When you think of Hawaiian musical instruments, you probably think of the ukulele – but this is certainly not Hawaii’s only contribution to Western music! Another instrument to come from Hawaii, the lap steel or “Hawaiian” guitar, has had an immense impact on musical styles of the last century.

According to legend, the lap steel guitar was invented in Hawaii in 1885 by Joseph Kekuku, a young student. As the legend goes, he began experimenting with sliding bolts, knives, and other items across the strings of a guitar to change the musical sounds. Within seven years, he had developed the new style of guitar that would become known as a Hawaiian guitar.

This style of guitar is based on the Spanish guitar, which was very popular in Hawaii at the time. Though guitars first made their way to Hawaii in the early decades of the nineteenth century, it wasn’t until the Mexican and Spanish cowboys hired by King Kamehameha III in the 1830s that this style of instrument really took root. Both the ukulele and the Hawaiian guitar trace their roots to this era.

Within a few decades the lap steel guitar had reached the mainland, where it was hugely popular in the 1920s and 1930s, in part because of the large number of Hawaiian musicians who performed at San Francisco’s 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition. Kekuku also toured the United States and Europe until 1932, popularizing the Hawaiian steel guitar. His cousin, Sam Nainoa, also visited the mainland to play the Hawaiian guitar. Though the trend died out in the 1940s, Country Music Hall of Famer Jerry Byrd is credited with leading a Hawaiian steel guitar renaissance in the following decades. The rising tiki craze also contributed to this instrument’s resurgence.

The lap slide guitar, the first type of lap steel guitar, differs from other guitars in that the strings are raised at both ends of the fingerboard, so that the string does not touch the fingerboard at all. This guitar is placed on the player’s lap, rather than held like a traditional guitar. A metal slide known as a steel is moved along the strings, while the other hand plucks or picks the strings. Though the original Hawaiian guitar was built with six strings, over the decades there have been versions with as many as eight strings on each of four necks.

Electric lap steel guitars, originally known as Electric Hawaiian guitars, were developed in the early 1930s. This predates the first electric guitar by several years, making it the first electric stringed instrument. Another innovation, the pedal steel guitar, added pedals to allow the player to change the pitch of a string.

The lap steel guitar, along with the similar dobro and pedal steel guitar styles, are closely associated with Hawaiian music, as well as country music and bluegrass. Known for their sweet and melodic tunes, both the acoustic and electric versions figured heavily in the tiki and exotica music movements of the 1950s and 1960s. Even Hawaii’s last monarch, Queen Lili’uokalani, composed music for the steel guitar, which was then a popular up-and-coming instrument.

Author Bio: Royal Tiki’s genuine Hawaiian Tiki statues, totems and masks make a great addition to any Tiki bar. Also check for current specials on Tiki bar decor

Category: Entertainment
Keywords: