Playing
The lap steel ukulele is typically placed on the player's lap, or on a surface in front of the seated player.
The strings are not pressed to a fret when sounding a note, rather, the player holds a metal slide called a steel in the left hand, which is moved along the strings to change the instrument's pitch while the right hand plucks or picks the strings.
This method of playing greatly restricts the number of chords available, so lap steel music often features a restricted set of harmonies (such as in blues). Alternatively, the lap steel ukulele player can play the melody or another single part.
Read more about this topic: Lap Steel Ukulele
Famous quotes containing the word playing:
“Someday our grandchildren will look up at us and say, “Where were you, Grandma, and what were you doing when you first realized that President Reagan was, er, not playing with a full deck?””
—Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941)
“Sometimes, because of its immediacy, television produces a kind of electronic parable. Berlin, for instance, on the day the Wall was opened. Rostropovich was playing his cello by the Wall that no longer cast a shadow, and a million East Berliners were thronging to the West to shop with an allowance given them by West German banks! At that moment the whole world saw how materialism had lost its awesome historic power and become a shopping list.”
—John Berger (b. 1926)
“When as the rye reach to the chin,
And chopcherry, chopcherry ripe within,
Strawberries swimming in the cream,
And school-boys playing in the stream;”
—George Peele (1559–1596)