The New Pedal Steel Guitar Manifesto

We are the few, those who fight with and against the Exquisite and Terrible Logic of this Instrument, The Pedal Steel Guitar.

We alone have known the dark depths visited upon us during years of time and effort invested.

We alone have understood, in our practice, the hopelessness of standing at the foot of the Face That Has No Summit.

We alone have caught glimpses of its secrets when, effort momentarily rewarded, we have elicited the Sound No Other Can Make.

We alone have experienced the rare illumination of its music, as are able only those who have lived it from within.

We have seen the Amateur and Virtuoso alike constrained by limitations inherent in Our Instrument’s design.

We have seen the Obstacles, mechanical and physical, thrown in the path of Experimentation as we weigh the cost of implementing a new copedent or pedal change against its benefit.

We see our inspiration and creativity thwarted in ways small and large by the Consequences of the Mechanical … of string fatigue and breakage … of cabinet drop … of the decades-long entrenchment of two main copedents, both by-products of design limitations and historical musical convention … of tension-constrained pitch intervals … of the instability of splits … of the need for compensators

We see the potential ... … for a Revolution which promises Freedom from these Consequences.

We demand Change. We demand No Change.

We demand no change of the essence of that which is the Source of our beloved music, the main Vehicle for its conveyance, The Pedal Steel Guitar: its clean sound, its essential symbiosis of hands, feet, and knees with metal and magnets.

We demand change. We demand pedal and lever changes with no limits in number or range.

We demand the easy exploration of new vistas in pedal changes and copedents.

We demand no change in the Technique we have spent hours and years and decades developing; we demand no loss of the investment of our very selves!

We call for new ways to Imagine.

We call for effortless and instantaneous change of tunings.

We call for freedom from the Tyranny of tedious and difficult retuning and adjustments.

We call for liberation from mechanical constraints!

We banish the erratic behavior of splits and springs!

We cast off the bonds of metal moving against metal and embrace the Freedom and Power attained thereby!

We call for the Preservation of Tradition even as we look forward to the arrival of future players who shall inherit and expand it.

We urge Pedal Steel Guitarists, future and current, young and old, to reject all constraints mechanical, musical, and philosophical!

We call upon players of the Pedal Steel Guitar everywhere to hold dear its History even as they break from it, to carry forward into the Future the Tradition which lives in Our Instrument and all its Music.

We Will Have It.