususlly different style of playing- although you can play any acoustic style on a resonator and they sound good for alot of different styles of music.

[phangeaux]

There are alot of companies who make these, Johnson and Regal, are a couple of the less expensive ones and I think you can get reasonably good quality and sound from the less expensive ones. Fender even makes some affordable ones as I recall.

I don't know how to advise you but in my opinion good quality sound is more related to the skill of the player than it is to the price and quality of the guitar. There aree some pretty good sounding much less expensive dobro style guitars on the market.

You'll have to post in a forum somewhere - where people discuss these instrument comparisons, IGS forums or Guitar Noise (Alternate Tunings discussions) are a couple of examples.

If you get good at it playing dobro then you might want to invest in an expensive one. Just my opinion, unless you haver the money and want very high quality