"Steel Guitar Rag" is the seminal

Western swing Western swing music is a subgenre of American country music that originated in the late 1920s in the Western United States, West and Southern United States, South among the region's Western music (North America), Western string bands. It is dan ...

instrumental credited with popularizing the

steel guitar A steel guitar ( haw, kīkākila) is any guitar played while moving a steel bar or similar hard object against plucked strings. The bar itself is called a "steel" and is the source of the name "steel guitar". The instrument differs from a conve ...

as an integral instrument in a Western band. Written by

Leon McAuliffe William Leon McAuliffe (January 3, 1917 – August 20, 1988) was an American Western swing guitarist who was a member of Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys during the 1930s. He was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a me ...

, it was first recorded by

Bob Wills James Robert Wills (March 6, 1905 – May 13, 1975) was an American Western swing musician, songwriter, and bandleader. Considered by music authorities as the founder of Western swing, he was known widely as the King of Western Swing (although S ...

and

The Texas Playboys James Robert Wills (March 6, 1905 – May 13, 1975) was an American Western swing musician, songwriter, and bandleader. Considered by music authorities as the founder of Western swing, he was known widely as the King of Western Swing (although S ...

in 1936. The song bears a striking resemblance to "Guitar Rag" recorded by guitarist Sylvester Weaver in 1927., although others have claimed stylistic similarities 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.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." Many musicians and bands have recorded this instrumental over the years. A recent version was performed by Country Music Hall of Famer Jimmy Russell.

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) *Harrington, Joe S. ''Sonic Cool: The Life & Death of Rock 'n' Roll''. Hal Leonard, 2002. *Komara, Edward. ''Encyclopedia of the Blues''. Routledge, 2005) *Koskoff, Ellen. ''Music Cultures in the United States: An Introduction''. Routledge, 2005. *Lange, Jeffrey J. ''Smile When You Call Me a Hillbilly: Country Music's Struggle for Respectability, 1939-1954''. University of Georgia Press (August 2004) *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. *Ruymar, Lorene. ''The Hawaiian Steel Guitar and Its Great Hawaiian Musicians''. Centerstream Publications, 1996. *Santoro, Gene. ''Stir It Up: Musical Mixes from Roots to Jazz''. Oxford University Press, 1997. *Stambler, Irwin; Grelun Land. ''Country Music: The Encyclopedia''. St. Martin's Griffin, 2000. *Townsend, Charles. ''San Antonio Rose: The Life and Music of Bob wills''. University of Illinois Press, 1986.

External links

YouTube documentary
{{Authority control Western swing songs 1936 songs Leon McAuliffe songs Bob Wills songs