Banjo
Photo by Mike Melnyk
Bluegrass banjo, level 2, back-up—Back-up includes all the skills and techniques needed to play well with others in jams and in bands. We’ll take a step-by-step approach with lots of hands on/in-class playing. Beginning with some exercises that will help us learn the banjo neck and remember the up-the-neck chord positions, we’ll move on to discuss vamping, down-the- neck roll-based back up and up-the-neck back up (like you’ve heard Earl and J. D. Crowe play). We’ll discuss how to use some ideas from basic music theory to understand chord progressions and the role of target tones in back up, and learn a few of those characteristic showy Scruggs style back-up licks. We’ll also cover transitions from lead playing to back-up, how to use the capo, intros and endings, ensemble listening, concepts of rhythm, fiddle tune accompaniment and more.
Prerequisites: Have some familiarity with basic Scruggs style playing (rolls with slides, hammer-ons, pull-offs) and ability to play at least a few songs and follow a basic I-IV-V chord progression. Knowledge (not mastery!) of the major chord shapes is recommended. Ability to read tablature is helpful but not required. Audio and videotaping is welcomed.
Bill Evans has spent a lifetime learning from direct and extensive one-on-one interaction with his own mentors: Sonny Osborne, J. D. Crowe, Alan Munde, Tony Trischka and Bill Keith. He has shared what he’s learned along the way through his Off The Record and All Strings Considered columns in Banjo Newsletter magazine and in four critically acclaimed DVD projects for AcuTab Publications. He is also the co-author of Parking Lot Picker’s Songbook: Banjo Edition from Mel Bay Publications. He is known not only for his innovative original compositions and progressive playing techniques utilizing both melodic and single-string styles but also for his complete understanding of traditional Scruggs/Crowe/ Osborne-based bluegrass banjo.
Over the years, Bill has performed with David Grisman, Peter Rowan, Laurie Lewis, Dry Branch Fire Squad, Lynn Morris, Jim Hurst, Jody Stecher, Tony Trischka, Megan Lynch, Alan Munde and Kathy Kallick in addition to co-leading the California-based bands Bluegrass Intentions and Due West and leading his own Bill Evans String Summit. These days, he tours internationally with his own solo show The Banjo in America and performs with The NashVillains, the Flatt and Scruggs Tribute Band and Steve Smith, Chris Sanders & Hard Road and the DePue Brothers Band.
Bill has taught thousands of bluegrass banjo players in both group and private lessons in a performing career that has extended across thirty-five years of accomplishments. The author of Banjo For Dummies, Bill has taught at most every major banjo and bluegrass camp and workshop in the world and for the last ten years he has co-hosted his own annual camp, the NashCamp Banjo Camp, each fall in the Nashville area with banjo legend Sonny Osborne. When he is not out on the road teaching or performing, he typically maintains a full schedule of private teaching out of his home studio in Albany, California. He has taught five hundred students in the San Francisco Bay Area alone! Bill holds a Master’s Degree in Music from the University of California, Berkeley and completed the coursework for the PhD. He has taught in the music departments at San Francisco State University, the University of Virginia and Duke University. Among his most well known banjo students are Chris Pandolfi (The Infamous Stringdusters), Greg Liszt (Crooked Still), Wes Corbett, (Joy Kills Sorrow), Erik Yates (Hot Buttered Rum) and Jayme Stone (From African to Appalachia). He’s an awesome teacher and we’re proud to have him on our staff.
www.billevansbanjo.com
Clawhammer Banjo from Scratch—Ivan Rosenberg—Spend a fun-filled weekend learning the "bum-ditty" (aka "basic strum") for clawhammer banjo and how to use it with common chords and basic melodies in a few tunings. It’s easier to get started on clawhammer banjo than any other instrument, and we’ll all be playing real songs by the end of the workshop! We’ll learn some easy backup patterns that you can use while singing or playing with a group, and we’ll learn to incorporate melodies into the clawhammer style using fretted notes, hammer-ons, pull-offs, slides, and (time permitting) some double-thumbing – all while maintaining the rhythmic pulse of clawhammer banjo. You’ll leave with enough to practice until CBA summer camp rolls around! Tab of tunes and exercises will be provided, as well as some soundclips of essential techniques.
How to Prepare: No experience is necessary for this workshop, but it couldn’t hurt to spend a little time trying to get the feel for the basic “bum ditty” strum. It would be beneficial to get at least one lesson with a good banjo teacher before camp, or alternatively, to get a beginning clawhammer banjo video and spend some time on chapter 1 and chapter 2.
Bring: Once you’re positive you’ve packed your tuner, remember to bring your banjo and a capo! It doesn’t have to be an open back banjo, though you may wish to take the resonator off if you have a resonator banjo. If your banjo has extremely low action and a very low bridge, it will be difficult to play clawhammer on it. If you have a question about your banjo set-up, please contact Ivan in advance. Probably the most important thing is that you have a sufficiently long fingernail for playing in the clawhammer style – just a smidge past the end of your fingertip is enough, and a little longer might help. If you’re used to having really short fingernails, remember to let your index and middle fingernails of your “claw” hand grow a bit in the week or two prior to camp. Also, please bring a recording device, notepad, and pen.
Ivan Rosenberg has been performing and recording Dobro and clawhammer banjo music professionally for over a decade. Millions have heard his original songs playing in the background of over 250 television shows. In recent years, he earned an IBMA Award for co-writing the 2009 Song of the Year; played on the CD Southern Filibuster: A Tribute to Tut Taylor (produced by Grammy winner Jerry Douglas); engineered and/or produced albums for some of the most original voices in west coast roots music (Pharis and Jason Romero, The Breakmen, Kevin Brown, Mighty Squirrel, Lee Watson); and performed throughout North America with musicians such as Chris Coole and Chris Jones. Several of Ivan’s original banjo compositions have been featured in Banjo Newsletter, and BNL editor Donald Nitchie wrote: “One of the best instrumental recordings I've heard this year is Ivan Rosenberg's Clawhammer and Dobro. Ivan is a banjo and resonator guitar player who writes simply irresistible tunes in that wide-open, almost-no-man's-land between contemporary bluegrass and old time.”
This is Ivan's eighth time at the California Bluegrass Association Music Camp, and he’s back by popular demand. He’s a fantastic teacher, and we’re always glad to have him join us.
www.ivanrosenberg.com
Clawhammer Banjo, level 2—Chris Coole—Chris will teach his three main right hand clawhammer techniques: the basic strum, drop thumbing, and double thumbing. He'll go over how to play each technique with the best economy of motion, then help you see how each one allows you to add notes and rhythms in different ways, so you’ll have new tools in your musical toolbox. Once you know how they work, you can start to use them with more control to add variations to your playing. Then he’ll move on to the essence of the tune. Ever wonder how players learn tunes on the fly? The trick is the ability to find the key notes of the tune and fit them into the rhythmic framework of your right hand techniques. While working on this, the 5 Ts and a P will be emphasized: Tone, time, touch, technique, tuning and practice. These six elements make or break the music you end up making. Chris will help you look at how you can improve your five "T"s. He'll especially focus on ways you can practice on your own to support the development of these skills and prepare you for ensemble playing. And don't worry, you'll have new tunes at the end of all this! All of the above will get taught within the context of learning some new material. Chris teaches by ear, but will provide tab and recordings of everything covered, at the end of the course.
Prerequisites: This course is level two, so you’re expected to have a basic understanding of clawhammer banjo...you should have a few tunes under your belt at least.
Bring some sort of recording device.
Chris Coole is a Toronto based musician who specializes in bluegrass and old-time music. He has recorded ten critically acclaimed CDs with Arnie Naiman, Erynn Marhsall, Ivan Rosenberg and The Foggy Hogtown Boys. Over the years Chris has performed and taught at festivals and workshops across North America, Europe and Israel. In 2009 he released his first solo project Old Dog - Five new original songs mixed with three covers (The Band, John Hartford and Dave Dudley), and a few traditional tunes to create a unique and atmospheric roots music album. “Chris' banjo playing is, frankly, incomparable” (Penguin Eggs Magazine) This is Chris’ first time teaching at the CBA Music Camp, and we’re pleased to have him join us.
www.chriscoole.com
Photo by Mike Melnyk
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