Speckled Dog

An original tune called Speckled Dog (aka Bitch, Get That Cat Turd Out Yo Mouf). Played on my trusty Fretless Enoch Tradesman in double C tuning. Figured out over the course of a few days.

Night Work

I love trying to learn old time songs, trying to get them "right" (i.e. recognizable), but I also highly respect those who use the elements of old time music to create something more abstract, more evocative. An earlier post, Warm February Night, is an attempt to do just that. Having played and recorded WFN, I remembered that a few months ago I tried to play a certain ballad in a tuning that the song wasn't written in, and came up with something that I found interesting. So, here it is. I'm calling it Night Work II. There is a Night Work I and also a Night Work III. The recording quality is a little rough (a few pops here and there when I hit the high notes) but I think it sounds pretty interesting after all.

Lost Angie

Variations on Angelina Baker, fretless Enoch Tradesman, double C tuning.

Warm February Night

Arranged by yours truly. Not sure what this is, but I like the sound of it. Fretless Enoch Tradesman, gCGCD.

Wicked Betty

Banjos Out Back

Fretted Enoch Tradesman, 11" pot, medium weight steel strings. Open back. This banjo and the one below are primarily constructed of wood. They are both very simple banjos. When I bought this at Zepp Country Music in North Carolina, I switched out the standard bridge for a moon bridge. However, I've since switched to a standard bridge, though with a lower profile. This is the banjo that I play everyday, and take with me just about everywhere I go.

Flush Fret Enoch Tradesman, 12" pot, light weight steel strings. Open back. I bought this banjo used at Fiddler's Green in Austin Texas. At the time it had heavy weight steel strings on it, and had a sound that was both mysterious and wonderful, but kind of dull. I've tried a lot of different types of strings on this one: steel, synthetic gut and real gut. Recently I've found that light weight steel strings sound the best to my ears. This banjo is outfitted with the moon bridge that used to be on my smaller, fretted Tradesman. The sound of this banjo is incredible. The larger pot and lack of actual frets (in place of regular steel frets, this banjo only has fret markers on the neck) creates a thumpy, tolling resonance, the tone of which is evocative of the really old timey banjo sound. And of course, you can slide all over the neck of this thing because there are no frets to stop you.

I have three banjos in my life. The first banjo I ever played was a loaner from my friend Isak. I had no idea how to play it but was instantly enslaved by its sound. A few years later, I received my first banjo as a gift from my parents. They had recently traveled to Maggie Valley, Tennessee on a bike trip and purchased the banjo from a man named Jack who made banjos and dulcimers as well. This banjo is very special to me, and I'll post a photo and description of it soon. I recently lent it to a friend who is interested in learning how to play clawhammer banjo. When I started learning how to play, I focused on bluegrass music, starting with the song Pretty Polly. I was in love but something was missing, and it wasn't too long before I figured out that the banjo sound that really struck me in mysterious ways was what is called clawhammer banjo.
So I focused on clawhammer banjo and I'm still exploring it today.

Andrew Jackson, Go Back Home

For the past few years I have been learning to play old time clawhammer banjo. It has quickly become an essential part of my life. My banjo goes with me almost everywhere. My thoughts, both waking and asleep, are haunted by banjo tunes.
Below you'll find a link to a recording of me playing a Mary Z. Cox tune called Andrew Jackson, Go Back Home.

I've played it here on a fretless Enoch banjo, with gut strings tuned (starting from the fifth string) dADGA. This is an older tuning, equivalent to what we call Sawmill, Mountain Minor, G Modal (or A Modal if your banjo is capoed) today. You can't tune gut strings up to today's higher tunings as they would likely break. Playing songs in these older tunings is really evocative, almost foreign to my ears as this is a tuning that probably would have been used about two hundred years ago.

Though I love the sound of those gut strings, I recently put lightweight steel strings on the fretless so that I could play with a fiddler.

For best results, view the above photograph while listening to the tune.

Late ramble, but not too late

Hello,
I am primarily a painter, but recently I've been exploring, or rather, realizing that there is a lot of value in other aspects of my life. And so I decided to start this blog as a way to share my other creative endeavors with people.

Here you will most likely find a lot of field recordings of banjo, fiddle, guitar, bass, birds, bugs etc. Accompanying those sounds will be photos that I have taken that I find compelling, as well as just about anything else I feel like sharing.

My background image is a photo taken by me during a drive from South Carolina to Texas, in late June of 2010.

I hope you find something, anything, here that moves you. Thanks for taking the time to look and listen.
Joe