Official Luthiers Forum!

I am building a banjo. A whyte ladye copy. I got most of the materials from Stew Mac (sponsor plug) and though the shell is prelaminated, I am laminating a thin veneer of curly maple on the outside of that. I would like to know whether anyone has any experience with a form of sunburst finish on banjo shells. (seriously) Seems like I have seen that somewhere but I can't remember the details.

Is my grizzled veteran status in jeapordy?

Banjo, you mean a garbage can with strings?

I once had a low opinion of banjo, but then I really go listening to Ron Block...and well, I have changed my mind. It's a great instrument. I'm tempted to build one for myself.
Good for you! Demoted? Promoted perhaps...

Don Williams38783.5190856481

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"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

Does this mean we have to make a Banjo forum now?

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Lance@LuthiersForum.com

Thanks Don!
   I really like the sound of clawhammer style banjo. In fact it sounds pretty good with a flatpicked guitar. Great old timey music.

John

Lance that is a great idea! Where's Brock when you need him?

OK I have to: Why did the banjo player cross the road?
Who cares he's gone!
I will be performing this and other routines at the Catskills in upstate NY.....
Evan

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http://www.NewYorkGuitarRepair.com

Yeah, yeah,
What's the best kind of pickup to put on a banjo?

Ford F-150

Hey you folks of the south of my frozen border, please don't tawk bad about one of the finest instruments of American history, when i hear that good ol bluegrass playin', it gets me happy for the rest of the day. There is nothing like that sound when one is quickly strummed by a talented player, i was raised to that sound and just love it to death even though i can't play it well. Coupled with mandolin playin', it gets even more magical! Pseudo rant over!

John,
Don't let them get you down. Nothing wrong with a banjo at all. I'd like to some day build one with an internal resonator. Please be sure to post pics.

I started on one years ago with a walnut neck and a cherry rim. I couldn't afford a tone ring and hardware at the time and just set it aside. I guess I need to dust it off and see if I can make anything out of it.

John

My favourite banjo joke:

"What's the best pickup to put on a banjo?
A Ford F-150!"

Banjo's are a bit like sharks, stop moving and they die - no sustain at all!! In the right hands they sound magnificent, and in the wrong ones ... well!

Go for it and post the pics as you build.

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Dave White
De Faoite Stringed Instruments
". . . the one thing a machine just can't do is give you character and personalities and sometimes that comes with flaws, but it always comes with humanity" Monty Don talking about hand weaving, "Mastercrafts", Weaving, BBC March 2010

John,

You're in for a great time! The first instrument I built was a frailer, using a Whyte Laydie copy pot from Bucks County, iirc, with some detail stuff from Stew Mac. This was about 1977. A friend had a 5-string Tubaphone (the ultimate frailer) so I copied his neck, only instead of the Gryphon head inlay, I did a chicken head. Used a skin head for that soft, thumpy old timey sound. Wish I still had it. It was a load of fun. PUUHHLEEEEASE post pics!

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now known around here as Pat Foster
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http://www.patfosterguitars.com

John, that is great! I'll stand behind you on this one. I love the banjo, and I play it well as the guitar. I took it up some years back to help me work on fingerstyle stuff, and it did help me a lot.
My favorite banjos are the old-time open back ones. They actually sound quite mellow with a hide head on them. I bought a few basket-cases on eBay, and fixed them up to learn about them, and my favorite one is an old Maybelle that was a four-string when I bought it, but it had a nice Vega-style pot with birdseye veneer. I built a 5-string neck for it, and it's a nice little banjo! It's not a loud bluegrass monster, but a nice mellow sounding banjo that works great for old-time fingerstyle stuff. Way back when, one popular type of muisic played on these was "classical banjo", and that's what I am working with. It can be hard to find music, but there are some tabs around. One of my favorite players at this kind of thing is John McCuen (sp?) of the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band. You can find a few amazing instrumental solo things on their records.
Also John, if you want to take the plunge and build one from scratch (and I bet you will) Elderly instruments sells a few really nice banjo plans.

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Mark Swanson
Swanson Guitars
http://www.MarkSwansonMusic.com

Hey I appreciate those kind remarks guys. Very supportive of my heresy. I will post pics when all is said and done.

John

Hey, banjo's are fun too, and can be built quickly. Give this a try sometime, instead of a hide or Remo stretched head, use wood, spruce, cedar, redwood, etc. Play around with some simple bracing and bridgeplate ideas, and brace shaving inside the open back. Top can be attached to the rim with spool clamps, or metal brackets, easily removed. Lots to learn from banjo's. Afterall, this is a "LuthiersForum", right? Not just a 'guitarmakers forum', is it?

CrowDuck

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Chris Nielsen
Soquel, CA.

Hey, I'm a banjo lover/player, too. I also will build one in the not too distant future. Go, John, go. It's nice to see some culture on this forum.





Ron

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OLD MAN formerly (and formally) known as:

Ron Wisdom

Somewhere in the middle of Arkansas......

Favorite banjo joke:

What is perfect pitch?

That's when you throw the banjo into the dumpster and it hits the accordian.

My German Shorthair Pointer LOVES banjo. Well at least we think he does. When a banjo player showed up recently to one of the weekly jams at my house, the dog sat in front of him and stared at the banjo for literally the whole time he was there! It started to freak the banjo player out. We couldn't decide if the dog thought it was really cool, or was just thinking, "Dear God please make it stop!"

-Mark

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Pullman, WA

The more I know, the more I know I don't know.

trippguitars.com
OR
Find me on Facebook

[QUOTE=old man] Hey, I'm a banjo lover/player, too. I also will build one in the not too distant future. Go, John, go. It's nice to see some culture on this forum.





Ron[/QUOTE]

Hey Ron that is an awesome LOL guy ya got there buddy1!Try sending me a box full of those please!

John, oh John!

No, OK I have to admit it I was a secret banjo player, I've had one since I was 14 but took the resonator off and binned it straight away, I can't stand clawhammer banjo, Earl Scruggs has a lot to answer for, but give me that old style frailing and I love it that and double thumbing.

In my formative youth in the UK folk scene in the 60s I knew The McColl clan pretty well and Peggy Seeger was something of a heroine and she taught us how to play banjo, always wanted a long neck one like brother Pete had. I've still got it tucked away and I've even just got a new thin goat skin to replace the old tired skin. I think the new skin cost me ten times what the old banjo did in the 60s. Now if I can just stop that 5th string knob slowly undoing...

Do you know John I might just add a new banjo to my list of build projects. That and a 34B (No not that, John will understand!)

Colin

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

Hey Colin
If I am not mistaken clawhammer and frailing are the essentially the same style. I am not going to do the Scruggs bluegrass roll.
This banjo will have one of those new artifical skin heads that is supposed to sound like skin without the problems that humidity changes cause. Other than that it will hopefully look old time, open backed, and long necked.
34B's would be such a fine project. I would fly the Atlantic to witness that.

John

Thanks Ron and Serge. I appreciate your ecumenical point of view. Serge it impresses me that you are fond of bluegrass and souther rock/blues.

John

Back in the 70s I must have converted 6 or 8 four-string banjos to five-
stringers. I'd carefully remove the headstock overlay and glue it to a new
neck made for 5 strings. I don't recall what brands they were, but I got
rave reviews on every one of them.
Craig

[QUOTE=csullivan] Back in the 70s I must have converted 6 or 8 four-string banjos to five-stringers. I'd carefully remove the headstock overlay and glue it to a new neck made for 5 strings. I don't recall what brands they were, but I got rave reviews on every one of them. Craig[/QUOTE]

Well well well..... we keep uncovering more and more about you don't we? So, were you once President or anything like that? Graphic artist, machinist, guitarmaker, archtop maker, banjo modifier, what else Bro?

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"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

Play a banjo - Go to jail!!!

I enjoy teasing my freinds who play banjo. They take it well especially since most of them play guitar better than I do.

Al

Q: How can you tell the stage you're playing on is level?
A: The banjo player is drooling out of both sides of his mouth.

Q: What do you say to the banjo player in the three piece suit?
A: "Will the defendant please rise."

Q: What's the most beautiful sound anyone ever got out of a banjo?
A: Splash
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Good on you John -- the jokes are only in funAnthony Z38783.8602546296