What is a Plectrum Banjo?

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From:
Date: 14 Oct 98 - 06:37 AM

Bob, that post about Australian-style harmonica deserves its own thread. I am going to start a thread with just a reference to that.

Let me get this straight. Is there another book besides "Band in a Waistcoat Pocket" or does the 4 CD set have that name?

Murray

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 15 Oct 98 - 02:14 AM

G'day Murray,

The Book is called Band in a Waistcoat Pocket and the Larrikin 2 CD set has the same name and matching artwork - they are designed as a set and were launched together. I don't have the cassettes here but I'm fairly sure they have another, more generic name (like Australian Harmonica Players). I also seem to remember that that have a double credit - the recordings are on Ray's Bush Lark label and the whole package is retailed under Australian Harmonica History Association or similar.

I'll probably be calling in on Ray, at Blaxland, on my way up to Clarence, in the Blue Mountains, tomorrow and I will see what is still available and refresh my memory on details and prices. I am in the final throes of organising a free camping weekend, [23]/24/25 October for the Bush Music Club at a friend's property (up the hill, opposite the Zig Zag Railway).

I might post this to your new site as well ... and leave this one to Plectrum Banjos (remember them?).

Regards,

Bob Bolton

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Noel Induni
Date: 15 Oct 98 - 08:11 PM

The plectrum banjo is a 4 string banjo. It has 22 frets. The standard tuning is CGDB but is often tuned like the 1st 4 strings of a guitar. It is used predominately for Dixieland Jazz or solo banjo playing. Probably the most famous plectrum banjo player was Eddie Peabody. I suspect that among most banjo players Perry Bechtel would be favored in terms of ability although he was not the showman that Peabody was. If you want more information about 4 string banjos in general check out the links on http://homepages.together.net/~induni/4string.htm

Noel

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: BSeed
Date: 15 Oct 98 - 10:34 PM

Another of my missing posts: A couple of days ago I posted a note in response to Bob Bolton's post about the electric banjo that didn't sound like a banjo. Alison Brown plays kind of a bluegrass/jazz fusion on a couple of banjos that have microphones under the drum. The drum, vibrating sympathetically with the strings, produces the sound of the banjo. Alison's banjo sounds like a banjo; I heard her play in front of a music store in Berkeley, with her combo (herself, a keyboard, an electric bass, and a drummer). An electric guitar with magnetic pickups doesn't sound like a wooden guitar, either. A wooden guitar with a magnetic pickup doesn't sound like a wooden guitar, either. But one with a mike pickup inside the body does. The sound comes from the body, not the strings. --seed (more off-the-top-of-my-head pontificating; wait until Gargoyle reads this!) --seed

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Ole Bull
Date: 16 Oct 98 - 05:41 PM

Banjo history is not so sketchy as the one (way above) thinks. Wheras traders and explorers of the 17th century made note in their journals of African banjo-like instruments (with any number of strings) the first documented true American banjo (which began the craze) from about 1842 on had five strings, one being the short chanterelle. About 1860 and later come all the other variants.

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Jon W.
Date: 16 Oct 98 - 06:31 PM

Ole Bull, you proved my point. Note that the comment I made above was about a 5-string banjo which was supposed to have been developed in by Joel Walker Sweeney in 1830 in America (Apottomax VA as I recall), which predates your 1842 documentation. I have seen the Sweeney story cited in several banjo books, sometimes as fact, sometimes as conjecture.
Here is a web page of banjo history that debunks the Sweeney story.

Jon W.

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From:
Date: 17 Oct 98 - 04:45 AM

That is an interesting site Jon.

Today I saw a six-string banjo in a shop in the same neighborhood whre I saw the plectrum. I guess they (the 6-string ones) were made for guitarists.(?)

The only thing I never see here is a five-string.

Murray

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Big Mick
Date: 17 Oct 98 - 12:39 PM

I was at a local historical tourist sight, Bowens Mills, and they had a mountain man rendevous, and a hammer dulcimer club. One of the supporting musicians was playing a 12 string banjo. The sound was very unique. It looked like a 12 string guitar neck and a banjo body. Is this just something that someone "cobbled together" or is it an accepted instrument with a history?

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From:
Date: 17 Oct 98 - 08:06 PM

Were all twelve strings independent, Mick, or were they tuned as courses (like on a 12-string guitar)?

Murray

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Big Mick
Date: 18 Oct 98 - 01:29 AM

Hi Murray, Yes, they were in courses like a twelve string guitar.

All the best, Mick

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: BSeed
Date: 18 Oct 98 - 01:44 AM

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Jerry
Date: 19 Oct 98 - 10:56 AM

Noel,

Yer the first one in this entire thread to mention tuning the plectrum banjo like a guitar. I acquired a tenor banjo some time ago, and being too lazy to learn new chords, I tuned it guitar-like (feeling semi-guilty for not honoring the tenor banjo tradition). I was delighted to be told at one point that a banjo tuned my way had a name of it's own. Very few folks, it seems, have heard of a plectrum banjo.

So now I sing on merrily, secure and guilt-free as I accompany meself on my plucky plectrum.

Jerry

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From:
Date: 19 Oct 98 - 09:26 PM

Jerry, I had a friend who tuned his guitar like a lute (don't ask me what that is!) so he could play ancient lute tablature. He tended to appologize for it until he read in some book that it was a practice in the seventeenth century. Then he not only became guilt-free; but he bragged about it!

Murray

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Bill in Alabama
Date: 20 Oct 98 - 06:33 AM

The Deering Banjo Company in California has been manufacturing six-string banjos for many years. They also manufacture an electric banjo called the crossfire; Bela Fleck performs with one.

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From:
Date: 20 Oct 98 - 10:16 AM

Are they tuned like guitars, Bill. (I imagine the can be, but are they?)

Murray

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From:
Date: 21 Oct 98 - 06:21 AM

Actually I might have found an answer to my question. There was a thread in RMMA about six-string guitars. It was said that they were played by guitar players in the 20s and 30s who wanted to get more volume than they could from the existing guitars--same for 12 string ones.

Murray

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Bob Bolton
Date: 21 Oct 98 - 07:13 PM

G'day all,

I have also seen the odd seven-string banjo ... six guitar-like stings plus a drone. I saw one in the hands of a Canadian singer visiting Sydney back in the 1960s and I also noted that in a book The Diary of Charlie Hammond (?)(a facsimile of a late 19th / early 20th century illustrated diary of a young artist who moved between England, New Zealand and Australia) when his brother, who had been in the RCMP, visits he has a seven-stringer.

I presume the drawings are accurate as Charlie was a skilled artist (who did reportage illustrations for newspapers), a musician (autoharp, guitar and uke in one photograph of his studio) and a skilled photographer (he was the first to take action photographs of horse-racing in Australia).

The Canadian I met used guitar chords with a thumb-played drone. There must have been a lot of interchange across body types and stringings: occasionally I play a tenor guitar, the four strings of which can be tuned like a banjo instead of the four highest of the guitar, depending one the player's preference.

What was it they said about banjo tunings "... there are as many mountain banjo tunings as there are mountain banjo players ..."?

Regards,

Bob Bolton

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Jerry
Date: 22 Oct 98 - 10:38 AM

There's a traditional chantey, of African-American origin, called "Dance Gals, Gimme the Banjo" that has these lines:

Today is the day we pick on the banjo/ Dance gal, gimme the banjo/ Oh, that banjo, that 7-string banjo/ Dance Gal, gimme the banjo/ Oh, that banjo, that talla talla wango/ Dance gal, gimme the banjo.

I love the onomatopoeia in that verse, and imagine a 7-string banjo sounds a lot like that.

Jerry

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Jon W.
Date: 22 Oct 98 - 10:47 AM

Jerry, any chance you could post more info on that song - any recordings available? Can you post the rest of the lyrics and the tune?

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Ritchie
Date: 22 Oct 98 - 11:32 AM

Well a fried egg sandwich here is some times known as an Egg Banjo !

Why?

Well (this is gonna take some explaining but here goes)

Stand in front of a mirror , pretend that you are eating a fried egg sandwich with your left hand..

Whoops , what always happens ? yes the yolk has broke and squirted on to your chest ..damn

Right move the sandwich to your left side and with your right hand quickly rub away the egg from your chest.

There you’ve got the answer....An Egg Banjo....Hee Hee Hee

love and happiness Ritchie

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Bill D
Date: 22 Oct 98 - 01:41 PM

since I know nothing about banjos except what I glean fron banjo playing friends, I did not open this thread...but in the 'Cat I KNOW that any 70 message thread has GOT to have interesting stuff, I bit...and, though I enjoyed the byplay, I find I can make only one contribution....waaaaayyyy back up there ^ was a mention of Heinlein and the "Stranger in a Strange Land" book...and the correct name of the 'hero' was

Valentine Michael Smith (first paragraph, I think)

Bill D...(nearly too old to be a child of the '60s, but still heavily under their influence)

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Jerry
Date: 22 Oct 98 - 04:23 PM

Jon,

I learned this chantey from Joanna Colcord's collection "Roll and Go" which is devoted to American chanteys. The only recording I know of is a disc by Forebitter, a chantey group based at Mystic Seaport Museum. They've released an anthology of American chanteys. You can contact them at [e-mail].

Here are all the verses I know:

Today is the day we pick on the banjo. Dance, gal, gimme the banjo! Oh, that banjo, that 7-string banjo. Dance, gal, gimme the banjo! Oh, that banjo, that talla talla wango. Dance...

When I was just one and twenty Dance... I had gals and money a-plenty. Dance... Oh, that banjo, that talla talla wango. Dance... (these two lines repeat at the end of each verse)

I was sent to school to be a scholar. My collar was tight and I could not swaller.

That's my book there on the table, You can read it if you are able.

I think Stan Hugill gives a version in his Shanties of the Seven Seas. I don't know how to do tunes on this rig yet, so I can't help you there. The books and the recording can supply that for you.

Jerry

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From:
Date: 22 Oct 98 - 09:19 PM

About egg banjos. I almost forgot about them. We had an egg banjo in our house where I grew up. It consists of a round metal frame with thin metal wires strung across it and this mechanism has a handle. (So it looks like a banjo.) You push a hard-boiled egg through it, over the wires, and the egg gets sliced.

Now somebody is going to tell me a plectrum banjo is for slicing hard-boiled plectrums (or should I say plectra.)

Murray

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Ole Bull
Date: 24 Oct 98 - 10:27 PM

Jon W. The reason I stated 1842 is because after that point there is no question about what the Banjo configuation was. Yes, Sweeney predates the Virginia Minstrels but to When?? I don't consider the info on that web-page to be a good de-bunk. The point has been oft repeated but I wonder if those who do have looked at that plantation painting mentioned. I've seen it and it doesn't for sure look definately like it's most certainly a drone string to me! I find it questionable, not real proof. Maybe somebody had it "computer image enhanced"....

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Songbob
Date: 26 Oct 98 - 12:48 PM

The plectrum banjo does NOT predate the five-string, having been introduced for the banjo-band craze of the late 1800s-early 1900s. Joe Hickerson once showed me an ad from, I think, 1909, for a five-string banjo with a special hook which you slipped the fifth string under (also slipping it to the side of the bridge) so as to drop it out of the plane of the other strings for plectrum use. The plectrum banjo is typically tuned like the "classical" banjo, CGBD (low to high), and is a melody instrument in the classic banjo band.

The tenor banjo, developed around 1910-15 (as a commercially-made instrument), has 17 or 19 (not 20) frets, and is tuned like a cello (CGDA). It is primarily a chordal instrument (and I seem to remember that Eddy Peabody played lots of chord-melody, so my guess is he played a tenor). Use of it by Irish musicians for melody is an example of the "dog walking on hind legs" syndrome (it's not that he does it well, but that he does it at all) -- the plectrum is actually a much better melody instrument than the tenor, but the tenor is what gets used. (Probably a supply-and-demand thing there; tenors are a dime a dozen and plectrums are pretty rare).

The five-string banjo, which passed into white use about 1830-40, was one of many kinds of banjo-like instruments found among African slaves and freed blacks in the 1750-1850 period. Some evidence exists that the fifth string that Joel Sweeney supposedly "added" was, in fact, the low (4th) string, and the thumb string -- chanter -- was already in wide use among African banjo players. The non-use of the fifth string in some musics, like in Australia, probably relates to the prevalence of the 6/8 and 9/8 celtic-based tune in those areas. It's hard to play jigs on a five-string, especially if one uses the down-picking "Clawhammer" style of southern US players. I hold, in fact, that that difficulty is one reason that southern fiddle players don't have very many jigs, strathspeys, or hornpipes -- played in the original time signatures -- in their repertoires. Accompaniment by the banjo, the most common fiddle accompaniment instrument in the south, was difficult, so the tunes got dropped or turned into reels.

Anyway, that's what I know about the various banjos (the guitar banjo and banjo-mandolin, which have been mentioned, were a part of that late-19th-Century period of experimentation with banjo-like instruments I cited earlier). I have a bunch of the things (several fives, one tenor -- but no plectrums, and no electrics -- a six and an eight, and a couple of banjo-ukes), but tend toward guitar and mandolin these days. Haven't found any in the trash, either, nor bought any on eBay (actually, I did, but it was for my sister in Iowa).

There, have I covered all the significant sub-threads in this one?

Bob Clayton

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Big Mick
Date: 26 Oct 98 - 08:28 PM

Great post, but am I the only person who has seen the 12 string version? And does anyone know if there is a specific name for the flat pick style of playing the banjo?

All the best,

Mick

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Art Thieme
Date: 26 Oct 98 - 11:17 PM

bit o' history! The banjo was actually invented as an IUD for Catherine the Great.

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From:
Date: 27 Oct 98 - 02:08 AM

Yeah, that is a great post Bob.

Mick: I have never seen a 12 string banjo, but wherever it was that I read about six string ones being used by guitar players to "cut" through a band. The twelve-string ones were mentioned as used for the same purpose.

Art: Catherine must have been greater than I imagined!

Murray

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Jon W.
Date: 27 Oct 98 - 01:16 PM

Well, now I have no doubt but that the true origins of the banjo are so lost in the mists of time that we'll never really know. Actually, the short high-pitched drone string seems so illogical to me (although that's the part that makes banjo playing so fun) that I wonder how it ever got added - perhaps, therefore, it couldn't have originated from anyone so steeped in Western civilization as I am, and presumably Joel W. Sweeney was. Can anyone cite examples of short drone strings on any other Western instrument? Or on the other hand, Eastern instruments? I have a hunch the number of Eastern examples wins in a landslide.

As far as playing jigs etc. on 5-string, the book I am currently learning from, "Basic Clawhammer Banjo" by Ken Perlman, has a few jigs, slip jigs, slides, as well as hornpipes and even a couple of 3/4 tunes. I have so far just learned on of the jigs and found it not much harder than the other pieces I learned from the book - but that's probably because I cheat (I up-pick with my index finger most of the time).

Subject: RE: What is a Plectrum Banjo?
From: Peter T.
Date: 27 Oct 98 - 03:40 PM

Given that this is a banjo thread, there might be interest in this month's issue of The Atlantic Monthly which has a substantial article on Dock Boggs by William Hogeland, part of which deals with the origins of clawhammer, etc. Very interesting (for a non-banjoist, anyway)

Yours, Peter T.