Any banjo players out there?
Adventures with 'other' instruments...
razyn said: I don't play very often, but I started a long time ago. I have a few old banjos, say 1870-1900 or so, with and without frets -- and one reproduction "minstrel" banjo, made within the past ten years (an eBay coup de foudre). I've been to the Antietam Early Banjo Gathering, twice, and really enjoy the fellowship of those guys even though many of them are certifiable (i.e., dedicated Civil War reenactors). There's a Ning group for Minstrel Banjo, and I was lurking in it about a year before Strumelia started this dulcimer one.
My best banjo is an open back S.S. Stewart "Universal Favorite" tenor (a Nashville pawn shop purchase) that Homer Ledford converted to a 5-string for me. He added his special tone ring, as well as making the new birdseye maple neck (fitted with the old inlays), in 1966. One of the earlier Ledford banjos, I guess. He didn't sign it or anything, but I have letters from him when we arranged for it. I swapped him a nice early Washburn mandolin he wanted -- didn't pay actual money for the conversion, but he costed it out at $75. (More than I had paid for his standard dulcimer, in 1963.) I also got Pete Seeger to autograph it, when he did a workshop in Nashville around 1968 -- so now I can't change the dang head. Mike Seeger also played it, not long after that -- guess I should have asked him to write on it too, but we were actually friends, so that just seemed odd.
Back in the day, about 1915-20 when Uncle Dave Macon was a wagoner and there was not yet a radio show in Nashville (the Grand Ole Opry), my paternal grandfather was one of his employers. (I just checked the Wikipedia article about Uncle Dave, and it discusses The Macon Midway Mule and Wagon Transportation Company.) So my dad and my grandmother had some anecdotes about him. I knew two of his sons, but he had died when I was about twelve -- and he had long since been a professional entertainer, rather than a wagoner. I got into folk music a few years later. I do have a banjo that Uncle Dave broke in about 1892, when he fell off a friend's porch in Lascassas. He gave it to the boy who lived there -- who got the broken neck fixed, and about 70 years later I bought it from him. And I also got some good banjo tunes from him (Elbert F. Pilkington).
Dick
Wow rayzn - I am deeply envious of your contacts with people who are heroes of mine - Pete and Mike Seeger, Homer Ledford....I have looked at some of the re-enactor/historical society banjo clips on Youtube. There are some fascinating instruments there but I am not sure I could countenance playing one with calfskin and real gut strings. And I know what you mean about the mentality of some re-enactors: I used to do meadieval re-enactment and found some of my companions to be rather in retreat from real life!!
