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maxmax - Posted - 02/05/2007: 16:59:26
Hey!
When I started playing banjo (three finger) I used to practise scales all the time. I spent a lot of time with Pat Cloud's "Key to the 5-String Banjo" and I now know myself around the fretboard quite well when tuned to open G. That's the thing though, now a days I don't spend all that much time in open G any more. Do you guys practise scales at all and in that case do you do it in different tunings as well? Or do you just don't bother since you feel that you will probably have a new favorite tuning next month and be lost again?
Thanks,
Max
oldwoodchuckb - Posted - 02/05/2007: 18:30:18
It is always good to familiarize yourself with the scales available in any tuning, but I never stressed scales with my students - they have several failings when it comes to the banjo.
1) Tunes on the banjo usually fall into three modes - Major, Mixolydian, and Dorian. There are a few tunes in other modes and some people turn Dorian into Minor - I won't get into what level of heck they should be relegated to. Furthermore, many tunes are pentatonic and some are hexatonic I suppose you could practice your pentatonic and hexatonic scales as well as Major, Mixo, and Dorian - then of course you have to do Dorian pentatonic PLUS Mixolydian pentatonic and.... I think you can see where this is going. My feeling is that the banjo is supposed to be fun so instead I tend to write out the used notes (essentially a scale) on the same page as tunes and tell my students to go over it a couple times to get the idea. After a few tunes I only do this for new tunings or new modes, etc.
2) There are about 200 - 300 tunings for the banjo. Although many are pretty limited and little used I still find I tend it takes about 5 to 7 tunings to go through most of my common repertoire - and I've dropped a lot of stuff that I used to do simply because I'm too lazy to puddle around with all those tunings. Were I more ambitious I would still use about 12 tunings.
3) Knowing scales can lead to running scales. Old time music is the wellspring of a lot of more modern styles, many of which involve a lot of hot-dogging on scales. This never sounds like old time music. It sounds like the stuff that old time created - Carter Family country for example.
To me running scales always sounds like Nashville circa 1972, when I quit a country rock band to escape that very sound. To others it sounds like newgrass, and to some it sounds like jazzgrass. The main thing is it never sounds like old time to anyone who actually knows what old time sounds like. Oldtime is the turtle of music, a survivor from the distant past. But it is awful easy to paint the shell gaudy colours, creating something that might impress some people today but that is not a turtle and will not survive long. I advise playing the melody and doing rhythmic embellishments - or even going into melodic clawhammer - but stick with melody as the basis of playing.
The Whiskey Before Breakfast variations and a few tunes in "F" tuning are now available on the web at:
http://home.thegrid.net/~fjbrad/id20.html
maxmax - Posted - 02/06/2007: 02:17:16
Thanks oldwoodchuckb! You sure calmed my thought about this.
/Max
