Your question reminded me that in the 1970s in Louisville KY, the Fall City Ramblers regularly had a clarinet player perform and record with them. My initial reaction was surprise, but a clarinet worked quite well!

Go for it!

We had a lady in our jams that used to play both tenor banjo and tenor guitar. She would bring both to the jam and pick on whichever one she wished. Worked out fine in our jams. She very seldom took a break on either instrument, but she would start a song and sing and pick and it sounded just fine.

I've played bluegrass with pianos,horns,synthesizers,marimbas,ukeles,melodicas,button accordions and thumb pianos.
Every once in a while The Neon Valley Boys' mando player would grab his clarinet and play Klezmer style riffs to Old Joe Clark,etc.
Klezmer mixes very well with bluegrass.

My brother played excellent clarinet and taught me the Clarinet Polka.

In high school in the ‘60’s, a bandmate came back from seeing the Smothers Brothers at KCU, go ‘Roos, kangaroos that is.
He was flipped out over a plectrum player using a flat pick to simulate bluegrass patterns all night!! Is that bluegrass?
Syncopation and all? Sounds hard as a rock, but he insisted it worked, so, ok by ears for any other porpoise but a tuna, lobster and never flounder………

So I’d like to hear that, permission granted!!

If it stays in tune, go for it. Traditional bluegrass gurus might raise an eyebrow or two , but most jams will welcome it.

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Originally posted by chuckv97

If it stays in tune, go for it. Traditional bluegrass gurus might raise an eyebrow or two , but most jams will welcome it.

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I've been to jams that wouldn't.. just sayin'.

The thing a LOT of people forget is that Bill Monroe's banjo player before Earl was Stringbean, who was a clawhammer player, and was largely there because he was also a talented comedian, and thus a core component of the show. And it was ALL about the show.

In fact, Lester Flatt is well-reported to have told Monroe that the band didn't need a banjo player, until he heard Earl, and then told Monroe "If you can afford him, hire him."

People forget that the first time Earl appeared on the Grand Ol' Opry, it was revolutionary. Nobody had ever heard anything like it - the mix of Monroe's melodies and rhythms were as shocking as The Ramones or the Sex Pistols. But not as controversial: people absolutely loved it. It was exciting, and new, and it launched a new genre of music: rooted in country and string band, but absolutely unique. We are the heirs of that unplanned revolution.

I would not be averse to a tenor player showing up at a jam, provided that they had decent technique and understood the music. Sometimes, less is more - something I learned a long time ago. The song is the star, not the singers or the soloists. I can easily see a tenor banjo player thinking of his or her role in a bluegrass ensemble as essentially the same as a mandolin player - which would be a GREAT way to think of it. Chops on the two and four most of the time. Breaks that are respectful of the backup.

That could be a LOT of fun!

Choonk!

I thought it was Stringbean before Earl but A imbecile says this :

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Originally posted by chuckv97

I thought it was Stringbean before Earl but A imbecile says this :

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I (potentially) stand corrected.

Skip: "...The song is the star, not the singer[s]....  ."

Geez, dunno how I'm gonna break that to my fans.   

If I had to give up the five-string in favor of the tenor, I would wish to play like Fergal O'Hanlon.  He gets it.

Fergal O'Hanlon

Always wondered how a tuba would sound in a jam instead of a bass. I played one for 4 years when i was in school

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Originally posted by stanleytone

Always wondered how a tuba would sound in a jam instead of a bass. I played one for 4 years when i was in school

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In 1988 I had the privilege of playing an evening at Rudyard Kipling's in Louisville,Kentucky with Vaughn Meader who played piano/bar and used to live in Louisville.

I,Vaughn and our drummer drove there in my '84 Ford Escort.No room for a bass player so Vaughn called his old friend Quentin to play with us.

I had never met Quentin,but he arrived at Rudyard's wearing a tuxedo and carrying a tuba.He said he had just got done performing and recording  "Duelling Tubas" across town with P.D.Q. Bach.

What a pro!  What a great addition to our band.

There's an additional reason why Monroe probably liked having Stringbean in the band; he had been a semi-pro baseball player.

Thanks for all those comments.

I really want to honor the bluegrass tradition and be sensitive to the others in the jam session. They came to play bluegrass and newgrass. I'll try things and be sure to talk it over with others in the jam. Guitars and mandolins are the dominant instruments, and they like having a banjo for the most part. I can chop like a mandolin (more like a ukulele chunk), but there isn't much need for it in this particular group.

Irish music features the tenor banjo played melodically with a flatpick. I'd like to find artists in the bluegrass , OT, or folk genres that feature the tenor banjo played as a rhythmic instrument. Carolina Chocolate Drops had a tenor banjo in the mix and I really liked it.

I played for a couple of years with a tenor guitar player in the band.
He had prewar Gibson and Martin tenors and they had a great voice.
His playing fit folk,bluegrass,country and Irish very well.

It isn't the instrument...it's the taste of the player.

Banjo and tuba is a great duo combination -- five-string (e.g. Taj Mahal -- old-time), or four (e.g. Jimmy Mazzy -- trad jazz).

Playing with a good tuba is epic.

IIRC, Eddie Stubbs once played a cut on his WAMU country music program that featured Joe Maphis playing a very plausible emulation of Scruggs style--on a tenor banjo, with a flatpick.

Maurice Bolyer was a regular on The Tommy Hunter Show - he could cross-pick his tenor banjo and emulate bluegrass rolls convincingly.