oh, and while you’re at it …
Saturday, June 21st, 2008somebody please buy my Gold Tone Bob Carlin 350 banjo and Peavey SRP-16 Stereo Digital Reverb Pedal.
Archive for the ‘banjo’ Category
supplies!
Wednesday, June 18th, 2008Pleasantly surprised that a local store - Scarboro Music, at Vic Park and Kingston has autoharp strings.
It also has a very fine old Dobson banjo for $1500.
banjo chord forms
Tuesday, June 17th, 2008I’ve been trying to learn banjo chords for a while, and the books I have keep flopping closed. So I resolved to make a blank chord form that I could fill in, like this:
You might wonder why it goes to the 7th fret. If you’re in Double C tuning, you’ll need that if you’re drawing a tuning chart.
So for G tuning, the F chord would look like:
There are 12 fretboard images to a page - that’s enough for four whole folk songs!
Download: stewart’s banjo fretboard / chord grid [PDF].
at Bill Rickard’s
Sunday, June 15th, 2008I went up to Bill Rickard’s yesterday to have Hugh Hunter tweak my banjo. Unfortunately Bill wasn’t there; he father died earlier in the week, and the memorial was later in the day. My condolences to Bill and his family.
Hugh was busily turning a banjo-uke block rim on the lathe when I arrived. After a little setup work (file the second string nut to kill a buzz, reduce the head tension to get the tubaphone sound), I looked around the shop.
Tone Rings and rims - including Bill’s new Dobson tone ring
Hardware - bracket bands, Whyte Ladye parts, etc.
The work in progress rack
Whyte Laydie at rear, Tubaphone up front.
For a banjo and engineering nerd, Bill’s shop is amazing. Get yourself invited up there if you get a chance.
scenes from midwest banjo camp
Friday, June 13th, 2008
Olivet frogs
Saturday, June 7th, 2008I think I’m supposed to be blogging about more Midwest Banjo Camp related things - but J.R. Jenks is doing this fine. Here’s a recording of some of the tree frogs in Olivet: olivet_mi-frogs-20080606.
yeah, us long neck banjo players are a bad lot …
Wednesday, June 4th, 2008
Still from 1964 NFB docudrama Nobody Waved Goodbye, as mentioned in a nostalgia piece in Spacing.
the long neck has arrived
Saturday, May 31st, 2008I picked up my long neck banjo from Hugh Hunter today. It’s wonderful.
(The image links to some of Hugh’s work-in-progress pictures.)
Old Man Luedecke in Toronto
Saturday, May 17th, 2008I saw Old Man Luedecke play The Drake on Thursday night. After being snowed out of seeing him in Guelph, it was great to finally hear him play. Wasn’t disappointed; really fun show. Superb lyrics, fantastic technique (his clawhammer and Seeger up-picking are spot on) and gently self-deprecating stage banter make it a fun night. Go and see him if he’s playing near you.
banjo nails from the axis of evil
Saturday, April 19th, 2008I tried taping pistachio shells to my fingers to get those perfect frailing nails. It was, at best, a partial success.
But why axis of evil? Well, these were very fine Iranian pistachios from Rafsanjan. If we lived in the USA, we couldn’t buy them. We’d have to make do with the tasteless little California pistachios. Go Canada!
don’t fret
Saturday, March 29th, 2008We played guitar and banjo for most of Earth Hour. This is how my fretting hand ended up:
dude, you so need your banjo to glow in the dark
Wednesday, March 26th, 2008CBC Radio 1 Bandwidth: It’s a Banjolution!
Sunday, March 23rd, 2008CBC Bandwidth had a good show yesterday on the many banjo players and styles in Ontario. It features, amongst others: Jayme Stone, Jeff Menzies, Chris Coole, Chris Quinn, the Foggy Hogtown Boys, Andrea Simms-Karp, the Barmitzvah Brothers, Jenny Whiteley, Sheesham and Lotus, Feist and Elliott Brood.
If you missed it, I saved a copy of the stream here: http://scruss.com/music/banjodwidth-20080322.mp3 (25 MB).
There’s a faint click in some of the audio (I always seem to get it from CBC’s streams), but it’s not too noticeable.
the making of a long neck banjo
Saturday, March 8th, 2008
The making of a long neck banjo: Hugh Hunter sent me some pictures of the work in progress.
no banjo tonite
Friday, March 7th, 2008Dang! The roads were too snowy for us to get to Guelph to hear Old Man Luedecke.
Old Man Luedecke: banjo dude - in Guelph next week
Friday, February 29th, 2008
Who : Old Man Luedecke http://oldmanluedecke.ca/ Where : Folkway Music (163 Suffolk Street West, Guelph) http://www.folkwaymusic.com/events.html When : Friday March 7th - 8pm doors, 8:30 start How much : $15 What : clawhammer banjo and skewed lyrics
it was special
Monday, February 11th, 2008The 9th annual Banjo special was its excellent self last night. Messrs Taheny (x2), Quinn, Coole and Naiman - aided by a cast quite literally numbering more than three - were on fine form.
Got to meet a few BanjoHangout folks too - including Hugh (the maker of my banjo) and Loren, for whom Hugh had made “The Banjo of Death“. Loren’s got this thing about skulls, and this banjo has them aplenty.
Cello Banjo Blues
Saturday, February 2nd, 2008
Marcy Marxer improvises on Gold Tone Cello Banjo prototype.
down home radio show » The End of the World Banjo Band
Thursday, January 3rd, 2008down home radio show » Various Field Recordings
Anthology Film Archives - New York City 12/8/07:
This show was after a screening of the film “Bound to Lose” which is a GREAT documentary about The Holy Modal Rounders. “The End of the World Banjo Band” is a current project by Peter Stampfel of The Holy Modal Rounders. It’s an all banjo band featuring Peter Stampfel, John Cohen (of the New Lost City Ramblers), Jeannie Scofield, Walker Shepard and Down Home Radio’s own Eli Smith. Faced with the end of the world, seemingly the only option is actually to create an all-banjo-band. The band has 5-string banjos, banjo-mandolin, and 6-string banjo-guitar.
low
Friday, December 7th, 2007I played some tunes tuned down to eBEG♯B. I like it; extreme plunky tones.