Tag: Banjo

Categories
Bluegrass Music

J.D. Crowe RIP

This morning, December 24th, we lost one of the greatest and most influential banjo players in bluegrass music. The legendary J.D. Crowe passed away at the age of 84. You don’t know bluegrass if you haven’t heard of him, and if you listen to bluegrass, you have surely heard his work.

Somewhat of a banjo prodigy, Jimmy Martin offered him a job in the Sunny Mountain Boys when J.D. was 17. He declined so that he could finish school, but finally joined in 1956 and stayed for four years. During this time, some of the best recordings from the Sunny Mountain Boys were released, including “Rock Hearts.” “Sophronie,” and “My Walking Shoes.” After his stint with Martin, D.J. formed the Kentucky Mountain Boys, which lasted for 10 years. His next project was The New South, which became somewhat of a bluegrass supergroup that included Tony Rice, Ricky Skaggs, and Jerry Douglas. The group’s Rounder Records self-titled album, affectionately known by its release number “0044,” is considered a bluegrass classic, perfectly mixing traditional and progressive bluegrass sounds. If you haven’t heard it, go and get yourself a copy right away!

Along with the New South, J.D. would also take part in a number of tribute albums with the group The Bluegrass Album Band, which also included Rice, Douglas, Doyle Lawson, Bobby Hicks and Todd Phillips. In 1983, he won a Grammy for his song “Fireball” in the Country Instrumental category.

J.D. slowed down a bit as far as touring during the last decade for health reasons. He had been suffering from COPD the past few years, and went to meet The Lord early this morning. I am sure that there is a bluegrass Angel Band waiting for him up there.

I was able to meet him once at a IBMA World of Bluegrass conference when it was still in Nashville. I saw a bunch of bluegrass “fans” excited to seeing Dailey & Vincent running right past J.D. without a glance. I walked up to him and shook his hand, telling him how much I appreciated his work with Martin and the great 0044 album. He was not very talkative, but appreciated the fact that someone recognized him in the crowd without making a scene.

J.D. will be missed, especially by so many banjo players. More than an influence, he was a guiding light, and his work will last for decades to come.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dl0Z5LY7LUQ

Chew on it and comment. Merry Christmas to you all.

Categories
Bluegrass Music Musical Instruments

Is the Six-String Banjo Really a Banjo?

What constitutes a “banjo”? Why I bring this up is that I am seeing a lot of pop and rock stars claiming that they are playing a banjo, when in reality they are strumming and plucking a six-string instrument tuned like a standard guitar, with the strings going over a banjo head and resonator.

Now, 20 years ago, these instruments were referred to as banjitars, and the band Old Crow Medicine Show would call it a “guitjo” on its liner notes. These instruments have been around for decades, but popularity was mostly underground. I remember the first time that I saw someone playing one was guitar wizard Joe Satriani on an early episode of MTV Unplugged.

Usually when someone says, “I play the banjo,” we assume they are talking about the five-string variety, with the high G string droning, and played either clawhammer or Scruggs style. We tend to forget about the four-string plectrum banjo (popular with Dixieland bands), the shorter-neck four-string tenor banjo (used by many Irish bands), and of course, the many variations of gourd banjos. The one thing that they have in common is that the body or resonator part of the instrument has a top of skin or thin plastic stretched over the resonator pot (much like a drum head), and the strings being plucked will strike the head via a bridge to create the sound (unlike a guitar that produces sound through the sound hole). I am not going to get too technical here.

One of the most famous performers of the four-string variety was multi-instrumentalist Eddie Peabody. During the 1920s through 1950s, Peabody performed on stage, film and television on the four- and five-string banjos. His playing style was more of stroking the strings either with his fingers or a pick. He was a great entertainer, but his brand of music faded out as popular music turned to crooners, then country, then rock and roll. Toward the end of his career, Rickenbacker Guitar Company made him electric guitars with banjo necks. So, did this constitute the he was playing an “electric guitar”? By the way, Peabody was a whiz on guitar and fiddle as well.

Getting back to the six-string variety, is it an actual banjo? If one were to look at the entire lineup of banjos, as well as consider the sound that it produced and how it was produced, then technically, it is a banjo. For the fingerpick-style guitarist, it can be a new sound to songs, especially those using s drop-D tuning. As far as chord playing, it sounds way too washy (in my opinion). Yes, the those players of the plectrum and tenor varieties use a pick, but they usually either play a form of cross-picking, or the strumming is quick and semi-muted, so it is more rhythmic. Add to that the design with the strings draped across the bridge lying on a drum skin, this does not allow for sustaining tones.

Now if you were to ask a long-time bluegrass banjoist, or even a bluegrass enthusiast, he/she would probably have a set idea of what the banjo is. Five strings, played Scruggs style, ‘nuff said.

As for my opinion, I like to call it a “six-string banjo” and not just a banjo. Let the pop stars think that they are being cool, but we all know that when you say “I play the banjo,” the five-string variety is the standard. Now let’s get a taste of my favorite banjo player, Don Reno.

Chew on it and comment.

Categories
Bluegrass Music Rock Music

Don Everly/Bill Emerson/Charlie Watts RIP

This past week has not been good in the world. Way too many deaths. Before I get into my coverage of the three musicians, I ask that you pray and keep in your hearts the 13 soldiers that were killed at the Kabul airport by an insane ISIS-K bomber, as well as pray for the soldiers’ families.

Don Everly of the Everly Brothers. Man, those sibling harmonies were beyond human comprehension. Think about the hits that the duo had in the 1950s and early 60s. “Bye, Bye Love,” “Cathy’s Clown,” the controversial “Wake Up, Little Susie,” and my favorite, “All I Have to Do is Dream.” They came from a musical family, guitarist Chet Atkins promoted them passionately, and with the songwriting contributions of Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, the brothers were at the top of the music world. They both joined the Marines in 1961, and along with drug concerns as well as conflicts with their publishing company, the Everly Brothers lost footing in the pop music field. By 1973, they grew tired and resentful of each other, and there were a few reunion concerts until Phil’s death in 2014.

But those vocals were hypnotizing. Listen to recordings of the Beatles, the Beach Boys, Simon & Garfunkel, and the Bee Gees. You can tell where these groups learned to harmonize. However, one of the greatest gifts Don Everly gave to rock-n-roll was back in the mid-1960s. The duo was on tour with the Rolling Stones. Keith Richards asked Don how he got that great rhythm guitar sound. Don showed him the open G tuning and what fingering to use to change chords. Listen to Keith’s iconic rhythm guitar on “Brown Sugar,” “Honky Tonk Women,” and “Start Me Up.” That’s all the result of Don Everly.

Banjoist Bill Emerson. A true gentleman musician, beyond performing with the Country Gentlemen. His style was tight, yet not too flashy. His early career was with the Gentlemen as well as with Jimmy Martin. Those early years taught him a lot about the banjo, as well as timing with other musicians in a live setting. In the late 1960s and early 70s, he worked with guitarist Cliff Waldron, helping to advance the newgrass sound by combining bluegrass with country, rock, and soul music.

His big achievement came in 1973 when he joined the US Navy and helped to form the military band Country Current, which consisted of Navy servicemen performing as a bluegrass ensemble. He served as the band’s leader for 20 years before retiring as a master chief petty officer. Upon his retirement, the Stelling Banjo Company issued a Bill Emerson signature model. He performed irregularly the past few years, and passed away August 21 from complications of pneumonia at the age of 83. After Earl Scruggs and Don Reno, most banjo players today would name Bill as a major influence.

Charlie Watts of the Rolling Stones. This one hit me hard this past week. The Stones were one of the main reasons I got into playing music as a teenager. Charlie was the perfect rock-n-roll drummer. Seriously, he defined how a drummer should play a rock-n-roll song. The drummer should be felt and not heard. Yes, you can hear his drums in so many Stones songs, like the intro to “Get Off of My Cloud.” But when you listen to the full recorded work, his drumming is felt within, while Mick’s vocals and Keith’s patented rhythm guitar riffs fill the ears.

He was quiet when it came to the public persona, but he was a Stone. Just as much as Mick or Keith. The band could never have gotten to where they are without having Charlie in the drummer’s seat. He knew exactly what would fit in the song. You knew that Keith, Bill Wyman, and Ron Wood valued him more than anyone. He loved jazz drumming, studying the great like Max Roach, and implemented that attitude into the Stones’ songs. There will never be another drummer like Charlie, and I am so glad that I was able to appreciate him during my formative music years.

My favorite Charlie Watts story? Back in the 70s, Mick was going on a rant ab out the Stones being his band. He kept referring to Charlie as “his drummer.” Late at night in a hotel, Mick kept calling for “his drummer” to show up at his room. Charlie dressed up in his best suit, polished his shoes, went to Mick’s room, and when Mick opened the door, Charlie punched him hard in the face and walked away, telling Keith what he just did. That is classic rock! I leave you not with a Stones video, but a great video of Charlie doing a pre-show backstage warm-up. Just look at Keith’s reaction!

Chew on it and comment.

Categories
Bluegrass Music

A Perfect Song #2: Flatt and Scruggs “Foggy Mountain Breakdown” (1949 Version)

It is considered by many to be the National Anthem of Bluegrass. Every good bluegrass band keeps it in its repertoire because it knows that all music fans, bluegrass or not, love the song. Every budding banjo player MUST learn it along the way, most playing it nuance-for-nuance like Earl. Flatt and Scruggs re-recorded it in the 1960s for the movie Bonnie and Clyde. The song fit the film perfectly.

However, it is the original 1949 recording for Mercury Records that true bluegrass fans adhere to. While the duo recorded a similar song “Bluegrass Breakdown” with Bill Monroe, Earl wanted one that defined the Foggy Mountain Boys. A change in chord structure and more emphasis on the banjo work made this song more popular as well as a bluegrass standard.

The arrangement is perfect – banjo solos for a few breaks, fiddle solo changes it up, then back and forth one more time until we end with the banjo wrapping it up with a “shave and a haircut” outro. No bridges or changes in keys. The G to Em chord change (although the tuning on this recording makes it sound more like it is in the key of G#) catches the listener’s ear. In this particular recording, Earl truly sounds like he knows what he is doing, yet it sounds improvised in many ways. You don’t really “hear” the rest of the band, you FEEL them! Lester’s rhythm guitar is more like a brush on a snare drum and hi-hat, until the end of each verse when his trademark G-run can be made out. The upright bass is definitely felt more than heard, but if it weren’t there, there would be a lot less drive to the song. Also, Earl only does two counts of lone banjo intro before the band kicks in. Usual arrangements give the banjo a full four counts. It makes one think that the band was caught off-guard with his playing right away. However, it sounds fantastic! Two minutes and forty seconds of pure energy!

What makes it unique is that it was recorded the way all recordings were done back then — with one microphone and the band standing around it, all the while maneuvering back and forth to let the soloist get closest to the mic. You can close your eyes and literally see them dancing around each other to get to the mic. That is the charm of the recording – everyone knowing his job to get the best recording possible. Recording engineering was in its youth. Studio engineers were more scientists than music aficionados. The mic went into a very primitive mixer, which was then wired into the cutter, which cut the music directly onto a wax disc. Any big mistake meant having to do the whole thing over again. Minor mistakes were often ignored as long as the results were satisfactory.

I also prefer this version over the 1960s version because it is so raw and untouched. The later version adds harmonica and other studio tricks to make it sound professional. The original version is just the band doing what they do best – performing live!

Which leads to listening to this particular recording. With the chord changes from G to Em and back, sometimes the guitar and bass go four counts on the Em, sometimes six counts. Occasionally the guitar goes fout counts while the bass stays on the E for six. Because the banjo and fiddle are so up-front, it really isn’t noticeable to the casual listener. However, it does tell a lot about how wild it must have been to first record this great song and everyone being slightly in his own world for a few moments. Today, most bands are pretty much sticklers to the four counts of Em, but I have always loved the six-count, as it makes the sone a lot less “pop” and more “rock.”

Yes, one could say that this is a precursor to rock-and-roll music, especially the emphasis on instrumental solos having short breaks to mix the overall song up a bit. There were tons of recordings of instrumental songs prior to this, but most stuck with simple arrangements – the soloist sticking to mimicking either the vocals or the main instrument, usually the fiddle. Here, Earl goes off on his own, creating breakneck-speed solos that could not be easily duplicated. The banjo rolls were innovative to say the least. Bill Monroe knew this when he had Earl join the Blue Grass Boys in 1945, and Lester and Earl knew how to make it a power to be reckoned with by 1949.

I have always loved this recording, but really knew how important and great it was a few years back. Eddie Stubbs was DJ-ing one of his late-night shows on WSM, and on the anniversary of the song’s 1949 recording, he played it on the air, then followed up with the statement, “Are there any questions?”. That to me says it all.

Chew on it and comment.

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