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Posted by JanetB
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- Play count: 188
Size: 1,544kb, uploaded 6/7/2016 11:00:16 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Tennessee fiddler Charlie Acuff played this one and told the story of the 1886 campaign for governor between two fiddling brothers of different political parties. Bob Taylor won and this was one of the tunes linked to that famous campaign. Charlie said the tune was first called "Old Squeaking Fiddle." It's waltz time, not march, but it all seems to fit in with an unusual story, and very appropriate on this election day.
1 commentPosted by JanetB, written by Bob Wills
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- Play count: 211
Size: 1,471kb, uploaded 3/12/2012 5:45:50 AM
Genre: Other / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
The group I play with on Sundays--the Rough and Ready Fruit Jar Pickers--does a lot of songs that our band leader likes and he used to play pedal steel guitar. So here's Maiden's Prayer, Steel Guitar Rag, and Roly Poly (with some quiet vocals in honor of my new cello banjo arriving this week).
Add CommentPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 86
Size: 1,077kb, uploaded 10/3/2022 10:16:06 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Here's an old tune played by Melvin Wine of WV learned from his father, Bob Wine. The B part goes into another mode, thus the intrigue of the tune. It's a fun one to play.
Add CommentPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 116
Size: 776kb, uploaded 8/23/2021 10:26:09 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
From the fiddle playing of Tommy Jarrell and Jake Blount, and when the singing is added Boll Weevil tells the plight of the farmer victimized by the insect pests that destroyed his cotton crop.
Add CommentPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 1260
Size: 777kb, uploaded 2/8/2013 6:23:48 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Kentucky fiddler William H. Stepp so impressed Allan and Elizabeth Lomax in their 1937 Library and Congress recording, that Mr. Lomax recommended the tune to Aaron Copland who subsequently used it in his famous hoe-down piece in the ballet "Rodeo." The story is well-told by Stephen Wade in his new book The Beautiful Music All Around Us. Mr. Stepp played it an breakneck speed, different from the more charming versions abounding in other old-time recordings, but it was also impressive enough to use in the famous commercial: Beef--It's What's for Dinner.
4 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 247
Size: 1,304kb, uploaded 4/21/2017 9:53:39 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
For the old-time Tune of the Week, 4/21/17, this version comes from North Carolina fiddler (born in TN) Bill Hensley. The alternate title, Whip the Devil Around the Stump fits the music, especially when played at Mr. Hensley's incredible speed.
2 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 588
Size: 1,188kb, uploaded 3/5/2012 6:21:04 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
These two songs are mentioned in Bill Monroe's song "Uncle Penn." His uncle fiddled them at dances, so Monroe grew up hearing them and even accompanying him on guitar.
Add CommentPosted by JanetB, written by James Oswald
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- Play count: 106
Size: 3,096kb, uploaded 9/15/2023 2:10:15 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
An old Scottish reel of the 1700's, sounding just right for a contra dance!
2 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 1071
Size: 989kb, uploaded 11/4/2013 5:44:41 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
I wanted to learn a Franklin George tune after seeing and playing with him at the Berkeley Old-Time Music festival and happened to pick this tune after listening to it as I commuted. It turns out to be a tune he learned from a book and I believe that book to be Samuel Bayard's Dance to the Fiddle, March to the Fife, song #317. It's a song with a long history, some of it dramatically political. I listened to Cathy Fink's version, too, to come up with this one.
3 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 194
Size: 1,580kb, uploaded 5/3/2015 6:19:22 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
For the old-time Tune of the Week, 5/1/15, the second tune was learned recently in a lesson. It reminded me of a similar one we'd learned 40 years ago from Chief O'Neill's book of Irish music, so I happily brushed up on Boys of Bluehill. I think its influence has given more of a lilt to Twin Sisters.
Add CommentPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 444
Size: 805kb, uploaded 12/20/2011 9:02:01 AM
Genre: Traditional / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
It's said in the Library of Congress that Henry Reed learned this from Quince Dillon, the fifer, and that it was a tune used by the British to retreat from their defeat in the Battle of New Orleans. Alan Jabbour recorded Henry Reed.
1 commentPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 1202
Size: 1,675kb, uploaded 4/15/2016 6:40:20 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
My adaptation of Adam Hurt's version resulted from an assignment he gave to explore the Old Cumberland Gap tuning of f#BEAD (though raised one step). Adam's original Brushy Fork of John's Creek was based on Art Stamper and the old-time Tune of the Week has a video of Art's father, Hiram Stamper, playing the tune. Adam played it on the Earth Tones CD on a bottle-neck gourd banjo in SRB tuning (fDGCD). That CD was my inspiration to seek him out as a teacher. Check out this week's TOTW: http://www.banjohangout.org/topic/317352
3 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 1629
Size: 1,400kb, uploaded 1/18/2013 6:28:24 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Learned listening to Ed Haley's fiddling. It's challenging, like running through the brush. Yuck--stickers, ticks, tangles.
5 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 283
Size: 1,293kb, uploaded 7/9/2015 9:49:33 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
For the old time Tune of the Week, June 26, 2015. It's a catchy dance tune named after a mountain in Virginia. Unfortunately something happened to my first uploaded MP3, which won't play at all, and it was suggested that I upload it again.
Add CommentPosted by JanetB, written by Bob Flesher
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- Play count: 242
Size: 632kb, uploaded 12/30/2011 7:36:14 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Listening to Bob Flesher's clawhammer tunes is inspiring, though I play it with 3-finger picking. He's Banjo Hangout's own "Sandy Bob," aka Dr. Horsehair (drhorsehair.com). And a luthier as well, what a talent!
3 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 761
Size: 1,558kb, uploaded 7/1/2017 5:04:53 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
From the playing of Mississippi fiddler John Hatcher in 1939, Buffalo Gals is the old-time Tune of the Week for June 30, 2017. It resembles the familiar Buffalo Gals, but is definitely different. I put the two together so you can hear how they do go together well. I'm playing a small-scale Docs Banjo.
1 commentPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 820
Size: 1,315kb, uploaded 1/25/2014 1:53:18 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
For the TOTW, 1/24/14, from the fiddling of Earl Collins.
4 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 55
Size: 3,168kb, uploaded 12/28/2024 3:29:45 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
In topics:
TOTW 12/27/2024 - Bumblebee in a Jug
Arranged from a combination of two old fiddlers. The oldest one is Kentucky's George Lee Hawkins. Then a newer one from Alan Jabbour helped me to smooth it out. Also listen to Tom Harleman's version on the Tune of the Week and hear an active bumblebee who you might not want to see except safely in his stopped-up jug!
Add CommentPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 136
Size: 1,500kb, uploaded 8/8/2020 9:27:25 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Learned from the fiddling of WV Jimmy Triplett who learned from Burl Hammons. It's one of those crooked West Virginia tunes in modal tuning, symbolic to me of this special enclave of engaging old-time music. It was hard to tab because I didn't know which measures to make crooked. In the end, it's like a winding river -- it should have no measures or divisions. It just flows the way it flows...The cello banjo ended up tuned to a sawmill tuning with a raised 5th string to play along with Jimmy's recording (the whole album happily and cheaply available on Bandcamp).
4 commentsPosted by JanetB
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- Play count: 172
Size: 1,474kb, uploaded 8/10/2019 9:23:58 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
From the playing of WV fiddler Israel Welch as played by Noah Cline for the Tune of the Week, 8/9/19. Israel fiddled so well that even in the army when stationed in Newfoundland during WWII he entertained the troops. Played on a Gold Tone cello banjo.
3 commentsCopyright Notice:
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