mwc9725e - Posted - 10/24/2009:  11:39:01

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I usually play guitar 3-finger ( thumb and 2 fingers ) style, so I asked myself "why not try it on the old time banjo?". I actually did play bluegrass banjo a few years back, so I decided to give old time 3-finger style a whirl. It's working out pretty good, and one advantage is that there's some ( not as much as you'd think ) carry-over from things I learned on the guitar and bluegrass. Bluegrass, for example, focuses mainly on rolls, and old time playing doesn't -- at least the way I play it.

I suppose as often as I try a new style of playing, I'll never get above the level of "barely competent " at any style, but it sure is fun. And I'm even getting to the point where I switch from one to the other right in the middle of a piece-- clawhammer to 2-or-3 finger back to clawhammer, or vice-versa.

Heck I even spent a few days using a flat pick on my 5-string banjo. Never did make that sound worth continuing, though.

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Edited by - mwc9725e on 10/24/2009 11:42:18

Bill Rogers - Posted - 10/24/2009:  11:51:56

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quote:

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Originally posted by mwc9725e
...I switch from one to the other right in the middle of a piece-- clawhammer to 2-or-3 finger back to clawhammer, or vice-versa.

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I do that a bit; Tom Paley did it all the time back when, superb playing either way. I don't know if he still does. It's a really nice thing to be able to do.

Bill

g-hog - Posted - 10/25/2009:  06:30:04

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30 years ago I played banjo the same way... I didn't do any swtiching back and forth, but I just did my same fingerpicking style as I had done and still do on guitar. I think it makes sense... I believe it would work out well for a 4-stringed banjo (which is way outta my league... so I actually have no idea what I'm talkin' about here, but in my imagination, seems it would work out well)... the fifth string makes it interesting... I think it works out fine for that. I also played some Bluegrass, but always found the rolls clumsy, possibly because I had done so much guitar fingerpicking before I tried Scrugg's style banjo.

Another thing I think sounds really nice on banjo is doing a picking style with two fingers, similar to how Andy Griffith plays guitar on his B & W shows... only on 5-string banjo. It gives an old timey sound to ballads and such, and goes very nicely with singing, in my own opinion. I used to play that a little on banjo too. Now I just clawhammer. I might take up the two-finger approach in addition one of these days if I get psychologically comfortable with doing both.