Posts Tagged ‘bluegrass banjo’
A Bit of Bluegrass Trivia
Can you recall the controversial cinema to debut in 1972? If you guessed “Deliverance,” then your memory serves you correct. Directed by John Boorman, this film debuted the first recording of dueling banjos, or what is commonly referred to as ‘feuding banjos’ or ‘the battle of the banjos.’ The musicians behind this magic were Don Wayne Reno and Arthur Smith.
Prior to this blockbuster, both parts were played with banjos at the same speed for the entirety of the tune. But since this bluegrass banjo duet came to life in “Deliverance,” most modern-age bluegrass bands mimic the song in the key of G. However, in the movie both the guitarist and banjo players have capos on the second fret, denoting that it’s in the key of A. Maybe it’s about time to relive the bluegrass glory debuted in this movie with an at-home screening of “Deliverance.”
The five-string banjo presents a unique problem when using a capo. Since the fifth string doesn’t start until the fifth fret, capoing the four long strings at the most common frets (two, three, or four) leaves the fifth string unaltered. A number of solutions have been devised over the years. Simply re-tuning the fifth string is always an option, but tightening and stretching the string beyond its intended range repeatedly can cause it to break. Plus, the fifth string won’t note correctly when fretted. Fifth-string capos are available; some attach permanently to the side of the neck and some clip temporarily onto the string.
Earl Scruggs solved this problem by hammering a couple of his wife’s bobby pins into the fingerboard at the desired frets, leaving a small length of pin sticking out of the fingerboard and bent over so that the fifth string could be slipped under it. Pete Seeger illustrated the same idea in his pioneering book “How to Play the 5-String Banjo”, using a screw placed in the fingerboard. In more recent years, players have turned to less-obtrusive HO-gauge model railroad spikes to provide a simple and reliable way to capo the fifth string.
Banjos have a long history dating back to ancient Egypt, and they’ve evolved today into four basic genres. Folk or Traditional music features a clawhammer (also called a frailing) open-back five-string banjo. It’s usually played with the index finger and the thumb, and produces a melodious sound. It grew in popularity during the American Civil War as soldiers strummed and plucked it around the evening campfires. The standard strings of the day were made from purified cattle entrails, and the banjo head was made from calfskin, giving the instrument a mellow and relaxing tone. Though most clawhammer banjos use steel strings today, many nostalgic players prefer a modern synthetic string set that emulates the old sound. Notable clawhammer banjo artists include Grandpa Jones and Pete Seeger, and Dave Guard (The Kingston Trio).
Dixieland Jazz music came of age in southern Louisiana in the early 1900s and found its home in New Orleans. Four-string banjos became prominent in Dixieland bands due to their volume and percussive rhythm sound. They were strummed with a single flat-pick, and accomplished players such as Eddie Peabody and Perry Bechtel would also pick out the melody notes. The two standard four-string Dixieland banjos are the 19-fret tenor model and the 22-fret plectrum model. Their popularity exploded during the early jazz age; some call it the electric guitar of its day. By the late 1920s, Gibson, Vega and other instrument makers had added a resonator on the back that projected the banjo sound toward the audience, and a bell-bronze tone ring that gave the banjo more depth and clarity of sound.
Irish Folk music has been around for centuries; today the 4-string, 17-fret banjo is the standard for the genre. It’s tuned the same as a fiddle and mandolin, making it easier for musicians to play multiple instruments. Artists who helped popularize Irish Folk music include Gerry O’Connor and Seamus Egan. Listen closely to the style of music, and you’ll discover where bluegrass music got its roots.
The most popular banjo music today is bluegrass, which got its name from Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys. Monroe hailed from the bluegrass state of Kentucky. Though he was billed as a country artist during most of his career, his unique style of music developed into a category all its own. Banjo legend Earl Scruggs joined Monroe’s band in 1945 and appeared on the Grand Ole Opry stage for the first time. His unique style of picking electrified audiences. He played a five-string resonator banjo with a thumbpick and two fingerpicks, often at breakneck speed, with a clarity and precision that constituted an entirely new and exciting sound. By 1948 Scruggs left Monroe to form his own band with singer Lester Flatt. Foggy Mountain Breakdown and The Ballad of Jed Clampett became two of their most popular songs. Scruggs, who turned 86 in January 2010, is still touring with his banjo.
Many people—myself included—think of the banjo as being a traditional instrument that has seen little modification over the years. Just as with guitars, there are several different options for the number of strings that are on your instrument, but this is usually where the deviation in banjo designs ceases. While it is true that the basic design has changed little in recent decades, there have been significant advances in banjo technology.
One of the most revolutionary renovations has been the advent of the electric banjo. These models may feature a slightly more modern design, but, obviously, the main development is the addition of electricity to amplify the sound. This allows you to get the power of an electric guitar while preserving the distinct banjo sound.
Earl Scruggs learned to play the 5-string banjo on an instrument that belonged to his older brother Junie. The banjo did not always stay in tune well, and the young virtuoso found himself having to retune mid-song. Scruggs’s musical inventiveness took it from there, and he soon adapted that mid-song tuning sound into his developing style. After recording his first tuner instrumental Earl’s Breakdown in 1951, Scruggs decided a little mechanical help would make playing a lot easier. He installed a pair of cams onto his banjo peghead that raised and lowered the second and third strings to preset pitches. The most common settings are for the second string to lower from B to A and the third string to lower from G to F#, moving the banjo from G tuning to D tuning and giving the devices the common name “D-tuners”.
Scruggs’s new innovation was soon featured in such instrumentals as Flint Hill Special, Foggy Mountain Chimes, and Randy Lynn Rag. D-tuners soon became required equipment for any aspiring bluegrass banjoist. Melodic banjo pioneer Bill Keith took things the next step with a design that incorporated conventional second- and third-string tuners and the stop-setting mechanism in one unit, making it no longer necessary to drill extra holes in the peghead. Keith tuners became the standard in the banjo world with over 30,000 sold to date and are still manufactured by Bill Keith in Woodstock, New York. Players seeking the unique feel and sound of traditional cam-type tuners now have another option available in a new product called Cheat-A-Keys, which use the cam mechanism but are easily interchangeable between banjos and don’t require alteration of the peghead.
Virginia native Eddie Adcock first came to prominence as the banjo player with the groundbreaking Washington-D.C.-based Country Gentlemen during the 1960s. His overwhelming technical ability and blending of Scruggs, single-string, and Travis style were essential ingredients in the Gentlemen’s sound, and seminal recordings such as Sunrise and Pallet on the Floor earned the Country Gentlemen the reputation of being the first progressive bluegrass band, the progenitor of “newgrass” and “jamgrass” bands such as New Grass Revival, Yonder Mountain String Band, and Chris Thile and the Punch Brothers.
Since the 1970s Adcock has been performing and recording with his wife Martha and has recently performed a series of Country Gentlemen reunion concerts with fellow alums Jimmy Gaudreau and Tom Gray. An endorser of Deering banjos, Adcock became known as the “bionic banjo player” in 2008 when he underwent deep brain stimulation surgery to correct a tremor that had developed in his right hand. Adcock not only remained conscious during the procedure at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, but actually played the banjo as surgeons worked so that the placement of the brain implant could be adjusted for maximum effectiveness. A week later, he was back on stage at the International Bluegrass Music Association’s yearly convention in Nashville.
Gibson’s now-legendary Mastertone banjo line was introduced in 1925 and quickly became an industry standard, but by the late 1930s the banjo had fallen in popularity. Anxious to kick-start flagging sales, Gibson announced a new product that fixed an old problem. The new “top-tension” Mastertone design, introduced in 1937, was intended to make life easier for banjoists contending with the fickle calfskin heads. Calfskin heads were the standard before World War II (Remo Belli would later develop mylar heads) and calfskin needed frequent attention. Changes in the climate, especially in levels of humidity, dramatically changed the tension on a calfskin head and changed the banjo sound. Retensioning the calfskin head was common, and by moving the tension hook adjustment to the front (or top) without removing the resonator, Gibson made the tensioning process much easier.
While they were at it, Gibson introduced other changes such as carved solid-wood resonators, radiused fingerboards, and bold Art Deco cosmetics. Most important to modern players, flathead tone rings were also standard on the top-tension models. The three new top-tension Mastertone styles 7, 12, and 18 were, according to company literature, the “alarm clock” that was going to “wake up new possibilities in banjo playing”. The banjo’s time as America’s favorite fretted instrument had passed, however, and the top-tension line faded away when Gibson suspended banjo production during World War II.
The top-tension banjo had no real champions among the first generation of bluegrass banjo players (although Don Reno did occasionally use a style 18), but as the decades passed, Gibson’s prediction of top-tension-fueled banjo innovation seemed accurate, though delayed. A young Bill Keith used a converted TB-12 for his groundbreaking performances and recordings in the new melodic style when he joined Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys in the 1960s. A Style 18 has been in Bela Fleck’s arsenal since the 1980s, and a Style 7 is the favored banjo of Noam Pikelny of Punch Brothers fame. Although Gibson top-tensions are once again out of production following a revival in the 1990s and early 2000s, the banner has been taken up by other companies including Ome, one of whose top-tension models has found favor with virtuoso Matt Menefee of Cadillac Sky.