|
The Billy Hew Len Story & the Henning Kock interview
Jan Visser interviewed European steel player Henning Kock, and Lorene Ruymar permitted us to publish the Billy Hew Len story, previously published in Lorene´s Hawaiian Steel Guitar Book.
Links in the right column.
|
|
|
Pedal-Pro Universal is an internet project of freelance web designer Alexander Zaalberg, from Amsterdam, the Netherlands, Europe. In 2001 PPU started as a homepage to promote the Universal setup Pedal Steel Guitar, and throughout the years it has grown into a full size promotional website for steel guitar in general. To contact AZ click the "we invite your comments" line in the bottom table.
|
|
|
Latest update: Saturday, June 12, 2010. 18.30h GMT.
|
The Billy Hew Len story. Written by Jerry Byrd, and published by Lorene Ruymar in her book "The Hawaiian Steel Guitar and Its Great Hawaiian Musicians". Billy Hew Len, the amazing steel guitar player without left hand. Billy was of Hawaiian origin. The usual mix of Spanish Chinese Western etc. Played pedal and lap steel. backed up more Hawaiian artists than any other steel player did. His jazzy style of hawaiian was always exciting to listen to. His performance exciting to watch. Billy left us on November 23, 1987. We thought it was time to remember this great musician. But we could not find any info on the internet. Happely Lorene permitted us to publish Jerry´s words. With some nice photographs and video. when you haven´t read the story in Lorene´s book, Billy Hew Len remembered, in the PPU site.
|
|
Tom Brumley, known by his amazing steel contributions to the Buck Owens´  recordings passed away on February 6th this year. Tom was a Buckaroos´ keymember during the ´60´s. In later years Tom owned a (pedal) steel guitar company and done recordings with many artists. A brief retrospection by Jan Visser and Henning Kock.
Sunday June 29, the Central Illinois Steel Guitar Association held it´s annual  meeting at the Best Western Ashland House Inn in Morton, Illinois. Among the fifteen players were well-known steelers as Don E. Curtis and Joe Wright. Board member Rich Mounce mailed us this review.
In his steel guitar music review column Dutch pedal steel player Hans Drissen reviewed the lastest Bill Stafford CD. Hans is a busy man, both musician and teacher at the elementary school, so it took some time to do this job for the PPU website. But here it is, Smooth Melodies reviewed.
|
Bill Stafford informs us on the latest DSSG&MA meeting. DSSG&MA  stands for Deep South Steel Guitar & Musicians Asso-ciation. The Deep South parties are always very well attended. Big names and big fun. Great to read, down Mississippi, young kids pick up steel and turn out to be very talented. Read Bill´s short memo.
Lorene Ruymar wrote us a review on Scotty´s convention 2009. Lorene was invited to receive the Jerry Byrd Lifetime Achievement Award from the hands of Scotty. Read Lorene´s words. With some nice pictures.
In 2003 Ken Simmons wrote us a large article about the Brisbane Steel Guitar  Club Annual Festival. It turned out to be a very large article with great pictures. We haven´t heard since from Down Under. Upon our request, Ruth Ardern, from The Brisbane Steel Guitar Club wrote us an update. From Australia, read Ruth words about the Brisbane Steel Guitar Club Annual Festival.
|
FROM THE WEBMASTER: An update of the pulldown menu bar this time. re-arranged and more items. MP3´s samples in the CD page are back again. Still a few are missing we try to find. Jan Visser interviewed steel player Henning Kock. Lorene Ruymar penned down the amazing Billy Hew Lenn story. Enjoy reading and listening. AZ. June 2010.
A very personal vision on this great instrument by Carl  Dixon. Carl, using the pen name PatDee, wrote in his very personal way a great book about the Pedal Steel Guitar. A ringbinder book, high quality satin paper, and tons of wonderful photographs about the pedal steel, its players and inventors. Carl asked us to review it in the PPU website. We are pleased to do so. We scanned some pages to give you an impression of the content. To read the review click the link.
Jan Visser interviewed Al Brisco. Al well-known of his session work, his steel guitar store "Steel Guitars of  Canada", his CD´s and DVD´s, instruction tapes and his performances, said yes to our interview request without any hesitation. It turned out to be a great interview. With a nice series of pictures we received from Al, Michael Scott and Jim Harrison. We enjoyed organizing this interview. I hope you enjoy reading it. Click the link to read Al´s words.
Japanese Hawaiian, non pedal, steel guitar player  "Lion Kiyoshi Kobayashi" demonstrated Excel´s latest invention. A single 10 string, eight lock lever, non pedal steel guitar. The eight locks give players the possibility to change fixed tunings "on the flow". This guitar is in its final test fase, therefore no price tag known. Read this small review.
We asked Jan Visser to organize an interview with an European steel player. Jan thought it would be a good  idea to interview Hennig Kock from Denmark. Henning and his wife Inger are good friends of Jan and Trudy. So there was a lot to talk over. Henning is retired teacher and musician who played on many Danish commercial recordings. He visited the U.S. many times and made a lot of friends overseas. To all our PPU readers, enjoy reading Henning´s words. With some nice photographs.
In 2002 Lorene Ruymar wrote a special about the history of the Hawaiian (lap) steel guitar. Lorene Ruymar is the author of the book "The Hawaiian Steel Guitar and Its Great Hawaiian Musicians". It means she is an autority on lap steel guitar history. Read her story.
2004 we asked Jan Visser to write a special about the history of the pedal steel. 2006 he done so. Jan wrote this XXX-large special about the history of the pedal steel Guitar. Where Lorene ended her story, Jan started. Lots of info and lots of pics.
|
|
|
