This is a very interesting thread. I love history.

I remember from when I was a kid sitting watching the Grand Ole Opry at my grandparents house. My grandmother was fussing about Earl Scruggs banjo playing saying she liked to hear the old style like Grandpa Jones played, which she called "frailing".

I like what Dwight Diller said about it to me many years ago. He called it "African Down Picking", and when you study it a little that makes perfect sense. Dwight was once at an event that included some folks from Africa who were playing their traditional instruments. He sat in and played right along with them.

There are many different styles of down picking, I prefer the older descriptive of "Stroke Style", but it was also sometimes called "Guitar Style" a long ways back.

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Originally posted by AndrewD

Blame Pete Seeger ?

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Who apparently learned from Samantha Bumgarner? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samantha_Bumgarner

She's on the cover of the Muller Koehler, Frailing the 5 String Banjo book which was my first instruction book back around 1980. Bum ditty is taught early in this book.

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Originally posted by Lew H

So do we need a word like "frailing" to differentiale bum-ditty from "clawhammer"? Or is bum-ditty a kind of clawhammer? I've never known. I bum-ditty almost exclusively, but people don't know what I'm talking about unless I call it clawhammer. I don't know that "clawhammer" was a thing in the fifties and early sixties. I'd love to learn about that however.

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Some years ago, I mentioned on BHO that there were differences in frailing and clawhammer and I was chastised. At the time my frailing and melodic clawhammer books showed differences. Silly of me to make that mistake but I was younger and a rookie.

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Originally posted by R.D. Lunceford

How did it come to be viewed/taught as the basic clawhammer stroke for so long?

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Why would you invalidate a technique that teaches timing skills and  creates perfectly acceptable music.

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Originally posted by Fathand

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Originally posted by R.D. Lunceford

How did it come to be viewed/taught as the basic clawhammer stroke for so long?

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Why would you invalidate a technique that teaches timing skills and  creates perfectly acceptable music.

I was unaware that I was doing that.  

Ah well,  the question seems to have precipitated a fairly interesting discussion at any rate.

I think the opposite of that. Learning "Bum-Dit-Ty" early in my banjo learning was one of my biggest obstacles to learning good solid rhythm. It is unbalanced due to being only three quarters with a rest thrown into the mix.

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Originally posted by OldPappy

I think the opposite of that. Learning "Bum-Dit-Ty" early in my banjo learning was one of my biggest obstacles to learning good solid rhythm. It is unbalanced due to being only three quarters with a rest thrown into the mix.

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I don't have a horse in this race, since I quit playing clawhammer back around 1975, and just play three finger style.  But I never heard the term clawhammer back then.  Still, I have been hanging around with whatever you want to call yourselves all this time, and it does seem like some of you Bum Ditty a lot more than others, and some seem to more Boom-A-Lac-A.  I think both approaches go way back in tradition.  I believe Bob Buckingham had it dead right, a big attraction of the Bum Ditty is that it matches the basic fiddle shuffle.  Back when I first started picking, a fiddling friend told me it was called the Nashville Shuffle.  But Bum Ditty also matches the timing of the venerable "church lick" on the guitar, where the flat pick first strikes down on the bass note, and then follows up with down and up brushes on the higher strings.  So it's a rhythm pattern that sits at the core of many kinds of traditional folk and country music.

I've made a couple of posts here this morning, and already I am really nervous.  I think I'll go and do my taxes so I can relax some.

Why do we need so many terms. Down-picking or up-picking seems to cover it all.  The same tab works for either.
Count 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +
Down-picking:
1 - Down on a string with the back of a nail (usually index or bird)
+ - Rest or hammer or pull or thumb on a string (usually a lower string than 1)
2 - Down on a string or a few strings with the back of a nail
+ - Thumb on a string, often the 5th, but not always
Repeat for 3 + 4 +

Up-picking:
1 - Up on a string with the nail of the index
+ - Rest or hammer or pull or thumb on a string (usually a lower string than 1)
2 - Down on a few strings with the back of a nail or up on a string
+ - Thumb on a string, often the 5th, but not always
Repeat for 3 + 4 +

These are simple directions. There are more complicated ways of introducing syncopation or slides. . . or playing waltz time.

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Originally posted by Bart Veerman

"Bum ditty," never really thought about that. "One ennuh-two" would be more descriptive. The "June Carter scratch" would also fit.

I've always wondered about the term "clawhammer," actually sounds really weird to me...

Clawhammer? Frailing? When asked, I look them straight in the eyes and tell them I play both styles 

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I have never heard the term "June Carter Scratch", but Maybelle Carter did the "Carter Scratch" on the guitar, which was down on a melody note with the thumb on beat one, down with the back of the index nail across the top strings on beat two and up with the index nail on the + of beat two. . .
That's the first strum I learned in 1961.  Maybelle used her index, but I use my bird finger down and index finger up.
There are hammers, pulls, slides and melody notes that depart from this pattern.

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Originally posted by Jim Yates

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Originally posted by Bart Veerman

"Bum ditty," never really thought about that. "One ennuh-two" would be more descriptive. The "June Carter scratch" would also fit.

I've always wondered about the term "clawhammer," actually sounds really weird to me...

Clawhammer? Frailing? When asked, I look them straight in the eyes and tell them I play both styles 

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I have never heard the term "June Carter Scratch", but Maybelle Carter did the "Carter Scratch" on the guitar, which was down on a melody note with the thumb on beat one, down with the back of the index nail across the top strings on beat two and up with the index nail on the + of beat two. . .
That's the first strum I learned in 1961.  Maybelle used her index, but I use my bird finger down and index finger up.
There are hammers, pulls, slides and melody notes that depart from this pattern.

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You're so right, thanks for the correction!

For me, "fraling" is a word used to describe a person ranting and raving about.

Clawhammer was the technical term I discovered in using the top of the nail to hit strings. I learned the basic technique watching a YouTube video.

Drop Thumb was what I came to that described what I enjoyed hearing.

Tome, "drop thumb" is not a style, but a technique, like "hammering-on" or "pulling-off" or "sliding".
You can use "drop thumb" or any of these techniques in frailing or up-picking.

This could be played in either style. The 1+ in the 2nd measure is drop thumb.


___2_____2___________2_____ ___2___2____5____5______
_________1______1____1_____ _____1___________5______
_________0___________0_____ __________________5______
___________________________ __________________________
____________0____________0_ __________0__________0___