D13 Pedal steel copedant, tabs and sounds



This page is dedicated to the 12 string D13th pedal steel copedant that was developed by Johnny Cox. Check out Johnny's Facebook Page for some excellent discussion and video tutorials related to this tuning. I have adapted this tuning to my own needs and what is currently installed on my guitar is shown immediately below. I will post eventually and hopefully, about 50 tabs and a bunch of audio files that I have created with this tuning. Some of these have been gleaned from Johnny Cox's playing and some are uniquely my own. This D13th tuning is installed on my Excel 12 string keyless guitar and will also be installed on a new Sierra pedal steel I have on order. Note that I have changed my LKL, LKR, P1 and P3 to the Emmons setup versus the Day setup that Johnny uses. Having played this setup for a few months I must admit that the Day setup makes more sense in terms of proximity of pedals. A few things I have learned so far:

    1. The Day version of this setup puts Johnny's pedal 3 right next to pedal 4 and closer to pedal 5. You'll see in the tabs below that there are many times your will want to use the original pedals 3 and 4 in quick succession to move string 6 smoothly from a full tone up to a full tone down. As such pedal 4 is heavily used in both the E9th and C6th modes. Pedal 5 is also used in both modes and it's easier to pivot your foot between pedals 3 and 5 with the Day setup. I E9th mode think of pedal 5 as the B to Bb knee lever!
    2. In E9th mode string 5 is extra and often skipped over. In C6 mode string 8 is extra and often skipped over. There are exceptions but the complete D-10 equivalent sets of open strings are present and even expanded upon with extended tuning ranges in both modes. Having both modes immediately available is pretty cool but have the extended ranges and added function of the Chalker/Andseron changes on LKV give you more sounds and functions that any D-10 setup I've seen.
    3. The Franklin change is a split implementation with pedal 4 and RKL working together to accomplish this. I am considering dropping the 11th string a whole tone on pedal 4 as well to complete the Franklin change as I like the full sound it produces.
    4. I usually tune the 2nd string to a dominant 7th but occasionally tune it to a Maj 7th so the I can do a few riffs with the 2nd and 4th strings in unison. Note that no changes are need to the function of RKR and LKL-O to accomplish this other than minor changer endplate retuning.
    5. Knee lever LKV is a combination of 2 a common C6th changes in C6 mode and some new Curly Chalker changes and is a great Johhnny Cox innovation. I will eventually have tabs with sound files that show most of these uses. This knee lever covers the standard C6 string 4 knee lever A to Bb change and the C6 string 1 D to D# change that Buddy Emmons commonly added to pedal 8
    6. The D13 tuning is not that far apart from the E9th tuning and you'll see this if you've ever had the low D to C# and low B to A changes on your E9th tuning to get C6 type sounds. Add a 6th note in the middle of the E9th tuning, drop the bottom two string down using a knee lever and add one more low string and you've got D13th!
    7. The D13 tuning is pretty powerful even without pedals and I've got at least one tab that will show this. Minor, 6th, 7th and 13th chords and tons of really close single string intervals are provided.
    8. The lower strings provide some fantastic standard guitar rock and rolls sounds that are really handy and break out of the pedal steel only sounds mold. Again I will provide examples of these below.
    9. My RKV is used for experimental reasons and not required for this copedant. I have tried out a bunch of changes on RKR and it will change over time
    10. There are time when you will want to lower string 4 and not string 9 in C6th mode. This can be accomplshed by tuning the 4th string lower with the split tuning screw only. You will lower the 4th string until it bottoms out on the split tuning screw and then further moving the knee lever will start lowering the 9th string without further lowering the 4th string.
    11. You will want to have your left knee levers moved more to the right than you would normally have them on as S-10 or D-10 guitar. This facilitates using the with ALL the floor pedals What has worked well for me is to plave the center of the left knee lever grouping at the center or the 4th floor pedal.
    12. I only use a 10 string bar on my 12 string steels. I've yet to find a need to cover all 12 strings at the same time. The 10 string bar is lighter, faster and has less drag and noise.
    13. The Excel changer has excellent raising and lowering capability with little force or travel required even for strings that move over a full tone up or down. Click here to view the setup on this guitar.
    14. Note that RKR and P8 identically lower String 10 from C to B. There are times when it's convenient to just play a riff on pedal 8 and not use RVR if you are only going as low string 10.
    15. Short summary of this tuning?
      1. All of standard 10 string E9th
      2. All of standard 10 string C6
      3. Adds extended E9th
      4. Adds extended C6
      5. Contains most of Tom Morrel's non-pedal D13th tuning
      6. Adds "secret" Curly Chalker up knee levers function into LKV
      7. Add's key parts of Maurice Anderson's 12 string universal tuning pedal setup
      8. Covers Weldon Myrick's open tuning and 2nd string knee lever setup
    16. There are also a few advanted that this tuning has over an E9/Bb6 12 string universal tuning. All of your E9/C6 type fret positions are at the same place on the fretboard. And it retains the 9th E9th string and all 10 E9th strings. There's also no need to hold in a knee lever all the time to play in D9th.

Copedant on my Excel and Sierra guitars