Playing Since: 2002
Experience Level: Novice
sgdesertrat1 has made 1 recent addition to Banjo Hangout
Interests:
[Jamming] [Socializing]
Occupation: Computer Programmer
Gender: Male
Age: 42
My Instruments:
Banjo (Mostly Clawhammer)
Favorite Bands/Musicians:
Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, Old Crow Medicine Show, Hobart Smith and others.
Classified Rating: not rated
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Profile Info:
Visible to: Public
Created 2/27/2012
Last Visit 2/11/2021
My name's Dan Moore. I got my banjo in 2002 as a birthday present along with Geoff Hohwald's book on Scruggs style playing and Wayne Erbsen's "Complete Ignoramus" book on Clawhammer. I focused primarily on Scruggs style for about a year and I enjoyed it immensely, but had trouble working out arrangements of songs I liked outside of the bluegrass canon. I also had trouble singing along with my playing. I realize that players like Bela Fleck and John Hartford show these things can be done very effectively with the three finger technique, but I struggled with it.
A year after I got my banjo, my first child was born and my practice time dropped down to nearly zilch, but in the tiny amount of time I did spend, I focused more on Clawhammer. I found singing along and making arrangements of whatever struck my fancy to be a lot easier. I have four kids now and a demanding job and some other time consuming hobbies, but I’ve started practicing again and really want to try to keep it up better than I did last time. I’m primarily working out of Ken Perlman’s “Clawhammer Banjo” book, and I also have “How and Tao”, Tim Jumper’s Banjo songbook, and Dan Levenson’s “Festival Favorites”, all of which I like to play around with. I spend a fair bit of time printing chord progressions of songs I like off the internet and bum dittying along with my singing. Some of my favorite clawhammer players are Hobart Smith, Walt Koken, Ken Perlman, Abigail Washburn and Mike Iverson. Other artists I like include Bob Dylan, John Prine, Bela Fleck, William Elliott Whitmore, Cat Stevens, Tom Waits, Gordon Lightfoot, Bruce Springsteen, Bill Monroe, The Beatles, Buddy Holly, JS Bach. I could go on but I think that gives some idea of where I’m at.
