Steel Guitar News

Hello fellow players,
Obviously last week’s newsletter hit a major chord with many of you. I got many favorable responses. Many I’d like to share with the rest of you. However, the gist of everything is almost everybody needs me to continue my newsletters with candor, honesty, tempered with a certain amount of belligerence which I will do.
I also got many responses by those of you that have been financially bit by club owners and band leaders that have hired you in the past. One story that was related to me was about a club owner that hired this gentleman’s band and when it came to the end of the night, claimed he didn’t have any money to pay the band.
So the band leader said, “Well I’m going to let you go this time and just remember us when you do have money to hire us.”
Two weeks later, the band leader walked in the club to see a disc jockey with all his paraphernalia setup in the stage area. Upon talking to the deejay and asking him what he charged for a night, the deejay said, “Seven hundred and fifty dollars.” And that the club owner had hired him for every weekend for a year.
The band leader was only charging $500 for a five piece band. So I ask you, wouldn’t this sound about right? By the way, the five piece band was a very good band.
I have heard many stories like this about deejays or karaoke machines replacing fine bands. Now I’ll agree that not every band in the world is worth what they’re asking, but most are, and let’s face it, nothing quite has the impact of a live band when you go out to a night on the town.
Now for a technical update that I’m seeing that is working out very good. The old Professional Fender three legged steel guitars with the trapezoid pickups are fast becoming to the end of their workability. I am installing a set of Alumatone pickups on a triple neck Fender Custom and so far these are working out much better than the original and I would continue to use these Alumatones even if I had a new set of trapezoids to install on these guitars.
As time sneaks by the keyheads in these wonderful old Fender steel guitars are rapidly suffering from tuning keys that are chewing themselves up. The little brass gears are just too soft to last another fifty years. So we are doing a Fender Stringmaster type modification to these old keyheads.
It involves some fairly expensive machine work, but if you have a double or triple neck Fender Custom or Dual Professional in your closet that won’t work because of bad pickups or slipping tuning keys, these modifications will make your guitar generally a lot better than new. Isn’t it better to have a steel guitar worth two to three thousand dollars than one piled up in the closet that’s only worth a hundred or two?
Check out our monthly specials at http://www.steelguitar.net/monthlyspecials.html and we’ll try to save you a lot of money.
Your buddy,
Bobbe
Steel Guitar Nashville
123 Mid Town Court
Hendersonville, TN. 37075
(615) 822-5555
Open 9AM – 4PM Monday – Friday
Closed Saturday and Sunday

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