Slide

[Egads]

Who plays slide? What do you prefer for slide material? Glass, brass, chromed brass, ceramic, or other? Brand?

Which finger? Pinky (a la Sonny Landreth and Clapton), ring (Duane and Derek), middle (Bonnie), or first (???)?

Do you have a dedicated guitar (or several)? What tuning(s) do you prefer? Why?

Do you play lap steel or pedal steel, too?
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On acoustic, I love brass. On electric, I like brass and love glass. Last year I found a slide made by Rock Slide that has a scooped end, making it easier to bend your finger, and a flat spot on the side, where your supporting finger rests. They are the best slides I've found. The only problem was that they were only brass or chrome. So, I've gotten used to brass on electric. I just saw yesterday that they came out with a glass version of the same slide!

I started out on my ring finger, but have moved to my pinky, so I can cover more territory without taking the slide off.

Other than the lap steel, I do not have a dedicated guitar. Some of my guitars have too low of action to easily play slide, so I always have something else available. I love the sound of my SC HB II with the slide.

I play in standard on guitar, so I don't have to switch tunings in a gig. On the lap steel, I play in Em7, which gives me a lot of similarity to standard, but also gives me some more flexibility.

I love my Asher lap steel, and am (sorta) patiently waiting for PRS to make one!

 

[László]

I used to have a heavy chromed slide made for pedal steel that I held between my3rd and 4th fingers and used with electric and acoustic guitars (not lap style), as it didn't have a hole to stick a finger into. I'd just grab it from my pocket when I wanted to use it. The very heavy weight of the thing made the sound very good, and the sliding smooth.

For some reason, I fell out of the practice of playing slide in recent years.

 

[garrett]

I use my ring finger. On electric I definitely prefer a thick glass slide, I think the one I have is a Dunlop. My tone and control is better with a heavier design.

I play a little lap steel and I use the heavy chrome-plated brass Shubb bar for that. I use the one with the cutaway sides; super comfortable.

On acoustic I'll normally just use the glass slide, but I've laid it in my lap and used the Shubb, too.

I used to favor open G on electric, but I'm gaining appreciation for open E lately. Open D sounds the fullest on the acoustic to me. I'll have to take a crack at Em7.

Aside from the lap steel, I have an Ibanez Talman with lipstick pickups that is slide-only. I even took the frets out of it. I wired it up to connect middle/bridge and middle/neck in series and the tone is huge, like Sonny Landreth (with 90% less skill). One of these days I want to re-fret it and set it up with high-ish action so it can do double duty. I get by on my other guitars, but my action is usually pretty low so I have to be careful not to clack against the frets.