Rick's Banjo Style and Tuning

My banjo is an old Iida, made in Japan.  I bought it in the 70's for about $450.  Iida still makes a banjo that sells for $450 but it's not the same.  My banjo has a lot of features that are on banjos that cost $2500 and up.  Like... steel sound ring, 30 brackets, fancy inlays, circular inlays on the resonator.  I have observed, however, that the quality of the banjo doesn't always determine the quality of the player!

Critical Attributes.  The banjo head needs to be tight.  Someone once told me once that "you won't know how tight to get it until you break one."  I did that on my first banjo, which was a Slingerland Tenor (ca. 1949)  You eventually get so you can tell how tight it needs to be.  Many banjo heads are not tight enough, so the tone is not really bright.  You can hear a loose head on many of the early recordings that give the banjo player a solo. 

When I went out to San Jose in 1958, right away, I got a job with a sing-along banjo band.  But they were critical of me because I used a guitar tuning.  (They called me a "ukulele player.")  Later, I got to know Bob Burdick, banjo player with the Queen City Jazz Band.  He set me straight.

"Tunings aren't important.  Most of the technique is in your right hand.  I change tunings every two or three years, just to keep it interesting."

So I started working on right hand technique, fast tremolos and glisses like you can see Eddy Peabody do here.  My goodness, that was an eye-opener.  I didn't know you could DO that stuff!

When I bought my Iida, it didn't sound sharp enough.  So, I tuned my guitar tuning up to a G.  That is, a usual guitar tuning is DGBE.  My tuning is FBbDG.  So, when I play this form at the fifth fret, it is a C.  Formal banjo players scoff at this.  But the guitar tuning is much more facile than the plectrum tuning or the tenor tuning.  I get many melody notes on the second string.  (I have learned to damp the first string; a handy technique for rhythm guitars who want to play "power chords."  )   Here is my solo for ???. (Obviously, a "work in progress.")

I have found that, using this tuning and my techniques, I sound less like a Tenor Banjo player (like Dick Roberts of the Firehouse Five and the Banjo Kings) and more like a Plectrum player, like Red Roundtree, who played with Spike Jones and then the Banjo Kings.  

As time goes on, I will show you some solo choruses here, with sound.  Stay tuned!

Here's an interesting cut from YouTube.  

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