Steelin' Corn Tab (E9th Tab Added 8/27/21)



Steelin' Corn is an instrumental that was written, played and made popular by Merle Haggard's band, The Strangers. It featured Roy Nichols on lead guitar and Norm Hamlet on pedal steel guitar. The tempo at full speed is a brisk 240 BPM. I started learning it at 120 BPM for both the lead and steel parts and will include all the tracks for that below including the complete song, rhythm track with guitar only, rhythm track with steel only and rhythm track only. This way you can hear what the finished product should sound like and practice the steel and guitar parts separately. This song is not really playable on just steel or guitar because the steel plays lead in some sections and then plays harmony in others! Same for the guitar parts. I played this on my Excel 12 string (pictured at left) using just the standard 10 string C6 tuning with a high G string. If you have a high D string on your C6 tuning you can tune it up to G or else use the C to C# knee lever to get the high G string grouping 3 frets up.

It's important to keep pressure behind the bar at the 12th fret to minimize the strings ringing to the left of the bar. Although it's possible to eliminate a few bar slants I found it easier to slant the bar when needed and not have to focus on pushing a pedal while playing at a brisk speed. I've also avoided the use of any pedals or knee levers as they are not really needed but could be used. On the steel solo part you can add C6 pedal 8 and pick up the bottom string at the start of the solo as is barely audible on the original recording but I did not show that in the tab or play it on my recording. I've been able to play this now at 180 BPM after a few weeks of practice and will post sound files and tracks for that as soon as I get them recorded.

There are various links on the net including on YouTube for the guitar tab and a few different ways to play that part. I used the guitar tabs linked below. It's money well spent and you will get a lot more really cool licks with the tab purchase for just a few bucks. I made up my own guitar solo because I couldn't play Roy's version at full speed! The rest of the guitar parts on my recording should be identical to the original.




Sound Tracks



Tab files







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