The oldtime banjo blog from Kiel

Everything changed in banjo-land. No sessions, no festivals, no meetings, no banjo-breakfasts 😷😷😷 But there´s one thing that didn´t change. Every year at the beginning of December I think of learning a Christmas tune. And every year when Christmas is over I am like: Oh, if only I had learned one Christmas tune... So this year I browsed my PC and found this tune which I recorded as early as 2016 (from the Mike Iverson´s tablature). No need to learn another one 😁 Carol of the Bells

Well known accidents which can happen when you're playing the banjo: 1. You hit the wrong note 2. You hit the wrong note again 3. You get bitten by your dog (not loving you hitting wrong notes)  4. You get hitten on the head by flying items (sometimes caused by a cohabitant not loving you hitting wrong notes)  5. Some bloody incident. At least No 5 just happened to me. Yesterday I put on a new 5th string on my banjo. As I know they tend to break when not carefully handled, I only tuned it up to F and let it rest over night. Today I tuned it up to G. Perfect so far. Played a tune ("Alonzo Janes") and suddenly the 5th string broke - and hit my right hand. See proof below. It broke near the tailpiece at some point where no sharp edge could have cut it. Happened with one of the Red Series from Aquila. As this string had broken some days ago too and it was my second try I now go back to the white Super Nylgut strings from Aquila - they seem to be safer and sound perfectly too ...

 ... but this may give us some reason to smile. Major and minor differences between Bluegrass, Celtic and Oldtime (found this somewhere on the web): The Music Old Time and Celtic songs are about whiskey, food and struggle. Bluegrass songs are about God, mother and the girl who did me wrong. If the girl isn’t dead by the third verse, it ain’t Bluegrass. If everyone dies, it’s Celtic. A Bluegrass band has between 1 and 3 singers who are all singing about an octave above their natural vocal range. Most Old Time and Celtic bands have no singers at all. If a Celtic band has a singer, it is usually either a bewhiskered ex-sailor, or a petite soprano. A Bluegrass band has a vocal arranger who arranges three-part harmonies. In an Old Time band, anyone who feels like it can sing or make comments during the performance. In a Celtic band, anyone who speaks during a performance gets ‘the look.’ Celtic songs are preceded by a call for silence and a detailed explanation of their cultural signifi...

Clawhammer banjo may not be the born instrument for Bach´s music. But I love it anyway - both his music and my banjo. Now during Corona-times I thought to have time enough for practicing. Well, you never practice enough. But I now reached a point when my newest try on Bach seems to be (almost) ready. - and practicing more could mean mental cruelty to my cohabitant. I´m afraid this is all I can achieve.  I always was fascinated by the famous Bourrée in E-Minor. Everybody knows it. It almost became lift music ;-) To play it in clawhammer style is not so absurd as it may seem because it´s lots of 8th-notes which lie so close together that some drop thumping should manage it. So I wrote the tablature with TablEdit following the notes I kept in my drawer since long (which were written for guitar). It took me some time as TablEdit really has some tricky points - but it worked. And then I had to spend hours and hours practicing the drop-thumbs, open pull-offs and all that favorite stuff....

No doubt, Corona sucks. A lot. On the other hand there never were more banjo workshops close at hand than now. Last weekend I joined the Rollick at Ashokan, this weekend there will be even more: Workshops with some of the most admired Clawhammer players And when this is over the next Ashokan Rollick is lurking around the corner, hopefully again with Rachel Eddy who did an amazing job at the last one. No date fixed until now, but I´m sure Debbra Clifford  and the other guys will get it done.

For me last weekend was stuffed with clawhammer banjo 😉 Just a few days before the start I came to know that the famous Ashokan Festival has got an Oldtime version called "The Ashokan Online Rollick" (sorry to say but I found it on infamous Facebook 😟). I registered and via "Zoom" participated in great concerts with wonderful musicians and amazing clawhammer banjos. I even joined a workshop online. Rachel Eddy taught us "Over the Waterfall". She demonstrated a slow version and led us through the tune and then demonstrated an upspeed version with some really hot licks. Some day I´ll try to find out, which almost jazz-like licks those were, but that could take time... Applaudable how systematic and precisely she guided us through the tune. I think all participants have gained a lot. The Rollick-guys uploaded some videos and audiofiles to google drive which is open to participants, so we can repeat the great experiences. Of course I would have loved to a...

Big event next weekend - stop - have a look here - stop - Online Rollick 2020 - stop Donate and have fun! 😷

Bob Carlin published a great booklet in 1977 to his (et al.) record "Melodic Clawhammer Banjo, the Return of Clawhammer Banjo". It not only includes beautiful fiddle tunes for banjo but also some duetts for banjo. I gave it a try with "Green Willis". It took me some time to learn both melodies - and again some time to record this stuff. The smartphone microphone tends to exaggerate the tone of the steel strings of the right side banjo (builder Karsten Schnoor, Hamburg). I should have recorded it with another mic, but anyway. And again it took me some time to combine this video (through VideoPad) with the other voice of Doc Huff´s banjo. Hope you enjoy the result.

The rivalry between three-finger-pickers and clawhammer-guys is said to have sometimes even led to breaking up old friendships (well, allmost so) and definitly ruined some jam sessions 😉. But since years Abigail Washburn and Bela Fleck are the role model for, uh, tolerance of these two genres. Blacky sent me a link to one of their fabulous concerts, TYVM

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Again the Oldtime Festival in Gainsborough was "terrific", "amazing" - just unbelievable wonderful. Here are some impressions:

Looks like Ciara/Sabine moved East, so trains might run according to schedule. This year I'll be going to the FOAOTMAD-festival by train. Footprint and all that. Will be a long travelling...

Während wir noch in Erinnerung an die letzte Hamburg Session schwelgen, (guckst du hier:) hoffen wir schon alle, dass die nächste Session genauso schön und wild abläuft. Angedacht ist der 14.6.2020, wieder in der Kulturküche Alsterdorf. Hoffentlich klappts. Das Video hat übrigens Ruud gemacht,  der Mann mit dem Banjo und den Kühen . Er ist auch ständiger Gast beim Banjoree. Ohne Kühe.