pedal steel

noun

variants or pedal steel guitar

plural pedal steels or pedal steel guitars

: a box-shaped electric steel guitar with legs that has usually 10 strings which can be altered in pitch by the use of pedals and which are plucked while being pressed with a movable steel bar

[Ben] Keith broke into the business playing pedal steel on Patsy Cline's "I Fall to Pieces" …

—Kevin Dettmar

compare hawaiian guitar, lap steel

Examples of pedal steel in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Wooley sensitively explores the nuances of Miles’ profound music, with Susan Alcorn’s beguiling clouds of pedal steel guitar, Ava Mendoza’s potent electric guitar, and Ryan Sawyer’s responsive drumming. — Bret Saunders, Denver Post, 6 June 2026

Rostam Batmanglij's new album, American Stories, blends Americana sounds of acoustic guitars and pedal steel with his Persian influences. — Brittney Melton, NPR, 22 May 2026

Jonathan Gregg plays pedal steel, an ambient-country must, and has a tidy Americana background. — Brian Howe, Pitchfork, 12 May 2026

Musically, Middle of Nowhere leans into traditions shaped in small-town Texas dancehalls (pedal steel, Norteño accordion and other border-blurring textures) but rarely plays it straight. — Jonathan Cohen, SPIN, 1 May 2026

Word History

First Known Use

1959, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for pedal steel

• bookmobile
• cochineal
• nonideal
• peroneal
• philomel
• snowmobile
• waterwheel
• abele
• alkyl
• anneal
• appeal
• cartwheel