Posted by JanetB, written by Richard Fraley
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- Play count: 707
Size: 2,825kb, uploaded 6/23/2017 6:43:00 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
For the old-time Tune of the Week, 6/23/17, Maysville is a town in northeastern Kentucky and the past scene of tobacco trade. J.P. Fraley rode in his father's wagon as a child in the 1930's and learned to fiddle this tune from his father. Oddly, the tuning I used for this recording is sawmill. I added a bit of cello banjo for accompaniment.
4 commentsPosted by JanetB, written by Richard Fraley
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- Play count: 284
Size: 1,271kb, uploaded 4/12/2012 10:17:07 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This version of J.P. Fraley's fiddle tune includes banjo, mandolin, and cello banjo. I'm interested to see how the cello banjo can be used for accompaniment.
Add CommentPosted by JanetB, written by John Phillips
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- Play count: 153
Size: 940kb, uploaded 7/2/2022 12:11:07 PM
Genre: Other / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Listening to Joni Mitchell and Carl Baron's vocals, I came up with this banjo solo in sawmill tuning, like Carl plays it for this week's Tune of the Week called Me and My Uncle -- a kind of modern-day cowboy ballad.
Add CommentPosted by JanetB, written by Alice Gerrard
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- Play count: 851
Size: 1,710kb, uploaded 9/2/2016 3:46:41 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This is my first effort using Garage Band which comes with the Mac computer. I played an openback banjo in modal tuning and a cello banjo in open C tuning. Meadows of Dan is a beautiful little town in the mountains of Virginia where Alice Gerrard did lots and lots of field work collecting music. I don't really know what I'm doing with Garage Band, but it seems to have turned out okay today. Send any feedback my way so I can continue learning.
2 commentsPosted by JanetB, written by George Lee Hawkins
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- Play count: 1151
Size: 1,591kb, uploaded 2/10/2015 9:15:31 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
I first heard of this Kentucky fiddler on the old-time Tune of the Week. I've found two sources so far to hear George Lee Hawkins -- the Slippery Hill website and a Traditional Fiddle Tunes of Kentucky cd. When I became aware of this particular tune via BHO member brooklynbanjoboy I looked for more info and read that Mr. Hawkins, born in 1904, heard it as a boy from an elderly fiddler and attempted to reconstruct it much later. He called it Meg Gray, or Maggie Gray, included in Jeffrey Titon's Fiddle Tunes of Kentucky book. It interestingly modulates from minor to major.
6 commentsPosted by JanetB, written by Jake Phelps
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- Play count: 271
Size: 963kb, uploaded 8/9/2014 10:16:14 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This is the third tune I've learned from this historic Kentucky fiddler, Jake Phelps (1885 - 1977). Bruce Greene recorded him and this is one of the tunes Jeff Titon included in his book of Old-Time Kentucky Fiddle Tunes. He describes it in his book as being "well-crafted" and I agree! I used some advanced clawhammer techniques to get the fiddler's notes--the thumb on the first string and an pull-off from a fretted ninth fret to a seventh fret. It was fun and challenging to arrange this one.
3 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 129
Size: 1,140kb, uploaded 6/26/2020 4:21:23 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Learned from my favorite old-time Alabama fiddler James Bryan, who learned it from another Alabama fiddler, Jim Cauthen, who learned it from another one, Henry Lee Hudson of Clarke County, who was taught the older fiddling styles of the 1800's, like that of his father, Joseph Hudson (b. 1860) and other family members.
2 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 387
Size: 1,149kb, uploaded 11/10/2015 7:54:03 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
For the old-time Tune of the Week, 11/7/15, the wanderings of this tune mystify me. With that title it's actually said to have come from Arkansas via a Missouri family who migrated to Oklahoma and then somehow it got to California, my home state, where it was recently taught. It feels like a polka to me and I bet they polka in Michigan.
3 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 277
Size: 1,215kb, uploaded 8/1/2011 7:16:26 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Lets me see calm, reflective water at midnight. There's a bit of tension or longing in the song that resolves with a calm ending.
2 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 751
Size: 1,643kb, uploaded 8/28/2015 5:51:29 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
From the fiddling of Kentuckian John Salyer, this is a three part tune with a modal feel, kind of like a mini-concerto. I'm playing on a Gold Tone cello banjo just recently strung with minstrel nylgut strings and tuned an octave below open A tuning.
Add CommentPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 693
Size: 1,066kb, uploaded 10/29/2014 6:17:37 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
A J.P. Fraley version of this delightful melody. He cited his source as Frank Clay. It sounds more like a hornpipe when I play it.
2 commentsWritten/Posted by JanetB
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- Play count: 775
Size: 996kb, uploaded 12/21/2011 9:11:53 AM
Genre: Other / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
I wrote Miracles on the first night of Chanukah, and have embedded a Chanukah song.
2 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 977
Size: 772kb, uploaded 2/15/2012 7:32:21 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
An old square dance tune I learned.
4 commentsPosted by JanetB, written by Lynn Chirps Smith
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- Play count: 345
Size: 1,564kb, uploaded 9/24/2021 10:52:38 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Chirps Smith is a legendary fiddler in my book. This Tune of the Week is an original by him, brought to my attention from Stephen Rapp, who with his fiddle-playing buddy Paul Kirk, brings us many good tunes. Though the tune is relatively new, it has a sweet old-time feel. I'm playing on a cello banjo to get to the original tuning that Chirps wrote Mississippi Palisades in.
Add CommentPosted by JanetB, written by Bert Payne
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- Play count: 824
Size: 2,128kb, uploaded 10/10/2016 1:10:13 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
For the old-time Tune of the Week, 10/7/16, the amazing duo of Spencer and Rains have released this tune on their DVD/CD "The Spotted Pony." Not much is known here about its author, a fiddler from Kansas named Bert Payne born in 1873. I was able to use Ken Torke's tab to learn the tune and added some cello banjo picked accompaniment. If you don't know what a snagboat is check out this TOTW for some info and pictures.
4 commentsPosted by JanetB, written by Bill Monroe
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- Play count: 271
Size: 971kb, uploaded 7/7/2011 10:13:07 AM
Genre: Unknown/None Chosen / Playing Style: Unknown/None Chosen
Such a pretty waltz...
1 commentPosted by JanetB, written by Jim Reed
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- Play count: 149
Size: 957kb, uploaded 8/8/2017 11:41:35 AM
Genre: Unknown/None Chosen / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Kentucky banjo picker, Jim Reed, was posting for a while on BHO video after video, truly enchanting us with his soft, fluent, melodious 3-finger style. Molly Sue is one of his originals (which he could write instantaneously at will) which is also on his only CD. I learned it yesterday, thinking it has that descending scale (in the A part) I'm looking for and recently posted about on a Sound Off! thread called Kentucky modal tunes. I really think there's a parallel with some Native American music. Kentucky was full of Cherokee Indians at one time. Somehow their traditional music, especially as played on flute, has slipped into our modern mountains. Can it be?
Add CommentPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 142
Size: 1,364kb, uploaded 4/22/2023 12:08:17 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
From the Balfa Brothers Cajun style, the tune is, in English, The Old Wagon -- a nice dance tune. I've liked Cajun music for a long time, though we don't get many presentations on Tune of the Week, so an enjoyable learning journey for me this week. Cajun music apparently doesn't have much clawhammer banjo yet, but it's not too late to add some in!
Add CommentPosted by JanetB, written by D. Dow (1776)
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- Play count: 1022
Size: 1,651kb, uploaded 8/8/2016 3:42:06 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
When I heard BHO members bd and David Colgan play the minstrel version of Money Musk it sounded familiar, but I couldn't place it. It's actually an old Scottish dance tune, notated in a publication dated around 1800. Then I consulted James Buckley's minstrel notation of 1868. Next I discovered it's also a contemporary fiddle tune. With many versions to hear, I chose to play it minstrel-style, then old-time. There's lots more to know about this tune!
2 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 112
Size: 1,376kb, uploaded 2/18/2018 10:24:14 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
For the old-time Tune of the Week, 2/16/18, Moon Behind the Hill was learned by Melvin Wine listening at a dance and remembering it 2 or 3 months later.
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