Article: Essential Listening

My last post focused on a new generation of banjo players, and how the banjo has found a place in the 21st century, but however much I dig what people are doing now, I have overwhelming admiration for the players who brought the banjo to our attention in the first place.

In my opinion it is essential to listen to music as close to its source as you possibly can, for example, if you want to listen to Rock ‘n’ Roll, you should listen to the Elvis Sun recordings, if you want to listen to the Blues, then check out some Jimmy Reed and Leadbelly... and if you want to accomplish anything on banjo, then listening to some pivotal players from this genre will pay dividends as you develop your own style.

Article: New Blood

Up until fairly recently the banjo has been absent from UK pop culture, in fact I struggle to remember hearing it on commercial radio during my teens, 20s & 30s, with exception to the Rednex version of "Cotton Eyed Joe" - why, Why, WHY!

So how could an instrument that was so vocal in the 60s folk movement become so unpopular? Was it because George Harrison never played banjo on "Norwegian Wood"? Bob Dylan and the Stones certainly didn't use it in the early parts of there careers, which is a sad thing, cos it would've worked well on some of there tunes. Over the years there were a few exceptions, such as The Violent Femmes Blister In The Sun and "Sweetheart of the Rodeo" by the Byrds, have a listen to I Am a Pilgrim, it's cool, but this album is more of a nod to the past than a step into the future.

Tab: Little Birdie, as recorded by The Stanley Brothers

I went to the Oxford Bluegrass and Old Time/Appalachian music jam last Thursday, and had a really cool time. There just a really nice bunch of guys, who welcomed my mate Tom and Me with open arms. Most of what I they played I was not too familiar with, but then I am new to this game. However I was able to play along easily and take the odd solo. I also got asked to play and sing a song, and choose Down Beside The Ohio, the Obray Ramsey way, and it went down really well. Anyway, I should get to the point, that being, how to play Little Birdie.

I was put onto this song by a Mandolin player at the Bluegrass jam, and agreed to learn it for next time. I quickly scoured the Internet for a tab or a YouTube video, but was unable to find a version similar to the Stanley Brothers version.

Advice: How to work out songs by yourself

I've come across a lot of people who play Banjo really well but can't transcribe songs for them selves. Many have tried and failed, usually when they started playing, and since then have been convinced they don't have "the ear" for it. Thing is that 99% of them are wrong! If you can play a song from start to finish and know you haven't played a wrong note, or can tell if your Banjo is out of tune, then you have a good enough ear to work out simple to intermediate songs and beyond.

However I will agree that it doesn't come naturally to us all, and like our playing, it can take time to develop. It certainly took me several years of occasionally trying and to varying degrees failing before I was able to transcribe songs myself, and to help you speed up this process I am going to share some advice.

Banjo tuition: Dick Smith, London's No.1 point of call

This is first in a series of articles where I hope to point you in the direction of that illusive group of people who teach Banjo in the UK. And I am setting the standard high with my first addition - Dick Smith.

I first saw Dick play Bluegrass Banjo about 18 months ago, during his stint in the Coal Porters, and was really blown away by his speed and technique. At the time it hadn’t occurred to me that anything happened above the 5th fret of a Banjo without the intervention of a capo, but that night Dick demonstrated a variety of sounds and rhthems, with his hands flying around the fretboard like a hillbilly Van Halen! I have since been in touch with Dick and told him about my blog and asked him if I could write an article on him and add him to my up coming list of Banjo tutors in the UK, and here we are.

Bluegrass: Resources for beginners to intermediate players

Learning to play Guitar is easy here in the UK, there are 1000s of books, websites people willing to teach or show you some cool new trick. Now as the internet reaches maturity we can easily find many resources for Banjo including books, youtube videos, message boards and several good tab sites, which were impossible to find 10 years ago. Frustratingly, Banjo teachers are few and far between, and as part of this project I intend to create a list of as many I can find (any Banjo teachers reading this article, who lives in the UK and wants to be listed please comment on this post or send me a email). I have sadly not been able to find a local teacher in Oxfordshire, where I live, so my journey started on youtube, where there are loads of Bluegrass lesson, varying in quality. Many of the lessons are basic, and you tend to have to go to another website and pay for intermediate or advanced lessons, but they are good to get you started. There are also many youtube videos where people just demonstrate that they can play a certain tune, but they offer no explanation as to how, other than what you can see.

Clawhammer: Patrick Costello is cool

When I brought my first Banjo I hadn't actually given any thought about what style I wanted to play. I knew about Bluegrass, but I was looking for something different, so looked around the internet for inspiration. The first style that I came across that really appealed to me was Clawhammer (sometimes known as Frailing), a rhythmic and at times repetitive style of playing popular long before Bluegrass. Many of the tunes I came across used modal tunings like (GDGCD), which give the Banjo a much darker sound, the archetypal example of this would be The Coo Coo Bird by Clarence "Tom" Ashley. Over the next few weeks I watched loads of lessons and examples on youtube, and I have to admit I was really struggling with the style until I came across a guy called Patrick Costello, who has posted loads of free content online for several years now.