can pickin a banjo help or hurt

Alex Piazza · From: Arkansas, USA

Just got a banjo for my birthday. I love it. Im wondering how many of yall play the banjo, and if it has changed your style on the ps.

Justin Griffith · From: Taylor, Texas, USA

I'm sure B0b will be along shortly to answer you're question

David Mason · From: Cambridge, MD, USA

It's funny, I've just been re-reading a book called "Secrets from the Masters" culled from interviews in Guitar Player magazine. Speaking of his standard guitar playing, Jerry Garcia spoke of the advantage his early banjo training gave him in changing melodic and rhythmic direction from string to string instantly - that's sort of what banjo players [i]do[/], I guess. A lot of the rolls must transfer over too, but I suspect the best things you can do for your steel playing are mostly found on the steel.

David Doggett · Posted 18 Feb 2006 12:18 pm

Josh Graves was a banjo player turned Dobro player. It think it had a big affect on his style and revolutionized bluegrass Dobro playing, compared to the older Brother Oswald Hawaiian style. For speed picking on steel, I think a finger-picking banjo player has a leg up on a flat-picking guitar player.

Tom Stolaski · From: Huntsville, AL, USA

The Banjo is a great tool for warming up the right hand before playing Steel.

Charles Pompe · From: Illinois, USA

IMHO based on 5-string banjo pickin for 20+ years, PSG can have a detrimental effect on Banjo pickin. If you don't keep it up, the banjo quickness gets away from you. When I took up PSG I was so consumed by it that I left the Banjo alone for quite a while and still have difficulty mastering some of the more difficult patterns. There are some similarities ie: finger picks and finger dexterity, but the patterns are extremely different. I think you end up favoring one or the other. For me it's the PSG

Charlie P.

Michael Breid · From: Eureka Springs, Arkansas, USA

If you check into it you will find a lot of PSG players were famous five string banjo players first. Winnie Winston, Bill Keith, Erik Weisberg, Jack Hicks, Fred Newell. I played five string for about forty years, and just a few years ago bought my pedal steel. I met a fellow, a banjo player, a few months ago and asked him how his steel playing was coming along. He turned sorta white, and said, "How did you know I was playing steel"? He had just left Seymour's in Nashville where he bought a rebuilt Sho-bud D-10. I told him that for some weird reason, banjo and dobro players always wind up playing pedal steel. I don't why, it just is. Does anyone have a logical explanation for this?

Dave Mudgett · From: Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee

Yeah, I'm surprised b0b hasn't moved this out of the "Pedal Steel" section.

For me, learning 5-string bluegrass banjo in the early 90s was my entree into fingerpicking with thumb and fingerpicks. Without it, I think I would have had a much tougher time starting steel in the late 90s, being the flatpicking guitar player that I was for over 20 years before I started banjo. I have been able to carry some banjo rolls over to PSG, but of course, many techniques are different. Still, I think it opens up some different ideas from time to time, for me anyway. I also agree about banjo being a good PSG warmup.

Of course, I just love bluegrass. That is reason enough for me to pick banjo. I know some bluegrass traditionalists may cringe, but I also love PSG in bluegrass. My first exposure to that was Doug Jernigan's playing on J.D. Crowe's album "My Home Ain't in the Hall of Fame" album in the late 70s. It's very cool, and I'm trying to work that kind of playing into my repertoire. I know - doubling banjo and steel in the same song - probably enough to cause certain grown men I know to weep.

Gary Lee Gimble · From: Fredericksburg, VA.

I will have to strongly disagree with David Mason in that most banjo rolls DO NOT transfer over to steel with the exception of a simple forward roll and the rolls posted below.
On C6:



5---------0---------0--


6-----------------------


7-1~2-------1~2----


8-----------------------


.





5------------0---------


6-----------------------


7-------2--------------


8-2--------------2----


.





On E9:





5------------------------0-


6------------0------0-----


7--------0-------0--------


8-0(L)--------------------


.





5---------------------------0---


6-------------0-------0-------0


7--------0--------0---------


8-0(L)------------------------

When you start out on banjo, basic rolls include, but are not limited to the alternating thumb and the forward reverse roll. Being a weekend hack steel player myself, I can suggest that learning how to pick banjo can only add some discipline to articulating your thought patterns to your fingers, if that makes any sense. The only downside of playing banjo is the many dirty looks you'll get if you pick the banjo on display in the Fender room at the ISGC. Oh well..... Posted below is a link to a banjo video I made a while back, I welcome the more experienced players to point out specifically where some rolls I'm playing can make some sense on steel. Maybe D. Mason is correct? http://www.desperate-measure.com/garylee/Balad-Of-Jed-Clampet.wmv

[This message was edited by Gary Lee Gimble on 18 February 2006 at 02:28 PM.]

Alex Piazza · From: Arkansas, USA

hey gary, nice video. I know this is off the steel subject but could you give me some advice on instruction materials. just something with the basic finger rolls.

Skip Edwards · From: LA,CA

This is the one that gets me... (E9)

1--------------------------------
2---10-----10---------10---------
3----------------10(B)-------10(B)-
4------10-----10---------10------
.

[This message was edited by Skip Edwards on 18 February 2006 at 04:04 PM.]

Gary Lee Gimble · From: Fredericksburg, VA.

Skip, that is a banjo lick but not a banjo roll. Alex, got my email?
glg

David Mason · From: Cambridge, MD, USA

I KNEW I could find this friggin' thread if I asked the right question.... http://steelguitarforum.com/Forum5/HTML/009987.html
Scroll down to a post by Dave Mudgett listing common banjo rolls - it's about using the rolls to count time intervals, or at least that's what I got out of it. I printed it out and stuck where I could find it and I try to work on some every week. You can use the strokes all on the same string if that's what the music requires; it's not just about rolling across strings. If you don't want to use the link, here's the meat, NOT shrunk by a quote box:

"
1. Forward Rolls: TIM-TIM-TI, TIM-TIM-TM, TI-TIM-TIM, TM-TIM-TIM, IM-TIM-TIM, M-TIM-TIM-T (Basic 3-finger pattern is TIM)

2. Backward Rolls: MIT-MIT-MI, MIT-MIT-MT, T-MIT-MIT-M, IT-MIT-MIT (Basic 3-finger pattern is MIT)

3. Forward-Reverse Rolls: TIM-T-MIT-M, TIM-T-MIT-I (Uses both Forward and Backward 3-finger pattern)

4. Alternating Thumb Roll: TITM-TITM, TMTI-TMTI (Basic 3-finger pattern TITM or TMTI, thumb alternates)

5. Foggy Mtn. Breakdown Roll: IM-IM-TIM-T

where T=Thumb, I=Index, M=Middle, and the dashes are not rests - they're there to highlight the repetitive patterns.

Just the plain 3-finger patterns work well for 3/4 or Waltz time: TIM, TMI, IMT, ITM, MTI, MIT. Actually, these 6 cover all the possible basic 3-at-a-time patterns. Really good Scruggs-style players can mix and match these patterns and more at will, and at high speed.

For example, in the 4/4 rolls, the first forward roll just repeats TIMTIMTI over and over again. There are lots of possible variations on these. I still like Earl Scruggs' famous book and the record that goes with it. I use T, I, M, and R (Ring) fingerpicks on steel, which provides even more variations yet. I use TIMR, RMIT, and TIMT-RMIT (which is sort of like a 4-finger variation of the Forward-Reverse Roll) a lot for arpeggiating 4/4 passages."

Thanks Dave! The T-I-T-M-T-I-T-M is the fastest pattern for me, in my still semi-pathetic bumblebeebop ventures....

[This message was edited by David Mason on 18 February 2006 at 04:49 PM.]

Chris Grotewohl · From: Kansas City (Roeland Park)

Howdy, Anyone who has played any instrument for a period of time, plays what they have to play, to make it sound right. 35 yrs here on banjo. Don't think about it much. Right hand does what it does. Transferring to Steel?, I think it might help. Most banjo folks have gone thru the saga of pick noise etc...Probably have the right hand figured out after 10-20 yrs. My problem is the bar. Both of these things are difficult to master. CG

Gary Lee Gimble · From: Fredericksburg, VA.

Now lets apply some T I & Ms. Same basic sounding lick for banjo and steel, posted first for banjo and then posted on steel. Really no similarities in roll patterns (T I M), again, same notes for banjo and steel, although the steel lick descends a little further. big yee haw there



12-----------------12------------------9------


-------------12-------------------------------10------


-------------------------------------------------------


--------------------------------------------------------


-------10------------------10------------------------10


.





-9----------------9--------------------------7-----------


-----10----------------10------------7------------------


--------------------------------------------------------


-------------------------------------------------------


------------0-------------------0----------------------0

Here is the same sorta lick played on steel, unlike the banjo lick which is a reverse forward roll, the steel lick is all forward roll.



1-------18-------------------18---------------------18---


2---------------------------------------------18------------


3-18-----------------18----------------------------------


4-------------18+ -----------------18+ -----------------


5----------------------------------------------------------- 


.


1-------15---------------15---------------15---------


2--------------------------------------15--------------


3-15--------------15----------------------------------


4-------------15----------------15--------------------


5--------------------------------------------------------


.


1---------10----------------10----------------10--------------


2-----------------------------------------10-  -------------10- --


3-10+ --------------10+ ----------------------------------------


4---------------10----------------10-----------------10-------


5----------------------------------------------------------------


.


1-------------------------------------------------------------


2---------------------10- ------------------------------------


3--------------------------------------------------------------


4--------------10-----------------------------10------------


5-10++ ---------------------10++ ~ 10------------------


6----------------------------------------------------10+ ---

Bottom line, banjo utilizes all three fingers which may assist you in speed playing. Charleton prefers not to use his index finger and told me once "it gets in the way."

Gary Shepherd · From: Fox, Oklahoma, USA

I have some free banjo lessons on my web site at www.16tracks.com. Use them. They will get you started out correctly. Break the bad habbits before you start them. The first free lessons are free.

------------------
Gary Shepherd

Carter D-10

www.16tracks.com

Charles Davidson · From: Phenix City Alabama, USA

Dont know about anyone else,but playing banjo sure helped me when I srarted playing steel.If nothing else I was already comfortable playing with thumb and finger picks.That was one hurdle I had already jumped.Learning bar intonation and string grips was another animal all together.

Jim Eaton · From: Santa Susana, Ca

IMHO - If you can play 5-stg, you have a head start on pick blocking. Jeff Newman and I had several conversations about it after Jeff saw how I pick-block and all I was trying to do was get my finger speed up, the pick blocking part just happened.
JE:-)>

------------------
Emmons D10 8/4 P/P -75'
Fessenden SD-10 3/5
Zum SD-12 7/5 - 91'
76'Session 400
86'Nashville 400

Bobby Lee · From: Cloverdale, California, USA

Tony Prior · From: Charlotte NC

b0b certainly is a man who can say a lot with very few words ...

t

Donny Hinson · From: Glen Burnie, Md. U.S.A.

Yes, it'll help your steel playing, as will just about any other instrument you learn will, too.

A lot of my pedal steel licks were stolen from Buck Trent, who played more pedal steel on a banjo than a lot of pedal steelers play on a pedal steel!

HowardR · From: N.Y.C.-Fire Island-Asheville

Bobby Lee · From: Cloverdale, California, USA

John Lockney · From: New Market, Maryland, USA

The "Foggy Mountain Breakdown" roll above is shown as "IM-IM-TIM-T".

In the Earl Scruggs book, it is given as:



--h----h---0-------------0---------


-2^3--2^3------------0-------------


-----------------------------------


-----------------------------------


------------------0----------0-----


 I    T    M      T  I   M   T

Thumb following index on the same string is key to this roll on banjo, and I have not seen this technique used on pedal steel. (?)

And in general, the fifth (half) string on a banjo is the highest note. In most banjo rolls the thumb keeps this open high string ringing to provide a sort of drone. To duplicate this sound on a steel guitar it seems like you would need to play the rolls in a different order. (i.e. it would be completely different)

[This message was edited by John Lockney on 20 February 2006 at 06:14 AM.]

David L. Donald · From: Koh Samui Island, Thailand

Howard.... ROTFLOL!!!

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