Susan Alcorn, an experimental composer and musician who pushed the pedal steel guitar, an instrument more often associated with the country music roadhouse, into the avant-garde, died on Friday in Baltimore. She was 71. Her husband, David Lobato, said the cause of death, in a hospital, had not been determined. A rare female virtuoso on an instrument long dominated by men, Ms. Alcorn erased boundaries for pedal steel guitar — a console-style electric guitar played face up, with pedals and knee levers to alter pitch, often used to create a forlorn, wailing twang. That made it a key instrument in country music. As hinted at by the title of her 2006 album, “And I Await the Resurrection of the Pedal Steel Guitar,” Ms. Alcorn steered the instrument into uncharted territory.
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