 Excel Eight Lock Lever S-10
for Hawaiian Style by Alexander Zaalberg. AMSTERDAM
About twenty years ago Japanese Hawaiian steel guitar player Kiyoshi "Lion" Kobayashi ordered a special designed 5 lock lever hawaiian guitar manufactured by Mitsuo Fujii, owner of the Fuzzy steel guitar company, better known for its brandname Excel. This custom made Hawaiian steel guitar was catalogued in the "Hawaiian Guitar Bible", "The Hawaiian Steel Guitar and Its Great Hawaiian Musicians". Throughout the years Mitsuo improved this lock lever system to what it is today. First used on the factory made Universal S-12 Excel pedal steel guitar on which the one lock This special edition Hawaiian style steel guitar is still in progress. A final test version is made for Kiyoshi Kobayashi, who demonstrated it on Scotties convention this year in the USA. Kiyoshi says two to three locks can be changed simultaneously on a moderate tempo of playing. Because this final version is not in production yet, there is no price known. Very likely next year (this review is written september 2009) more will be known about this Excel Hawaiian style steel guitar. According to the photographs the cabinet looks very similar to the Excel keyless U-12 pedal steel. Only ten strings and more locks levers. I wonder when playing seated will the locks obstruct the "tone bar" hand? How comfortable will this non pedal steel guitar be? Knowing Excel we don´t have to worry about the quality of the steel guitar. Excel always had high standards when talking about materials and construction. To finish this small review, some lock lever combinations Kiyoshi mailed us: 1+2 = Cmaj7 add 6th. To visit the Fuzzy website click the link: Or even better contact Scotty, St.Louis, U.S.A. for info in English. The Fuzzy website offers a lot of Japanese and very little English. Alexander Zaalberg, musician, photographer, webdesigner & webmaster PPU.
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system changes the E9 to a B6. This same lock system is now used on an Excel single 10 Hawaiian steel guitar. 8 individual locks on 10 strings creating a large array of fixed tunings.