The banjo is a plucked stringed instrument with a circular body and fretted neck. Its roots lie in the French and British colonies of Africa, where instruments made from a hollowed-out gourd covered with animal skin, bamboo neck and catgut strings were popular. Particularly associated with celebrations and dancing, these instruments went by various names including banza and ...
such as antique cymbals, tam tams and gongs. In Spain, a revival of the guitar was underway, started by Francisco Tarréga. In the American Deep South the banjo became popular among African-American workers, anticipating its adoption into early jazz groups. Nationalism was partly responsible for a surge of interest in folk instruments, such as the balalaika ...
that seem to have an ill-defined place in other types of music have come to characterize the country strain. One of the earliest and most enduring of these is the banjo – that homely mainstay of early vaudeville that is one of the most recognizable sounds in country recording. It has survived and been given a new lease of life in ...
thimbles. Resonator Guitar The early-twentieth century also saw the development of the resonator guitar. This technology used metal discs that acted in a similar way to the skin on a banjo, amplifying the soundwaves generated by the strings. The resonator guitars were somewhat louder than their wooden siblings. The Arrival of the Dobro In the 1920s, a refinement to ...
being with the invention of foot pedals for the bass drum and hi-hat in the jazz bands of the 1920s, in which drums, bass and rhythm guitar, banjo or piano formed the rhythm section. Previously, the bass drum and snare drum were placed side by side and played with sticks, or the bass drum was placed ...
A musical ensemble is a group of two or more musicians who have come together to play music. In theory, an ensemble could contain any number of instruments in any combination, but in practice, certain combinations just don’t work very well, either for musical reasons or because of the sheer practicality of getting particular instruments and players ...
strings mainly acting as drones. Sometimes the uppermost string is a short chanterelle string played on the off-beat in the same way as the fifth string on the American five-string banjo – a descendant of the West African spike-lutes. Some spike-lutes have a soundbox that is circular because it’s made from a gourd (or occasionally a tin can). This type have ...
This range means that entire balalaika orchestras can be created using the one instrument, often backed up by the bayan (a Russian accordion), tambourines and various flutes and pipes. Banjo In 1688 the physician and naturalist Hans Sloane came across an instrument in Jamaica which he noted down as the ‘strum-strum’. This was probably an early banjo, which had ...
to Europe. It became particularly successful as part of the British music-hall tradition, or variety acts that performed during the Second World War. Introduction | Stringed Instruments Instruments | Banjo | Stringed ...
, Buck Owens and neo-traditionalist divas like Iris DeMent and Gillian Welch. Some have even hailed from unlikely places such as New Jersey (Eddie Rabbitt) and New England (progressive bluegrass banjo masters Bill Keith and Dan Tyminski). Canada has also produced its share of artists: long-time Grand Ole Opry favourite Hank Snow, easy listening country-pop diva Anne Murray and alternative ...
peers. But as an innovative and inventive guitarist, he stands alone at the genre’s acme. Aside from being a master of such traditional fingerstyle techniques as Travis picking and banjo rolls, Legg has introduced entirely new techniques to the vernacular. His use of banjo tuners with carefully placed stops to enable mid-phrase pitch modulations is downright revolutionary. And while ...
In 1995, Alison Krauss (vocals, fiddle, b. 1971) achieved a level of success no other bluegrass act had ever matched. Her 1995 retrospective album, Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection, went double platinum, and she won the CMA Awards for Single, Female Vocalist, Vocal Event and Emerging Artist as well as the ...
(Vocals, bass, steel guitar, banjo, saxophone, b. 1948) Born in Texas and raised in California, Mandrell is an all-round instrumentalist. Starting in The Mandrell Family Band, she was playing steel guitar in Las Vegas nightspots by the time she was 16 – by which time she had also appeared regularly on the Johnny Cash ...
(Vocals, guitar, 1902–31) Barbecue Bob Hicks was a mainstay of the 1920s Atlanta scene. His 12-string guitar technique featured percussive, banjo-like flailing and sometimes a bottleneck slide, instead of the rag-style fingerpicking often associated with the Southeast. Hicks recorded over 60 sides for Columbia, including his trademark ‘Barbecue Blues’ (he had a day job at a ...
(Banjo, pedal steel guitar, b. 1939) Keith grew up in Boston, but he fell in love with bluegrass and mastered the Scruggs roll so well that he could play fast, fluid fiddle tunes on the banjo. He founded a duo with college roommate Jim Rooney (vocals, guitar, b. 1938) and in 1963 joined Bill Monroe. ...
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