Jay Bird - Posted - 03/27/2012:  07:38:25

I've reached a plateau in my frailing and decided to give thumb lead a try. Any suggestions on how to get started? I really like Clifton Hick's and his music, it is thumb lead...right?

stevel - Posted - 03/27/2012:  07:59:18

clif uses a variety of styles... up-picking, down-picking, index lead, thumb lead, etc.



for thumb lead, try this:



2ftlbanjer.wordpress.com/

Edited by - stevel on 03/27/2012 07:59:42

hoverflytheo - Posted - 03/27/2012:  08:32:54

Although Dock Boggs didn't play strictly thumb lead, lots of his tunes like Danville Girl (f#DGAD), Sugar Baby (gDGCD) and Pretty Polly (f#DGAD) work well with thumb lead / index and middle drone.

That was where I got started with picking. In fact my current banjo / guitar thumb lead style is basically an evolution of that.

As well as Sean's (mojo_monk) site, Hunter Robertson has some videos on 3 finger styles, teaching tunes like Sugar Baby, here: hunterrobertson.com/banjoframe.html

Edited by - hoverflytheo on 03/27/2012 08:34:04

janolov - Posted - 03/27/2012:  11:04:06

I have posted some thumb lead tabs of different levels in the tab archive here at BHO. Go to banjohangout.org/tab/browse.as...p;v=10381 and look at the tabs that have "thumb lead" in the title. 

My recommendation is that you should start with tunes you are already familiar with from the clawhammer side, so if you have any desires of tunes you want to play, so give us a hint.