DVD-quality lessons (including tabs/sheet music) available for immediate viewing on any device.
Take your playing to the next level with the help of a local or online banjo teacher.
Weekly newsletter includes free lessons, favorite member content, banjo news and more.
Premier Sponsors
|
Please note this is an archived topic, so it is locked and unable to be replied to. You may, however, start a new topic and refer to this topic with a link: http://www.banjohangout.org/archive/168006
BanjoDiva - Posted - 01/13/2010: 08:22:17
quote:
Originally posted by Alex Z
Topic initiated.
Fire away!
Ronnie - Posted - 01/13/2010: 08:25:53
IMHO its roots were in the classic styles of the late 19th early 20th centuries.
Thompson began developing his style @1948 inspired by fiddler Bennie Sims. By the 1950's he was working some melodic runs into such as Border Ride and Dixie Hoedown when he was working with Jim and Jesse.
Edited by - Ronnie on 01/13/2010 08:33:44
southerndrifter - Posted - 01/13/2010: 08:39:20
Listen to the playing of banjoist Carroll Best from North Carolina and I think you'll be amazed at what he was doing, as far back as the '30's!
BanjoDiva - Posted - 01/13/2010: 08:46:54
quote:
Originally posted by Ronnie
IMHO its roots were in the classic styles of the late 19th early 20th centuries.
Thompson began developing his style @1948 inspired by fiddler Bennie Sims. By the 1950's he was working some melodic runs into such as Border Ride and Dixie Hoedown when he was working with Jim and Jesse.
BanjoDiva - Posted - 01/13/2010: 08:48:49
quote:
Originally posted by banjo1930
Edited by - BanjoDiva on 01/13/2010 08:49:18
Ronnie - Posted - 01/13/2010: 08:49:35
Carroll Best was indeed amazing!!! I was just listening to some samples on a Barnes and Noble site.
Bill Rogers - Posted - 01/13/2010: 09:16:48
Best said he learned the style from his father (!), which suggests at least one player was doing that in the 1920s. The classic-style recordings could have been an influence if they were available and listened to in the mountains.
steve davis - Posted - 01/13/2010: 09:19:24
I'm just glad the melodic style had origins.
I like how it works with my Franco-American fiddle buddies.
Whoever started it,thanks a lot.
Goldstarman - Posted - 01/13/2010: 09:33:36
Lynwood this is interesting I was just listening to some of his stuff it wasnt just melodic it was in my opion from what Ive geard maybe better (in some aspects) thatn the other guys, more mature I should say even more modern. How do we know he was doing this in the 30s and 40s?
Marcello - Posted - 01/13/2010: 09:40:25
In Italy the melodic style was brought by the great Bill Keith with a method that together with a great banjoist Italian Enzo Longo. I have the fortune to meet many banjoist melodic, but for my part I remain enamored of the style of Alan Munde. With her elegance and technique is able to write WONDERFUL SONGS.
robbif - Posted - 01/13/2010: 09:41:53
My apologies for any repetition - I just posted a lot of this in the new topic on Bill Keith.
You can see my 2003 Grey Fox video of Bill's workshop.
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_li...C1110AC78D2D
You can also see him in my 2008 and 2009 Banjo Masters Workshop videos.
http://frobbi.org/gfbm08.html
http://greyfoxbluegrass.com/gfblog/...njo-masters/
It was only after the 2008 Grey Fox that I was surprised and honored that Bill
(and his banjo picker webmaster Thor) had also placed the 2003 and 2008 videos
on his website! http://www.beaconbanjo.com/tab/index.cfm
You can also hear the Bill Keith Band in my 1981 recording from the Towne Crier in Beekman, NY.
http://frobbi.org/audio/BillKeithBa...981-Set1.mp3
http://frobbi.org/audio/BillKeithBa...981-Set2.mp3
Bill also participated in the pilot program for the Bluegrass in the Schools program by the Hudson Valley Bluegrass Association. http://frobbi.org/advbgu1.html
There's also a detailed article in the Jan 2010 Banjo Newsletter about Marc Horowitz, including a discussion about melodic style and Bill's influence.
Edited by - robbif on 01/13/2010 09:42:54
sjyokel - Posted - 01/13/2010: 10:02:28
quote:
I have the fortune to meet many banjoist melodic, but for my part I remain enamored of the style of Alan Munde. With her elegance and technique is able to write WONDERFUL SONGS.
southerndrifter - Posted - 01/13/2010: 10:06:45
quote:
Originally posted by Goldstarman
Lynwood this is interesting I was just listening to some of his stuff it wasnt just melodic it was in my opion from what Ive geard maybe better (in some aspects) thatn the other guys, more mature I should say even more modern. How do we know he was doing this in the 30s and 40s?
Ronnie - Posted - 01/13/2010: 10:25:19
Hang in there, Reggio! We understand what you are saying! I could not do so well in Italian!!
Thor - Posted - 01/13/2010: 10:52:23
quote:
Originally posted by southerndrifterquote:
Originally posted by Goldstarman
Lynwood this is interesting I was just listening to some of his stuff it wasnt just melodic it was in my opion from what Ive geard maybe better (in some aspects) thatn the other guys, more mature I should say even more modern. How do we know he was doing this in the 30s and 40s?
There are some recordings of Mr. Best from the later '30's, early '40's that demonstrate his "classical" style of finger-picked banjo. There is no way to prove that his playing influenced people like Keith and Thompson, but it's for certain that the "melodic" style had been utilized (albeit, in a different style of music) way before those guys came along.
WildJimbo - Posted - 01/13/2010: 11:07:31
Let's be careful with how much we fudge our dates...
Carroll Best was born in 1931 and didn't begin playing publicly until he was 10 or there abouts. So, I doubt there are any recordings of him from the late 30s.
Bobby Thompson was born in 1937 and didn't start playing until he was 14 or so (1951). He was very likely not developing his melodic style in 1948 -- it would have been more like 1958 (from various interviews with Bobby).
Edited by - WildJimbo on 01/13/2010 11:18:15
Alex Z - Posted - 01/13/2010: 11:10:32
I have the Carroll Best recording. Not at all "classical" but rather fiddle tune oriented, with (to my ear) fingerings much like Mr. Keith and Mr. Thompson would do. Very polished arrangements, not at all rudimentary.
As Thor says, there is the possibility -- if not even likelihood -- of independent origination and development of these melodic techniques.
So, it might be productive to separate the question of "first" from "influenced by." It is possible to not be "first," yet not influenced by whoever was "first."
The development of the melodic style might end up being quite different from the development of the Scruggs style -- where many stories abound regarding players living in the same area, visiting each other, hearing each other at performances, etc.
Scooter Muse - Posted - 01/13/2010: 11:34:45
I would have to go with Carol Best -- and, according to Barry Palmer, Thompson was not too far away from him and Barry thinks Thompson was influenced by Best to go that route. A lot of us have the bootleg tape (cd now) with Bobby Thompson and Keith.(Rual Yarbrough gave me one in the late 70's) ..All I know on that one is that Bobby is doing some incredible stuff....I'll leave it at that.
Ukeridge - Posted - 01/13/2010: 11:54:50
Long ago, when I played the stupid guitar, I thought, man am I being lazy only learning scales in a linear (i.e. single string) way. I figured, mistakenly, that any accomplished player would have figured out how to play all his scales hopping around the strings as well as the usual way. Later I started playing the ukulele, then the banjo. When I discovered the melodic style I started applying it to the ukulele (which also has a high top string). After I got a few scales and melodies down I showed them to a serious ukulele friend of mine. The next day, entirely coincidently, someone handed him an obit of a ukulele player who had done just what I'd been doing, but to mastery, long before I or Thompson or Keith played around with it (forget his name, sorry). Short version: it's a natural thing to do.
Goldstarman - Posted - 01/13/2010: 11:58:27
Ive been listening and reading alot today about Mr Best after reading this post, after hearing what Tony T had to say and others it seems that maybe the role of Thompson and Keith in the true history of the banjo are a little different than what it is. According to best as a matter of fact he showed Thompson some licks and tunes, something Bobby said he didnt remember.
Laurence Diehl - Posted - 01/13/2010: 12:03:47
I am not so interested in who invented the style or who should get credit for it - that determination will always be fuzzy at best. I am much more interested in who developed the style, who innovated and promoted it. What was the tune that made you sit up and take notice, the one that made you say "I have GOT to learn to play like that!"
For many of us in Europe at the time, that tune was Devils Dream...and being a Bluegrass Boy didn't hurt either 
Laurence
rexhunt - Posted - 01/13/2010: 12:10:57
Melodic 5 string playing dates back to SS Stewart's day. His banjo instruction pamphlets clearly demonstrate how to pick the banjo with the thumb, index, and middle finger and most of the printed music was for melody, not accompanyment. Recordings from the late 1800's and early 1900's by Vess Osman, Fred VanEps, and Fred Bacon are clearly as complex as anything Keith or Thompson were doing in the 60's - they were just doing them with bare fingers on gut strings rather than resonated tonering banjos with metal fingerpicks.
This is pretty scratchy but it's a good example. I heard Tony Trischka do this almost as well http://memory.loc.gov/diglib/ihas/l...default.html
Rex
Edited by - rexhunt on 01/13/2010 12:22:54
Scooter Muse - Posted - 01/13/2010: 12:39:56
Got to agree with Laurence as far as when I was exposed to it...the Devils Dream/Sailors Hornpipe medley by Keith. That changed me -- that and hearing Randal Morton play the first time. By the way - that banjo that Keith cut that track on - is owned by Herb Trotman in Homewood, AL at Fretted Instruments. Played it not to long ago.
trapdoor2 - Posted - 01/13/2010: 12:40:10
Playing fiddle tunes 'note for note' exists in the earliest of Banjo tutors, Howe's 1851 and Briggs 1855. Although the piece "Devil's Dream" in Briggs is intended to be played 'stroke style' it is almost all melody.
Early three-finger pieces (1870's) include much of the basis for today's 'melodic' style but the use of adjoining and open strings to play scales was very limited, players preferred to work out of closed positions and play melodic/chromatic runs using what is today called "single string". Fretting the 5th string, for instance, was virtually unknown. It happened but very rarely.
By the 1900's, all the elements for 'melodic' are there...check out "Dixie Medley" (Van Eps, 1921) http://www.archive.org/download/Dix...dley_vbr.mp3 By the time of this recording, Mr. Van Eps had been playing (and recording) this stuff for over 20 yrs.
Just as a side note, Felix Arndt (composer of "Nola") was Van Eps' piano player. No wonder it sounds so good on the banjo!
edit: Rex, you got there while I was writing...that's a great example. Ossman was a great player and those Berliner recordings were generally cut in the 1896-7 time frame. I find it very cool that it was written by Sousa in 1896...fresh music!!
Edited by - trapdoor2 on 01/13/2010 12:52:34
Goldstarman - Posted - 01/13/2010: 12:44:30
Yep, i can see how all the parts were there.. for sure, but not in the form that most consider Melodic, maybe in precise terms but I think when you say melodics the first thing a banjo player thinks of is the modern melodic style ala Keith or Thompson, and it sounds liek Best may have been a pioneer and before those guys
BanjoLink - Posted - 01/13/2010: 13:23:52
quote:
Originally posted by WildJimbo
Let's be careful with how much we fudge our dates...
Carroll Best was born in 1931 and didn't begin playing publicly until he was 10 or there abouts. So, I doubt there are any recordings of him from the late 30s.
Bobby Thompson was born in 1937 and didn't start playing until he was 14 or so (1951). He was very likely not developing his melodic style in 1948 -- it would have been more like 1958 (from various interviews with Bobby).
The KIDD - Posted - 01/13/2010: 13:30:22
Yeah , I can remember gettin Carrols CD bout 20 yrs ago. I couldnt get the plastic wrap off fast enough. I was in HOT pursuit of Forked Deer and Grey Eagle and maybe another Fishers at the time and hadnt heard anything yet that spun my spurs. As I listened , I found that Carrol's approach was too pattern oriented and lacked important scale connector notes as well as a real comprehensive melody depiction certain tunes. Over these last 20 yrs Ive learned 100's more fiddle tunes of course as well as all the ones on his (Say Old Man) album, and NOW realize how unnique he was!!!..What a BRAT I was for dissin him back then..
Hearin a banjo played that way in the 30'sand 40's had to be trippin!..Im listening right now and have a totally different opinion..Maybe I have grown up ...A little....
Tuneager - Posted - 01/13/2010: 13:41:20
This thread is going to make me dig up some video I personally shot of Carroll Best (very humble, kind man) playing his style along with Pat Cloud and Ken Perlman. I was blown away by listening to Carroll Best, not flashy at all, but oh so tasteful, the notes just cascaded off his fingers. Also, another concert video I shot of Mr. Best with Bob Black. I'll post them soon as I can.
pearcemusic - Posted - 01/13/2010: 13:45:03
quote:
Originally posted by Tuneager
This thread is going to make me dig up some video I personally shot of Carroll Best (very humble, kind man) playing his style along with Pat Cloud and Ken Perlman. I was blown away by listening to Carroll Best, not flashy at all, but oh so tasteful, the notes just cascaded off his fingers. Also, another concert video I shot of Mr. Best with Bob Black. I'll post them soon as I can.
gDGBD - Posted - 01/13/2010: 14:16:39
If memory serves there's a clip of Best and Bob Black on the videotape from the first Tennessee Banjo Institute.
Tuneager - Posted - 01/13/2010: 14:39:12
quote:
Originally posted by gDGBD
If memory serves there's a clip of Best and Bob Black on the videotape from the first Tennessee Banjo Institute.
corcoran - Posted - 01/13/2010: 15:03:09
This is an interesting discussion, and an important one from a historical perspective – that is, if you care about the derivation of banjo styles. When I started playing, in around 1961, the debate among my friends was about the relative primacy of Earl Scruggs versus Don Reno. In other words, who started playing the style first, and who was influenced by the other? The few who were sophisticated enough threw the name of Snuffy Jenkins into the mix and raised the question of his influence on Scruggs and Reno. Before the Scruggs/Keith book came out in 1968, with its important historical information, most of us knew nothing about Rex Brooks, or Murph Gribble, or Smith Hammett, or Mack Woolbright, or Johnnie Whisnant, or any other 3-finger pickers who might have preceded Scruggs and Reno.
But around 1963 the topic of discussion shifted. Weissberg and Brickman came out with their LP “New Dimensions in Banjo and Bluegrass,” which featured melodic playing, and people became aware of Bill Keith, who had recorded melodic banjo with Red Allen and Frank Wakefield and was also playing and recording with Bill Monroe. And most of us knew of Bobby Thompson’s semi-melodic breaks on “Border Ride” and “Dixie Hoedown,” with Jim and Jesse. I say “semi-melodic” because, to my ears at least, in those early recordings Thompson was groping towards melodic playing, but with a style that was not fully realized and fleshed out like Keith’s playing was subsequently. So, then just as now, people began debating whether Bill Keith or Bobby Thompson was the originator of melodic playing.
Then along came the 1990s, and with it the revelation that Carroll Best, a pretty obscure banjo player from North Carolina, had been playing melodic style since he was a teenager in the 1940s, well before either Thompson or Keith began playing melodics. As word leaked out about Best in the 1990s, various people on bgrass-l provided information about him. I saved those messages that I knew about and will quote from them below. After the Carroll Best CD came out a few years ago, in 1999, another spate of discussion ensued. I will provide quotes below that may help to enlighten the discussion. Since some of these people obtained their information from Carroll Best himself, it is worth giving their comments and testimony due consideration::
First, where did Best’s melodic style come from? Some have claimed that he learned from his father. But here is what Jack Hatfield said (bgrass-l, 2002): “Carroll told me he fashioned his tunes from hearing his mother play fiddle. He never mentioned his father playing anything, or learning the ‘melodic’ banjo style from anyone ... He said he figured out his own way to interpret fiddle tunes his mother played ON THE FIDDLE, and that he did it long before Keith or Thompson.”
One of the real scholars in this area is Frank Godbey, who wrote the liner notes on Best’s CD “Say Old Man, Can You Play the Banjo?” Frank told me this (personal communication, 2008): “It seemed clear to me that, in Carroll's area of NC, and particularly within his own extended family, there had been banjo players playing in the style he adopted (and perfected) for more than a few generations. While I had no names, dates, locations other than what he said about his immediate family members, I'm convinced that Carroll's style was the product of those influences, and that his playing pre-dated any/all those who popularized ‘fiddle’ style playing in subsequent years. IMO, his general anonymity was just a matter of Carroll being relatively isolated, from a commercial exposure standpoint, compared to the others. And he was a modest, humble man who didn't really seek attention; he just played what he played for the enjoyment of it, and that it brought pleasure to folks was a bonus.”
Second, what about the claims that Carroll Best showed melodic stuff to Bobby Thompson and Bill Keith long before they became known for melodics? Steve Goldfield reported this on bgrass-l (1996): “Carroll told me that he'd played for Bill Keith once while Bill was with Bill Monroe. I asked Bill Keith about that, and he said he honestly had no memory of it. Bill told me that if he'd heard somebody playing like that back then, he thinks he definitely would remember it.“ Joe Wilson produced Best’s CD, and he stated this (bgrass-l,1996): “Carroll Best recalled a Keith visit before he played. ... What Carroll was saying was that Keith didn't play during his visit to his home at the time of one of the old Asheville Mountain Dance and Folk Festivals. But Bobby had considerably more interaction with Carroll than Keith. They were friends when both were playing on WLOS-TV in Asheville. Bobby was playing with Carl Story, Carroll with the Morris Brothers ... Bobby was very candid about Best being his source when I talked to him about it in 1976.” According to Kirk Randleman (bgrass-l, 2001), “Bill Keith visited Carroll in the early 60's when he was brought out to Carroll's house by George Rice, a guitar player from Asheville.” And Jack Hatfield stated (bgrass-l, 2001), “Carroll said Keith came to visit him on one of his pilgrimages down South. He saw Carroll playing melodic style (Carroll simply called it ‘Fiddle Style’) long before Keith won the Philly Folk festival banjo contest (in 1962 I believe), which may have been the first time ‘melodic’ style was noticed by the folk/bluegrass banjo world at large.” Minor correction: Bill Keith won the banjo contest at the Philadelphia Folk Festival in 1961, with a fully fleshed-out version of “Devil’s Dream” and “Sailor’s Hornpipe.” So if Best influenced Keith before then, it would have to have been in the late 1950s or early 1960. Keith does not recall meeting Best then.
The testimony thus seems consistent in suggesting that Bobby Thompson and Carroll Best knew each other in the 1950s, and that Best influenced Thompson’s playing. (See Wilson’s statement above, about “... Best being his [Thompson’s] source...”). But if Keith was influenced by Carroll Best, it would have to have been before the early 1960s, and the testimony above is conflicting about the time line of their earliest interaction, or whether they even knew each other. While acknowledging his awareness of Bobby Thompson’s proto-melodic playing with Jim and Jesse, Keith maintains that he worked out melodic style on his own, around 1960, after being influenced by Don Reno’s playing on “Banjo Signal” and after jamming on fiddle tunes with a neighbor originally from Nova Scotia. Indeed, in an article about Carroll Best in Banjo Newsletter, Tony Trischka (1992) reports that he was unaware of Carroll Best until 1990, and that Bill Keith was equally unaware. He quotes Keith,”...It shocked me too. It was absolute news to me. It's great. Where was he all my formative years? I didn't see anyone else doing it when I was learning. If I had, I probably would have copied it. I think the technique goes back as far as classic banjo. Remember, I wasn't the one who called it 'Keith Style'. It vindicates the technique, that people used it that long ago, and will continue to use it in the future."
Third, what about the influence that Keith and Thompson might have had on each other? In Trischka’s book Melodic Banjo (1976), here is what Keith said: "I had heard my Jim and Jesse records…and had learned 'Border Ride' and…'Dixie Hoedown'…So I admit to having been influenced by him. And it doesn't seem likely that he escaped some influence from me if he was listening to the Opry. ....During the time I was playing with Bill Monroe I was not influenced by Bobby Thompson to any extent. I have to feel that it was my stuff at that point." Here’s what Bobby Thompson said (in Melodic Banjo, 1976) about his influences: "(In the late 1950s) Benny Sims (a fiddler) made the suggestion…He kind of gave me the idea to see the banjo play note-for-note like a fiddle tune…The first tune I worked out was 'Arkansas traveler'.... Bill (Keith) went farther with melodics than I had, 'cause I'd kind of stalled out and pretty much forgotten about it…I don't know if he got anything from me or if he just run up on it same as I did."
Finally, what about Eric Weissberg and Marshall Brickman, whose “New Dimensions” album in 1963 was the first tutorial many of us had in melodic banjo? Weissberg said this (in Melodic Banjo, 1976): "…In the early 60s I was starting to experiment very slowly with semi-melodic stuff. I wasn't playing full tunes melodically, but was doing little riffs that had that kind of style in them.… Then I met Bill (Keith)…The first thing he played was 'Salty Dog.' It was another staggering thing … I certainly have to give credit to Bill for really going through with it all the way." Brickman’s melodic playing was even more out there than Weissberg’s, but I have not been able to find any interviews with him.
Where does all this leave us? From my perspective, there are no absolute and conclusive answers (I don’t think that evidence in life ever leads to absolute and conclusive answers, but that’s a topic for a discussion elsewhere). However, I do think it is safe to suggest that although we cannot trace the history definitively, melodic style evolved, probably to an extent independently, in several different locales, at somewhat different times (i.e., Best, then Thompson, Keith, Weissberg and Brickman). And this does not even take into account the playing of classical banjo players and others in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. As others have commented in this discussion, many of those earlier player sound like they were incorporating melodic and single-string passages in their playing.
Furthermore, it does seem clear that Keith and Thompson influenced each other. The influence of Carroll Best is less certain. The evidence/testimony seems to suggest that Carroll Best influenced Bobby Thompson’s playing in a way that led Thompson to develop his own version of melodic style. The evidence of Best’s influence on Keith is far less clear. Regardless of whether Keith and Thompson were inspired by Best, however, they took the "fiddle style" in a different direction, merging it more seamlessly into Scruggs style and introducing elements of jazz (Keith) and blues (Thompson).
At least, that's how I see it.
Michael
Edited by - corcoran on 01/16/2010 09:14:27
BanjoDiva - Posted - 01/13/2010: 15:29:16
quote:
Originally posted by BanjoLinkquote:
Originally posted by WildJimbo
Let's be careful with how much we fudge our dates...
Carroll Best was born in 1931 and didn't begin playing publicly until he was 10 or there abouts. So, I doubt there are any recordings of him from the late 30s.
Bobby Thompson was born in 1937 and didn't start playing until he was 14 or so (1951). He was very likely not developing his melodic style in 1948 -- it would have been more like 1958 (from various interviews with Bobby).
I gotta go with Jim on this one. I knew Carroll pretty well and played with him a number of times. I think Carroll was one of the first to really perfect that style, but his style was not exactly like anyone else I ever heard - it was his own - but definitely melodic. If I remember correctly from many conversations with him, I thought that he developed that style over the years and I would guess that he would certainly not have perfected it in his early years - guessing here that there are no recordings of him in the 40's - heck maybe even the 50's.
Carroll told me he developed the style mainly by listening to fiddle players on the radio - he particularly mentioned Howdy Forrester. My favorite of all of his tunes was the Clarinet Polka, I've heard others do it, but not like Carroll. I can also say that if he ever missed a note, I never saw it!
In addition to his great skill, he was an even nicer and humble person!
) from? If he influenced Thompson, it must have been from around here (upstate SC) somewhere.Brett - Posted - 01/13/2010: 15:32:03
if one wanted to sample some Carroll Best (I've never heard of him), what's out there? I'm sorry I'm ignorant, I never heard of him.
steve davis - Posted - 01/13/2010: 15:36:11
I believe there could have been examples of melodic playing in out of the way places
where nothing got recorded many years ago.
Alex Z - Posted - 01/13/2010: 15:59:49
A compilation of Carroll Best recordings is on this CD, 36 tracks.
"Say Old Man, Can You Play the Banjo," Carroll Best, Copper Creek Records, CCCD-0175, published 1999.
One of my favorites. Anyone desiring to render an opinion of the origin of the melodic style would find this CD very interesting.
Nosferatu - Posted - 01/13/2010: 16:00:17
Bobby told me that he was already playing fully melodic when he was with Jim and Jesse. He said that he and Vasser would play in the back seat of the car while going to gigs and then at the gig he'd go back to "Scruggs Style" because it was what others wanted to hear. There were some other things that Bobby let me in on about this topic that I'll not repeat....Ronnie knows what I'm talking about.
Edited by - Nosferatu on 01/13/2010 16:02:05
WildJimbo - Posted - 01/13/2010: 17:58:01
"There were some other things that Bobby let me in on about this topic that I'll not repeat....Ronnie knows what I'm talking about."
...and so quickly it turns into playground rules. "I know something you don't know..."
You know, I know stuff that Bill has told me personally about this topic, but what the heck, I'll keep it to myself too...
Sheesh.
Post the information or keep your secret knowledge secret. If it can be confirmed then what's the issue?
Nosferatu - Posted - 01/13/2010: 18:10:26
It means Jim, that what you read isn't how it always is and some people are polite and not saying what they really feel. I'm saying that there is more to the story and out of respect I'll not let it out of the bag.
Tuneager - Posted - 01/13/2010: 18:58:13
This was an informal jam session I was privileged to be filming in 1992 with melodic pioneer Carroll Best and Pat Cloud. I can't recall the name of the short piece that comes first, but then Carroll and Pat play Soldier's Joy. It was a fine time in life in the presence of some true banjo pioneers. My apologies if the frame rate is a little off, I just didn't feel like adjusting the fps deal once again, and it's fairly close. I wish I knew the name of the guitar player that accompanied Carroll, he did some fine playing himself. Carroll Best, one of the first, if not the first (arguably) banjo player to play in the melodic style. I can post some more if you would like, but don't bicker to death about it. Enjoy!
http://www.banjohangout.org/myhangout/videos.asp
You can also click on the You Tube icon in the bottom rt. hand corner of the screen if you want to watch it on their player in full screen.
The Old Timer - Posted - 01/13/2010: 19:04:36
Well, I've read about the Bobby Thompson and/or Bill Keith comparison since the 1970s. Carroll Best is relatively new to me.
I like to put an iron in the fire on behalf of Don Stover who had worked up some melodic "phrases" as early as the 1950s. I seem to remember Bill Keith offering some kudos to Don for giving him ideas about chaining notes together, but Stover never polymerized those short chains into entire "passages" or breaks.
As far as "developing" the style, I'd say it would have to be the two guys with the early COMMERCIAL success, exposing LOTS of banjo pickers around the world to the style. That's Thompson and Keith. Keith maybe got higher acclaim earlier due to the Blue Grass Boys exposure advantage. And Bill Monroe did got OUT OF HIS WAY to publicize Bill Keith's style. Those are the 2 players I was aware of when I was learning in the 1960s.
I heard little short flashes of melodic "licks" from Douglas Dillard too.
Probably the next COMMERCIALLY important melodic player I saw get wide exposure was Ben Eldridge with the Seldom Scene in the early 70s.
Then maybe Courtney Johnson/John Hartford/early Bluegrass Alliance in early 70s?
I was never wild about the melodic style, so I didn't pay as close attention as I might have!
Brett - Posted - 01/13/2010: 20:18:52
Tuneager, thank you so much for posting that it was truly enjoyable to see to understand the history of who this guy is. Very fine picking by all concerned! Brett.
Tuneager - Posted - 01/13/2010: 22:41:22
Your welcome, I'll post more later when I have the time. I think the man was an incredibly fine gentleman, and whether he was the "first" is irrelevant to me, he no doubt may have been, but he is unquestionably involved in the start of this type of music regardless.
I appreciated Michael (corcoran), taking the time to provide some extensive bibliographic resourced material about Carroll Best, that stands in and of itself, and is much better than "opinion" and vague heresay. Until I see another article that goes into such depth, this debate is rather pointless. Musicians have been ripping each other off for years and not giving credit where credit is due, I've seen it too many times, and you get to a certain point where you don't know what to believe.
It doesn't matter to me who came "first", there's been a lot of "firsts", including the banjo being brought to America by slaves. Maybe the first melodic picker was on a plantation somewhere that never made it commercial, who knows, in fact I think my Great Grandmother once told me about a certain slave that used to sit on the porch with homemade picks playing something she called Devil's Dream note for note with an old fiddler, and all these banjo players would come and steal his material, but she swore me to secrecy as to his identity, as men in black showed up and swore her to silence.
There is a slew of great banjo players and nearly every one of them contributed equally in their own way. Bill Keith, Vic Jordan, Larry McNeely, Alan Munde, Courtney Johnson, Carl Jackson, Pat Cloud, Bill Knopf, Gordon Stone, Marty Cutler, John Hartford, Tony Trischka, Eric Weissberg, Scott Vestal, Jack Hicks, Earl Scruggs, JD Crowe, Ralph Stanley, Don Reno, Eddie Adcock, Bobby Thompson, Roy Clark, Buck Trent, Butch Robins, Doug Dillard, Jerry Garcia, Bob Black, Randal Morton, Roger Sprung, Donnie Allen, and Dave Stype have all been influences and/or favorites of mine.
I think melodic banjo took a huge leap forward with Larry McNeely and Carl Jackson doing things that none of the earlier melodic players could, but do they get the credit they deserve? Commercial success means nothing to me. Courtney Johnson is one of my favorite banjo players of all time, very bluesy, but he was replaced when NGR wanted a more "commercial" sound.
Carroll Best may have not got the "commercial" success of others, and he may not be the "first", but does that make his legacy any less valid? Great musicians are seldom appreciated, many fly under the radar for years. People like to put their own personal idols up on pedestals and claim they're the greatest, I have mine too, but they're mine and I'm not going to try to make them yours.
I'll post some more Carroll Best because I was privileged to meet and videotape him, there's nothing by him on You Tube, and if I can do my little part to show what a fine player and a gentlemen he was then I will consider it an honor.
BR14 - Posted - 01/14/2010: 04:38:17
In a May 1998 interview in BNL, Bobby Thompson said "I can't place Carrol Best. Where's he from?". If Best influenced Thompson it must have been subtle. I have always felt that the definitive origins of the melodic style will never be known; it could have been some back porch picker somewhere (Best?). I think Keith popularized it by virtue of his appearances with Bill Monroe. Thompson gave up on melodic playing for a while because audiences wanted Scruggs style picking. Keith forayed over to the peddle steel. Although not the innovator, IMO Trischka pushed melodic into mainstream consciousness through his book "Melodic Banjo". Out of all the melodic players, Thompson remains my favorite.
Don Borchelt - Posted - 01/14/2010: 04:49:41
Some very interesting stuff in this thread. The Digital Library of Appalachia has 12 recordings of Best, playing with a variety of fiddlers. These are a free download.
Carroll Best recordings from the Digital Library of Appalachia
Best was the first picker I ever saw play melodic style, in the summer of 1970, when he beat me and several other pickers in the banjo contest at the Folk Festival of the Smokies in Gatlinburg. I had been struggling mightily trying to figure out how to play fiddle tunes with my Scruggs style rolls, and my version of Arkansas Traveler that In played was pretty anemic. Best blew us all away when he played Soldier's Joy in the key of D in open G tuning, without a capo, just like he is doing in this video. I even think it's the same banjo. It was an epiphany for me, but I didn't have the nerve to talk to him. I got back home to Cincinnati, and Mack Smith, then one of the proprietors of the Famous Old Time Music Company in Pleasant Ridge, told me about Keith and melodic style, and showed me how it was done.
Hugh, I respect and sympathize with your desire to maintain a confidence of an old friend, but in the end, it is still disingenuous. You leave us to assume the most probable interpretation- that Bobby told you that Best was lying when he claims that he showed Thompson his melodic style in 1955. That could well be. One of the things I have learned after working around politicians for over thirty years, is that ANYONE will lie like a rug when it is a matter of self-preservation or self-promotion. Sometimes you tell a lie by keeping silent, letting someone believe that you said something that you didn't really say. Let's face it, it is possible that Best was lying, or at least stretching the truth a whole lot. The earliest recordings of Best are all from the seventies, long after Keith, Weissberg, and Thompson had all recorded the earliest samples of what we call melodic style. When Tony Trishka interviewed Best for the Banjo Newsletter in 1992, Best first claimed to have played for Keith in 1960, I think it was. When Trishka pointed out that Keith did not come south to work on the book and play with Monroe until several years later, Best changed his story. On the other hand, when Trishka interviewed Thompson in 1998, he said that he had worked up melodic style while he was playing with Jim and Jesse. That appears to conflict with what he said to Hugh, related in the post above. Thompson told Trishka that he didn't remember Best. I am assuming that the quote from Joe Wilson, above ("Bobby was very candid about Best being his source when I talked to him about it in 1976") does not contradict this. So, folks, we don't really know for sure who is telling the truth, and who isn't, but obviously somebody, probably both, are telling stories that are not 100 percent accurate. That's what humans do, either deliberately, or because their memories fail them.
Of course, everyone remembers the famous exchange between Holmes and Watson. Holmes says, "Then, of course, there is the curious incident of the dog barking in the night." Watson counters, "But there was no dog barking in the night." Holmes replies, "Precisely, that is what I find so curious." In all of the testimony from people who have met, listened, and talked to Best over the years, I have never heard anyone say that they heard Best play something melodic before 1960. Best by his own account was playing semi-professionally at the time, that's how he first supposedly ran into Thompson in 1955. It is curious, at least, that no one has come forward to to verify that Best was playing fiddle tunes in the fifties. In fact, my own recollection from 1970 is the earliest one I've heard of, although there was another young bluegrass picker there at the contest who had heard Best play melodic style before. So while I want badly to believe Best's story, I have to admit that there is no proof of it, and the lack of proof is of itself, suspicious. And in fairness, I think the burden of proof is on Best, not Thompson. Best's account is probably the one that is for the most part not true, though I suspect we will never know for certain. He is still a hell of a picker. Now where's my body armor.
Edited by - Don Borchelt on 01/14/2010 05:52:59
Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Privacy Consent (EU/GDPR Only)
Copyright 2026 Banjo Hangout. All Rights Reserved.
