Five String Breakdown

Somebody black one. This is Roy fish and this is fostering bright man. I'm going to be teaching a 13 part banjo series. And although it helps you're not going to have to have any musical background whatsoever to learn to play the string banjo I'm going to start at the very beginning and take you through such songs as Cripple Creek Baal and cabbage jam and other things. So I'm going to be covering a lot of material today about purchasing banjos and what you'll need to get things you can do to upgrade your banjo and what you're going to need. I doubt if you can remember everything. There's a copy of the book we've written to go with the course. It's in title five string breakdown. And it's got a lot of songs exercises a lot of old favorites you've probably heard like salty dog and little Maggie. And I think it's got a lot of things in it you'll enjoy but it would really be in the cess city to take a course on TV. Now let's get over here. The first thing you're going to need is a banjo.

So I put my trusty Gibson there. If you're just starting out on the banjo course I would recommend that you use an inexpensive banjo. And the one that I recommend most is a harmony banjo the harmony banjo cost between 80 and a hundred dollars it's very easy to play and it sounds good. This particular harmony I have here I believe is about $84. If you'll notice on the back it does not have a resonator. The back part of the banjo the resonator makes the banjo sound a lot crisper and a lot louder. But it is not a necessity in the sesame to have one to start with. Some other banjos you can get you could you can get a banjo at the local pound shop or such stores as say yours. But like I said I would not recommend putting too much money in one to start out with. However if you already play the

banjo son or if you have some musical knowledge or experience you might want to invest into a little better instrument. This is a Vega. Your Vega Boeing and Fender banjos and of course your Gibson are some of your better known brands. This is a Vega Sonny Osbourne model this belongs to ole as you can see it's a very fine banjo got some nice wood in it. And these banjos start about four and five hundred dollars and go nothing pricey say there's a lot of difference in the price. And here is the banjo that I use. This is a Gibson master tone. They have made these for about 60 years and they are sort of considered the classic of all banjos. If you can latch a ho to a no one. If you can do it otherwise you'll probably have to be like me and settle for a new one.

After you get your banjo you're going to have to have a lot of things to go with it. More money right. Some of these accessories that you're going to need are most of them are very inexpensive but there are a lot of them so let's go through them just a little bit right now and try to explain them and show them to you. One of the first things you'll need is a pitch pot. The pitch pot is what you can tune your instrument by without having any other instrument piano or tuning fork around. They're about $2 and they're very handy. Works like this. This is a banjo bracket. It's also called a ranch it's actually what it does. It's it's used to tighten the head of your banjo when you see here. It's a lot easier to use than

a regular ranch you get out of a tool set or something because you can see here it's got the two wings on it which makes it a lot easier for turning. Now most banjos that you buy have bridges on them which are very inexpensive now the bridge on your banjo is the piece that holds the strings up on top of the head. This is actually what the sound or the tone of the banjo is transmitted through and the bridges that you buy or are usually much better than the ones with things stall at the factory. You can see this bridge on this harmony. It's one solid piece of white wood. Not too good if you got an extra buck in a half. This is a thing to get this is a maple and ebony bridge. If you can see it's got maple for the bottom half and then it's got a very thin strip of Ebony on top. The purpose of the

ebony they have any sense it is a very very hard wood it kind of gives your banjo a real Christmas play on and it also keeps the bridge from chipping so that that's what you need. And of course no banjo player should be without an extra set of strings. These are the type that opera for their Vega. The 700 light gauge any other strain of the light gauge variety is fine. You can get Gibson black diamond. Just about any other brain will do Stuart Macdonald makes a very good light gauge theory because you never know when the string on the banjo is going to pop can happen at the worst time in the worst place. You always need to have a set handy. And of course you need to change your strings about once a month or every 40 hours of playing if you practice a lot. Sometimes I have to change my strings as often as once every two

weeks once a week. But if you practice say an hour a day something like this you should change them about once a month. Now let's get down to two very essential items for your banjo. This is a fifth string the proper Civic is that it will fret the strings and put them in a higher register or a higher key than the one you're playing with. If you play with a vocalist a singer it's almost impossible to play the banjo without having a cake because they change keys and of course they'll fit the song fit the key to fit their voice. And this let me show you how this works on my banjo. If you can see the fist bone here and it simply slides along the rail just like this. Thank you for that show I get it back in the right place.

OK so your festering cape I was going to Cape all your fish during that lease for one down four to go. This is Khalid Bill Russell elastic as you can see it's just a metal bar with an elastic band around it they're very inexpensive they're about a dollar you can get those as expensive as $10 this depending on how much money you want to put into it. These are very good because being a last thing I slide up and down the net very easily you can change keys very quick with them. Now let's talk about maintaining your banjo once you get your banjo it's going to take a little money and just a little work to keep it up I think. Playing an instrument that is kept well is it'll sometimes it'll sound a lot better. And it's just a lot better. No words I hate a dirty banjo. So what it amounts to is that when

you're to keep your banjo in good condition what you need to do. Is using any type of furniture polish. It doesn't really matter. It's loud it's not a silicone base if you use a furniture polish it has got silicone base and not only will it polish your banjo but it'll strip it clean down to the raw wood so a real earthy looking banjo eyed using any type of spray polish works good. Using C this resonators mean getting kind of dirty here so you do it just like cleaning house. Lot easier though. Not only should you polish the outside of the instrument the resonator back of the neck. If you really want to get make it look good. Polish the headstock but when you change your strings. Polish the fingerboard I know this sounds a little unorthodox but remember this is where you're going to be playing this is where most of your dirt is going to

build up his own fingerboard so he changes strings take all your strings spray it down a little bit rub it down and get all the dirt off of it. They are much cleaner by engine. I guess the most important part about maintaining your banjo is keeping the head tied on it. Let's take this harmony since it seems to be convenient here hasn't got a back on it. Let's take this harmony and let me demonstrate how to tighten the head and take a range here. Remember this is our bracket bracket range and to tighten the head. You see how your bracket range fits on to the nuts on the rim of the banjo and you start with the upper right hand bracket and you turn it. Go Orange a little. You see I'm turning in about a half a turn.

Sometimes you start me that plastic crate. Sure. And then you know you get it just about tied in this. But if you keep a banjo head taught you'll notice a market change in the tongue. It should make you sound a whole lot crisper. So if you can keep it tight that's good enough. Put on a learner's model here on the wall. And there are a few other items in your maintenance that you would want to get one of them is a strap the banjo is a very very heavy instrument. And matter of fact my master here weighs about 20 pounds. So you want to strap to be able to hold it you can't stand up without a strap obviously but will be much more comfortable sitting down if you have a strap. And the course we can't leave out the picks your

picks. You should have a plastic Dompig of this variety and see if I can get it to where you can make something out of it. This is a Gibson plastic the pin. A thumb pick is good as long as the tail you can see this is the tail of the camera with the camera can get that or not the the end of the pix is the tail you don't want is too long. This is the thumb pic you need you will need to metal finger picks and they look like this. These are the Dunlop thing or pics I think they're a little better than I have. You can also get national fingerpicks. They have a tendency to tear my fingers up and when you put them on you have to bend and let me see if I can put my finger there. There if you can see how that it's really just formed around the natural shape of the finger. Now of course to carry a banjo around you're going to need a case cases come

in several varieties. They come in what they call soft shell and what they call hard shell. Here we have an example of a hard showcase the hard shell case cost approximately 40 dollars own up. And they are very good protection for your banjo. Not only will they protect it from somebody bumping it or sitting on it or something like that. Clouseau protected from the weather. The humidity is the main agent in the weather that can really kill your instrument especially your stranger strings will last a lot longer if you keep it in a hard shell case. The hard cases are pretty much whether they preserve the plating the strains they preserve everything on your banjo. This is a lot better and I think we've covered most of the items up here as far as what you'll need for your banjo

and maintaining your banjo. Now I'm going to sit down. It feels better. Let's talk about the book here this is the book five string breakdown everything I've told you about your accessories and everything that you'll need. It's listed in the first few pages of the book. The Cape owes the pigs how you wear your picks. Everything is in full detail in the first few pages of the book. There's even a glossary. There are a few terms I'm using that you don't understand. There's a glossary in here you can just look at some of the songs in here. Let's see if I can get a good look at the back here. We've got quite a few songs written out in the back. Some euro favorites. Keep them cards and letters Rohani and like wow would flower and John Hardy John Henry. And Cumberland

Gap. There's. A lot of songs in here. But now I'd like to play you attain that. I'm going to illustrate the caper. You know we were talking about the cape of just a few minutes ago looking probably better understand the cape if if we use them so let me go up here. Get down on a coord boys. If you say I'm putting people on here. So you have a lasting ban just fits right around the net. The banjo. Real convenient slogs real good. Can't beat it for a dollar. When you pull your banjo. There's a good chance it will get out a thing which is a good excuse for me to tame the manger. Now you're going to play your team. We got to put together before the show

started. To use the code and if you can see it the Bangles you've got a much higher pitch. A. Lot. Here goes. Oh I like that style. But I can't guarantee you'll be playing like that if 10 to 13

week. But to give you a little better idea of what we will be doing us take our Kay pose off there just as easy to take off as they are put Oh. Thank goodness. And I think we're going to play a tune now that's in the books and maybe you can get a little better I think this song is in that this is in about the fifth lesson. Will. Most.

Of. Our member in learning to play the banjo. Hoping to better last standing on their butt and learning to play the banjo. You want to be sure and get your five string banjo when you go in the music store. Be sure and ask him or pollen shop Be sure to ask him for five story. I don't think you would load one off when you get tenor banjos or plectrum banjos are as popular and there just as many floating floating around so make sure when you go to Bob banjo It's got your fist string here on top. That's pretty noticeable if it's looks like it's got four and a half strings and you know you're doing pretty good. There's also such a thing as a banjer reign. It looks like a regular banjo down here but it looks like the next got a thyroid condition or something it's about it's about eight frets long and we get up here playing up in this vicinity it won't work so be sure and get you a regular five string banjo.

Of course there are a couple things you can do before you even buy your banjo that can get you better acquainted with banjos that can really help you just as much as practicing can and this is listening to some of the better known banjo players or some of the better banjo players period. People like Earl Scruggs Bill Keith Bobby Thompson who are in the sunny house when all these people play with groups like their old Scruggs review the Osbourne brothers Bobby Thompson who is a studio musician in Nashville and you can pick up a lot of records that he's own and Don Reno plays with Don Reno Bill Harrell in Tennessee cut up Sammy's records you say there's really an art to listening to banjo music just as much as it is there is playing it. You really have to listen for the melody. So be sure and get used to hearing banjo music before you even try to play it. And you can see these artists at a lot of places not seeing that personal appearance is about the best place to

go is a bluegrass festival. The festival is where they have a usually have a tremendous lineup of musicians. Most of these people I've been naming appear at festivals anywhere from Virginia to Oklahoma to Georgia and places in this area they have very big bluegrass festivals. And if you really want to get your money's worth you got to go see one of these. I'm going to put my banjo down one more time. And show you a few of these magazines we've got up here. There are several magazines that would be very helpful in your picking process. And I have three of them here today. They're kind of the stock in trade of the bluegrass pickers these are the only three I know anything about but first you see here is ka pickin magazine. And all of these magazines are about $5 here for subscription. And

besides the fact that they're informative. And if you're like me you get to read up on what's happening with all the stars and all that canister. But it also contains a lot of banjo tab A TO EVERY MONTH different songs by various artists. This is picking. Here we have mule skinner news put out by Ilan college. In North Carolina. And in here we can bear with me just a minute here. See here they've got a nice little fold out on Bobby Thompson and there's an example of some of the banjo music that will be reading in fast during break down and hopefully after you've had the 13 lesson you will be able to not all of them but a lot of them you should you hopefully you will be able to tackle and learn some of these taboo tours that we have here. One more. There we go. Bluegrass unlimited

bluegrass unlimited is the oldest of the bluegrass publications and is probably best known for its I don't much care for hasn't won any yet I'm not sure if it has a tab or two in here or not feel out of sorts the Lewis family on the front cover a little Roy who is a fine banjo player in his own right will be. I think we'll be having an interview with him a little later on in the show. These three magazines they're not an expensive investment and they can kind of keep interested as you go along. I think we're going to play one more thing out of the book. I think this is about the first song we really learn with the picking style. About the third or fourth lesson lesson we should be working on getting called by Allan cabbage daily read about some cabbage. OK. You know that's that's one of the things we'll be working on the third or fourth lesson in the

5 string right down. Let me show you the book one more time. It's called string right down basic banjo and you can get this book by sending $5 to independent study. WG TV. Athens Georgia. Mike your $5 check payable to University of Georgia and send it to independent study TV. Athens Georgia 3 0 6 0 2. Well I hope you've enjoyed the show today. We've enjoyed being with you and I hope you will tune in for the series I think will have a lot of fun and I hope you'll learn a lot in the process. But be sure and try to obtain your banjo. Get the book and be sure and get the accessories that you lead in the book. Maybe 15 more dollars. Something like this I think would be off to have a good time.

So. I. Try and put my trusty pig's back on everything trust and I. And we're going to get out of here.