Archive for the ‘Banjo Setup’ Category
Beautiful Sounds of Old Ireland
One thing you will find that is popular in the Irish capital is traditional folk music. By going around the streets of Dublin like the Whelan’s in Camden Street, you will surely find traditional and folk music. This is one exciting spot has the best of Ireland’s talented folk performers.
A vast array of instruments are utilized in Irish folk music; and while fiddles and flutes are the first that come to mind, the banjo and guitar are now commonly used as well. Some famous Irish bands who have been very successful in taking traditional Irish folk music to the world are the Clancy brothers, The Dubliners and The Chieftans, Tommy Makem and Altan. These bands were even given tribute by the Irish post office by means of coming up with stamps of these iconic bands. Because of the distinct and mesmerizing sound of traditional Irish folk music, The Chieftans music, as well as The Dubliners’ and Clancy Brothers’ has been very popular all over the world.
There are lots of banjo-player jokes. One goes “You can drop a shoe on the banjo and make music,” due to the “open G” tuning that is standard among bluegrass banjoists. Unlike a guitar or mandolin, which must be fretted to make a proper chord, merely strumming the open strings of a banjo (or dropping a shoe on it) will produce a G major chord. This tuning of D-B-G-D-g (from first to fifth string) provides two G notes an octave apart, two D notes an octave apart, and one B note, thus filling in the three notes of a G major triad. While the vast majority of bluegrass banjo work is performed with this tuning, alternate tunings are sometimes employed. The “drop C” tuning of D-B-G-C-g was considered the standard tuning in the classical banjo era around 1900 and is sometimes used by bluegrass players to provide a low root note when playing in the C position. Bluegrass banjo standards traditionally performed in C tuning include Home Sweet Home and Farewell Blues as recorded by Earl Scruggs.
The next most-common tuning for bluegrass banjo is open D, either D-A-F#-D-F# or D-A-F#-D-a (the fifth string can either be tuned down one fret from G to provide the third note of the D major triad, or tuned up two frets to provide the fifth note). Reuben and John Henry are traditionally played in this tuning, and Ron Block has used it to great advantage in his work with Alison Krauss and Union Station. Rare alternate tunings include G minor (D-Bb-G-D-g) as used by Ben Eldridge in his original instrumental Appalachian Rain recorded with The Seldom Scene, and D minor (aDFAD) as featured by Earl Scruggs in Nashville Blues.
The world of old-time clawhammer banjo makes use of a much greater variety of tunings including “double C” (D-C-D-Cg) and open C (E-C-D-C-g), to name just two. . . but that’s a subject for another post!
This is the first in a mini-series devoted to parts and setup of a modern five-string bluegrass banjo. In this post, we define the major assemblies of the banjo and each component within those assemblies. In future posts we will expand on each of these and on the role each part plays in the setup process.
Pot Assembly:
- Rim – a hoop made of wood or metal that all other parts attach to. Three-ply maple is preferred on high-end banjos.
- Tone Ring – usually constructed of metal, preferably bell-bronze; this part rests on top of the rim and amplifies string vibration.
- Flange – usually constructed of metal (brass or pot metal); this part surrounds the rim and serves as the bottom support for tensioning the head as well as for attachment of the resonator.
- Coordinating Rods – these metal rods span from the bottom to the top of the rim and serve to attach the neck to the pot assembly.
- Head – originally made of calf skin, modern heads are made of mylar. This sits on top of the tone ring and serves as the soundboard of the banjo.
- Tension Hoop – usually made of metal, this sits on top of the head and evenly distributes tension to the head when tightened properly.
- Bracket Hooks – these are individual hooks that span the space between the tension hoop and the flange. These are used to adjust head tension.
- Tailpiece – located at the end of the banjo, on the pot assembly; this serves as a place to attach strings and is adjusted for down pressure on the bridge.
- Bridge – usually made of maple with an ebony top; the main purpose is to transfer string vibration to the head. It also holds the strings in place and can be moved to adjust intonation.
Resonator:
- Usually made of wood; the resonator is a bowl-shaped device that attaches to the back side of the banjo and projects sound forward.
- Wall Lugs – made of metal; these attach to the inside wall of the resonator and serve as a nut to receive the resonator thumb screws
- L-Bracket – these are actually L-shaped metal brackets that are mounted under the flange and attached to the rim. This is the attachment hardware that holds the resonator to the pot assembly.
- Resonator Thumb Screws – made of metal; these pass through the flange and L-bracket to secure the pot assembly to the resonator.
Neck:
- The neck and resonator are usually made from the same type of wood. The neck serves as a playing surface.
- Lag Bolts – these are threaded into the wooden heel of the neck, pass through the rim and connect to the coordinating rods that attach the neck to the pot assembly.
- Truss Rod – this is built into the interior of the neck, spanning the length of the neck and located in a routed channel under the fretboard. The truss rod applies pressure to counteract the pull of the strings.
- Fingerboard – a piece of wood laminted to the front of the neck that holds the frets and decorative inlay. This is the part of the neck that is in contact with the fingertips of the fretting hand.
- Frets – these are the metal bars typically made of nickel-silver and inlaid crossways into the fingerboard. They serve to stop the vibration of the string at the desired note.
- Nut – usually made of bone (plastic on entry-level banjos). This separates the strings a specific width and holds the strings a specific height above the fingerboard.
- Peghead – often shaped like a fiddle body; located at the opposite end of the neck from the pot, the peghead is a part of the neck and serves as a place to mount tuning pegs.
- Tuning pegs – usually geared, tuning pegs serve to tighten the strings to pitch. Guitar-style tuning pegs have tuning knobs on the sides of the peghead, and planetary tuning pegs go straight out the back.
- Inlay – decorative designs typically cut from mother-of-pearl or abalone which ornament the peghead and fingerboard and serve as position markers.
- Binding – decorative strips, usually of plastic, running along the sides of the neck and resonator.
Why are bluegrass banjos so heavy? That’s what everyone wants to know when they pick one up. The reason is that higher-end bluegrass banjos are equipped with a metal tone ring-a casting of a brass alloy weighing around three pounds. It rests between the wooden rim and the drum head. A quality tone ring can greatly increase the volume and power of a banjo.
Tone rings are available in two major configurations-an arch-top tone ring provides a somewhat smaller vibrating surface on the head (usually around 9 inches measured side-to-side) for a quicker, brighter sound. A flathead tone ring leaves the entire head (usually 11 inches) free to vibrate, generating more depth and richness of sound. Flathead tone rings are associated with the classic sound of such bluegrass greats as Sonny Osborne, J.D. Crowe, and Earl Scruggs; legendary players who have relied on the brighter sound of an arch-top tone ring include Ralph Stanley, Allen Shelton, Doug Dillard and Steve Martin.
We banjo players have a luxury unknown to players of other stringed instruments-the sounding board of our instrument is a drum head that can be replaced easily and inexpensively. That enables us to experiment with different sounds. Once upon a time, all banjo heads were made of animal hide (usually calfskin). The warm tone of a real calfskin head is hard to beat, but their susceptibility to changes in humidity makes them very high-maintenance.
Plastic or mylar heads have been the standard since their introduction in the early 1960s. They are available with a white frosted coating which gives a traditional appearance and sound for bluegrass banjo, or in a clear, uncoated version for extra brightness and response. Synthetic calfskin heads more closely mimic the look and sound of real animal hide and are especially popular with open-back (clawhammer) banjo players. Recent years have seen more options in banjo heads with eye-catching colors now available, and even heavy mesh heads for quiet practice.
The choice of wood type for your banjo may seem to be solely a cosmetic consideration, but it can have a big impact on the sound of your instrument as well. While it may seem counterintuitive, wood choice can have the biggest effect on tone through the neck. While bluegrass banjo rims are almost always made of maple and the veneers on the resonator have little impact on tone, the neck of your banjo is usually a solid chunk of mahogany, walnut, or maple and represents a significant proportion of the banjo’s vibrating mass.
Conventional wisdom is that mahogany, being a less-dense wood, is the warmest of the three woods and tends to accentuate the bass response of a banjo. Maple, a very dense hardwood, is considered to be at the opposite end of the scale with more “bite” and “edge” and enhanced treble response. Walnut is generally thought to fall somewhere in between mahogany and maple tonally. Keep in mind, however, that variations in setup and in individual instruments can make for a brighter mahogany banjo or a deeper-sounding maple one.