So
you want to play the banjo huh?
Good, it is a great instrument. This page is
dedicated to helping people who want to learn to play the 5 string banjo in
what is called Clawhammer, Frailing, or Old Time style. This consists of links
I have built up over the years, book recommendations, and other general tips.
More advanced players will probably know all of this stuff and may just want to
skim (check out the chords). Feedback, corrections, links, book recommendation,
and tips are always welcome. Please email me at zenbanjoman@gmail.com.
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Buying a Banjo
Learning Your First Licks
Chords
Albums and People
Books
Tips
Links
Buying a Banjo
For this kind of banjo playing you are mostly looking
for a 5 string open back model. If you have one great, start playing
it. If you have a closed back one, that should work fine to start, plus
you can always take the back off anyway. If you need to buy one there are
three routes you can go:
Buy a cheap banjo to see if you like it and can play
it
This is the route I went. Personally I would
recommend buying a pretty good banjo instead. Honestly anyone can play
the 5 string banjo, and play it well. I swear you can do it. There
is really no reason to doubt. You will outgrow this banjo quickly and
wish you didn’t buy it. But, if you must there are some options. You can get a new Rover RB-20 or RB-110 5
string open back banjo plus soft shell case from
Bernunzio.
As of writing this $169 or $279 depending on the model. Other starter
options which are a bit better and will last you a year or two more before you
outgrow them (you will outgrow the Rover within a year) are the
Gold
Tone CC-OT Openback for $299 which
is well worth it. This is a way better
banjo than the Rover for $20 more. There
is also the slightly more expensive American made
Deering
Goodtime for around $340. These are the main “entry” level
open back banjos out there today. This Gold Tone CC-OT is way better than
the CC-100 I originally bought. The Gold Tone CC-OT looks like the clear
winner to me in this category. Of
these banjos it is the one I would recommend.
However, there is a final option. Check out
bernunzio.com, they have a great banjo inventory.
Most of the banjos between $300-$600 would make a fine first banjo. All
of these banjos are played by man who runs the site and he comments on them
all. Look for the words “good player.” That is key since you don’t
want something hard to play. Also email him and ask for his advice.
Be very careful about used banjos from ebay! The cheap ones are mostly
not playable regardless of what they say. If you are a beginner and want
to go cheap don’t touch ebay, trust me.
For used banjos check out banjos check out what is for sale at the
Banjo Hangout’s Classified
pages. They are more trustworthy. Finally read the next section even if you
think this is the route you want to go, you will probably wish you went the
next route within a few years.
Buy a pretty good banjo as a starter but not for a lot
of money (My Recommendation!)
This is my personal recommendation. Someday you
will want two (or more) banjos, and this one can last you as your “second”
banjo for a long time. The main new options are the
Kevin Enoch Tradesman
and the Chanterelle
Student Model. Both are great
banjos. The Chanterelle goes for around $800,
and the Tradesman goes for around $850 depending on the options. Make sure you get a fretted model (starting
out fretless would be a bit hard). Both
of these banjo’s will last you forever, and in the long run you won’t be stuck
with a $300 banjo you don’t want to play.
I have a Tradesman and I love it and play it all the time. Both of these are light and easy to carry and
make great festival banjo’s too even if you have better banjos. This is the route I would recommend all
beginners take. For used banjos check
out what is for sale at the
Banjo
Hangout’s Classified pages. That is
where I got my Tradesman and I saved some money.
Buy the one and only banjo you will ever need right
off the bat
For you hard core people out there, this is the way
to go. Why waist money on a temp banjo? Life is too short to play a
low quality instrument, etc, etc. As I said above check out
bernunzio.com, they have a good banjo
inventory. For this category any banjo that is a “good player” over
$950 will probably do. Other than that, banjos are about makers. Some popular makers to check out are
Mike Ramsey , Bart Reiter, Kevin Enoch (his non-tradesman banjos
are played by some of the best players out there), Johannes Bonefaas (JB Banjos), Chuck Lee, Brooks Masten, and more. I suggest playing at festivals, banjo camps,
etc and get a feel for the options out there and what you like before going
this route. But for sure go this route
at some point. My Brooks banjo is on
order. J
Buying Tips
- You probably want an 11 or 12 inch rim and a 25 to 27 inch
scale. Way different that those two is probably not good for your
first banjo. When I started playing 11 inch rims were the standard,
most people seem to be moving to 12 inchs these days. I have both and both are good. Going smaller than 11 inch isn’t
probably a good idea unless you know what you are doing and are looking
for a specific sound.
- Do yourself a favor and make sure ALL of the tuning pegs are geared
even the 5th string one (assuming you can afford it, the Rover
doesn’t have a geared 5th string tuning peg). It saves a
lot of time and hassle when you are first learning to tune your
banjo.
- Real skin heads might be a bit more work than you need when first
learning to play. Keep that in mind.
The new renascence heads are great, and I highly recommend them.
- Never buy a cheap used banjo off of ebay. They are never as
good as they say they are. If they are good it will be way over
priced, used
bernunzio.com or banjohangout.org instead.
- Unless you really know what you are doing, get the new banjo setup
by a professional (some places come setup like Bernunzio, so ask).
It is cheap and will make a world of difference. To find one call a
local guitar shop which does setups and ask if they have people who work
on banjos. If they don’t ask if they know a place that does. A
few calls later you should find your man. Also banjo teachers should
know who can set it up for you. Also they should be able to tell if
it needs one.
- If there isn’t anyone around you that knows how to setup a banjo
buy the Complete
Banjo Repair book by Larry Sandberg and learn to do it yourself.
- Have your setup guy put a rail spike in the 7th fret for
the 5th string and buy a capo. Don’t put it in
yourself. It is too cheap to risk it. You don’t have to do
this right away, but you will need to if you want to play with a mandolin
or fiddle player.
- You can get your parts from Janet
Davis Music and Stewart-MacDonald,
both are fine stores.
Learning
Your First Licks
At some point I want to put a lot more instructional
info here, but for now I don’t have the time. But I can point you in the
right direction. First and foremost GET
A TEACHER! I can not stress this enough. The banjo has been
taught and “handed down” person to person since the beginning. There is
no substitute for a real live person to teach you. If you know of any
bands with banjo players ask them about it. Or call guitar shops who give
guitar lessons. Ask if anyone there teaches the banjo and if they don’t
ask if they could recommend another place to call. Once you find a banjo
teacher make sure they teach clawhammer and not just bluegrass. If they
look down there nose at clawhammer move on, life it too short for that.
With that out of the way, first thing you need to get
down in the right hand technique (assuming you are right handed). Luckily
you can work on this all day in Open G and it will sound fine. Get your
banjo to Open G. If you don’t know how check out the Tuning frame on
Uncle Bens Banjo
Homepage. Then check out the frailing frame on Uncle Bens Banjo
Homepage. Work on it. This is also very well explained in the The How and the Tao of Old Time
Banjo book. The companion DVD shows it and you can hear it.
Work on that for a while. Order the books while working from Uncle Ben’s
page, and find yourself a teacher. By the way I use my middle finger, you
can use either that or your index. Opinions vary. Once you can do
something with the right hand, start mixing it up with chords on the left
hand. Chords take some time to get down, so relax. Another, easier,
way to learn the chords is to learn one song after another, each song
introducing a new chord; this is what a teacher is for. Below are some
chords for you to practice. Practice switching between them. Start
by doing the basic right hand technique with different chords. Then play:
1 strum pluck, 5 strum pluck, for a measure of one chord, then switch to
another chord. If you are thinking “Huh?” that makes more sense after you
look at the chord diagrams. If you are still lost the Tao book has some
great exercises for this and explains it in more detail. And your teacher
will explain what I mean if you ask. One
note about the Tao book: It is a great
resource for beginners. But move on
quickly. The author tends to think one
size fits all, he uses only G tuning, tells people to use their middle finger
over the head of the banjo, etc. So
don’t take everything he says as gospel.
Use his book as a way to get going and quickly find teachers and people
to play with and keep an open mind.
The links below are the chord charts. The
dots are where your fingers go. The numbers represent which finger it
is. The numbers at the top show the fret, and the letters at the
bottom the name of the chord. Red is the root or 1 note of the chord,
blue is the 5 note of the chord. Closed chords (all 4 strings are
fingered) are shown as movable and each fret shows what the chord is. Enjoy!
Minor and
Major 7 Chords Double C Tuning
Albums and People
To get a good feel of this kind of music, you are going
to have to start to listen to it. There is no way around it. Let me
say that again more clearly: To be good at the old time banjo, you have
to listen to old time music. If you
listen to pop radio in the car, and expect to get good at old time music you
are kidding yourself. Unless you grew up
embedded with this music, you have some catching up to do. That means buying a lot of CDs and listening
to them when you drive and whenever you can listen but can’t play. Even with a teacher you can’t get good if you
don’t know what good is.
Places to
Buy:
Many artists sell their CDs directly on their own web
sites. I love buying direct, it is
better for them and you often get on their mailing list which is cool. So always check that. Many also sell them through
CD Baby so check there too.
Elderly Instruments
has a good selection of clawhammer banjo CDs to choose from.
There are many good CDs and artists, I'll try to give
you a good sampling to get you started:
Must Haves
Banjo CDs:
Clawhammer banjo volume One
Clawhammer banjo volume Two
Clawhammer banjo volume Three
High Atmosphere
Banging & Sawing by Bob Carlin
String
Bands (you should try to have about half of your CDs by string bands, pick
whatever CDs from them you like):
Skillet Lickers
The Highwoods String Band
The Volo Bogtrotters
Foghorn String Band
The
Indian Creek Delta Boys
Other good
banjo CD's:
Black Banjo Songsters of
Dear Old
The
Other Great
Banjo players who have CD's or are on CD’s to check out (this is just a
starting list):
Arnie Naiman & Chris Coole
Cathy Barton and Dave Para
Clare Milliner and Walt Koken
Dave Landreth
Dirk Powell (fiddle)
Doc Watson and Clarence Ashley
Frank Proffitt
Grandpa Jones
Lunsford, Bascom Lamar
Mac Benford
Paul Brown
R.D. Lunceford
Reed Martin
Riley Baugus
Uncle Dave Macon
Dan Gellert
Brad Leftwich
Reed Martin
Mike Seeger
Pete Seeger
Wade Ward
Kyle Creed
Fred Cockerham
Glen Smith
Charlie Lowe
Use those names to Google or help you pick out CDs
that look good. Good luck building your music collection!
Basic Learning Books:
The
How and the Tao of Old Time Banjo by Patrick Costello
Good starter book. If you get a teacher
you can skip it. If not this can get you
started, but don’t get caught up in the Dogma.
Don’t be confused later when you meet great banjo players who’s opinions
differ from what is in this book. There
is no right or wrong way to go most of this stuff.
The Banjo
Newsletter
Not really a book, but get it coming as soon as possible. I really wish I
started way earlier. This is a must have. Any keep them! You
will wish you had later if you don’t.
Great for learning how your banjo works, and setup, etc.
Tab Books:
I know,
some people think tab is evil. To a
point I agree, but I still use it some.
If you use tab, don’t rely on it and make sure you can learn songs by
ear. If you are all by ear, don’t
ignore tab, sometimes learning tab out of the newsletter is cool.
Banjo
Player's Songbook by T. Jumper
Some of you will use tab, some of you will go more old school. That is
up to you. If you learn by tab at all, this is a great book for
beginners.
The
Banjo Picker's Fakebook by David Brody
This will add songs that the songbook doesn’t have. You won’t need it
for a while, but at some point it is nice to have.
- Putting a towel in the back of your banjo will reduce the
volume. This will keep any spouse, roommate, or neighbor from
killing you while you learn new things. I also use this in hotel
rooms while traveling and have never got one complaint.
- Play with other people as soon as possible. It will make you
a way better player and you will learn faster. Even if it is just
one person.
- Get the Banjo Newsletter soon and start reading it. It will help you learn who is who in the
community, find CD’s, festivals, camps, etc.
- Join the banjohangout.org website, it is a valuable resource.
- Use youtube.com Search for
clawhammer, banjo, and song names you are interested in, there is a ton of
stuff.
- Listen to Old Time string bands, fiddle, and banjo as much as
possible. Don’t waste car time.
- Buy a capo and get a rail spike put in on the 7th fret for the 5th
string. Otherwise you will have a harder time playing with
people. Of course this is optional, not everyone does it.
- If you learn from tab, get the song "off the page" and
keep it there with practice. No one wants to see a tab book or sheet
music at a jam session.
- Sing along when there are words to do so. It doesn't matter
if you can't sing, it helps in the learning process.
- Keep you fingernails cut short, but leave just a little extra on the
finger you hit the strings with on your right hand. This will help
give you volume if you want it.
- Use a banjo strap so you don't have to hold the neck up with your
left hand even while sitting, it is more important than you think.
- Learn about old time music gatherings and festivals in your area
and start going to them. It takes
some courage but it will be some of the most rewarding parts of taking up
the banjo.
- Banjo camps are a great way to learn a ton in a short time from
world class teachers, meet a bunch of people, and check out a lot of
different banjos and their sounds.
Try to go to at least one.
Some of these links fit is two or more
categorize. You will just have to deal with it. Also not every link
above is listed here so look at the rest of the page for more links. For
the record, these are in no order. If you know of a cool link or two I’m
missing, email them to me. I’m always looking for new stuff.
Lessons
MP3 and Music
Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project
Sugar in the Gourd: Old-Time Music
Banjos and Parts
Banjo building, setup, playing tips, lessons and a whole
lot more