Steel Guitar Rag

Infobox Standard
title="Steel Guitar Rag"
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image_size=
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writer=Leon McAuliffe
composer=
lyricist=
published=
written=
language=English
form=Western swing
original_artist=Bob Wills & his Texas Playboys
recorded_by="(many, many other artists)"
performed_by=

"Steel Guitar Rag" is the seminal Western swing instrumental credited with popularizing the steel guitar as an integral instrument in a Western band. [Townsend, "San Antonio Rose",p. 99: There are authorities, McAuliffe among them, who believe this recording ["Steel Guitar Rag", March 25, 1935] and the subsequent use of the instrument in Wills's organization played the leading role in making the steel guitar popular in American music."] [Harrington,"Sonic Cool", p. 22: "In September '36, Leon McAuliffe had a huge hit with 'Steel Guitar Rag,' which helped popularize the sound of the electric guitar to the whole nation."] [Lange,"Smile When You Call Me a Hillbilly", p. 121: "McAuliffe's guitar eventually became an integral part of Bob Wills sound, particularly after the release of 'Steel Guitar Rag' in the late 1936. McAuliffe turned the instrumental piece, which was derived from a Hawaiian tune, into country music's first steel guitar standard."]

Written by Leon McAuliffe, it was first recorded by Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys in 1936. [Stambler, "Country Music", p. 289: " 'I've [Leon McAuliffe] written some songs that are good, but not many. I can't manufacture 'em, they have to come to me. I wrote 'Steel Guitar Rag' and the bridge to 'San Antonio Rose'—the trumpeter wrote the words—but Bob has total credit.' "] [Oliphant, "Texas Jazz", p. 50-51: "As early as 1933, Leon McAuliffe also was playing steel guitar, and in 1935 he joined Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys, recording with the latter his own composition, 'Steel Guitar Rag,' during a session of September 29-30, 1936."] The song stylistically bears a striking resemblance to a popular Hawaiian song, "On The Beach At Waikiki" (words, G.H. Stover; music, Henry Kailimai; arrangement, Sonny Cunha; 1915), which was widely performed on the vaudeville circuits in the U.S. [Koskoff, "Music Cultures in the United States", p. 129: "The debut of the song 'On the Beach at Waikiki' at the Panama-Pacific Exposition [1915] is credited with sparking a national fad for Hawaiian songs."] [*Ruymar, "The Hawaiian Steel Guitar", p. 50, quoting John York, president of the Western Swing Music Society: "When you next listen to a recording of Leon McAuliffe playing Steel Guitar Rag or Pan Handle Rag, listen for the Hawaiian style with a slight difference. Leon's influence came from listening to recordings of Jim and the Genial Hawaiians, and of Sol Ho'opi'i."] [Santoro, "Stir It Up", p. 183: "Hawaiian sounds began to outsell other forms of pop music on the mainland U.S., and had such an impact that Mexican bands added steel guitar players and masqueraded as Hawaiians to crash the lucrative U.S. vaudeville circuit."] The song also shares a five-note riff with "Guitar Rag" recorded by guitarist Sylvester Weaver in the late 1920s. [Dempsey, "The Light Crust Doughboys Are on the Air", pp. 57-58: "Dough Boy Kenneth Pitts admired McAuliffe's tune, 'Steel Guitar Rag,' which McAuliffe adapted from a tune called 'Guitar Rag' by blues guitarist Sylvester Weaver."] [Komara, "Encyclopedia of the Blues", p. 385: "The latter ['Guitar Rag'] is a blues guitar landmark, having been appropriated countless times including as 'Steel Guitar Rag' by Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys in 1936."]

References

Bibliography

*Dempsey. John Mark. "The Light Crust Doughboys Are on the Air: Celebrating Seventy Years of Texas Music". University of North Texas Press; Har/Com edition (September 2002) ISBN 1574411519
*Harrington, Joe S. "Sonic Cool: The Life & Death of Rock 'n' Roll". Hal Leonard, 2002. ISBN 0-634-02861-8
*Komara, Edward. "Encyclopedia of the Blues". Routledge, 2005) ISBN 0415926998
*Koskoff, Ellen. "Music Cultures in the United States: An Introduction". Routledge, 2005. ISBN 0415965888
*Lange, Jeffrey J. "Smile When You Call Me a Hillbilly: Country Music's Struggle for Respectability, 1939-1954". University of Georgia Press (August 2004) ISBN 0820326232
*Oliphant, Dave. "Texas Jazz: 1920-50". "The Roots of Texas Music" edited by Lawrence Clayton, Joe W. Specht, pp. 37-65. Texas A&M University Press, 2005. ISBN 1-58544-492-8
*Ruymar, Lorene. "The Hawaiian Steel Guitar and Its Great Hawaiian Musicians". Centerstream Publications, 1996. ISBN 1-57424-021-8
*Santoro, Gene. "Stir It Up: Musical Mixes from Roots to Jazz". Oxford University Press, 1997. ISBN 0-19-509869-2
*Stambler, Irwin; Grelun Land. "Country Music: The Encyclopedia". St. Martin's Griffin, 2000. ISBN-10: 0312264879
*Townsend, Charles. "San Antonio Rose: The Life and Music of Bob wills". University of Illinois Press, 1986. ISBN 0-252-01362-X