Join Banjo Paul as the journey begins…
I‘m taking on an aggressive…and long…blog series suggested by my reader George Preiss, where we take a look at one of the most pivotal and important albums of banjo instrumentals ever made: the Foggy Mountain Banjo Album by Flatt & Scruggs. Join me as we look at each song. We’ll take the songs apart and look at how to roll each one. We’ll focus on making the songs playable, avoiding the pitfalls, and picking up choice and tasty licks for use in other songs. I’ll answer the questions that you give me at the bottom of each blog post, and in the end we’ll all have a pretty good handle on this important album in the banjo lexicon. (To find links to the important tools that I mention in this blog post, refer back to my blog post where I introduce this series and provide links for getting your own copy of these tools by clicking here: introductory blog post.) If any of you knowledgeable historians can correct anything I say or add to the conversation, please do so by leaving your corrections or comments at the end of this blog post. I’d appreciate the help; I only want to put out factual information.
The first song on the album: Ground Speed
I was really glad to see that the first song on the album is Ground Speed. This happens to be my all-time favorite banjo instrumental. I feel I can play it fairly well, and I’ve been doing it for a good long time. Peter Wernick told me that it’s one of the most played banjo songs there are, so I’m not alone in loving this song.
I heard Scott Vestal do a killer version of this song at a festival I was playing at once, and it blew me away. He took Scruggs’ work and embellished it in some wild and really cool ways. I fell in love with the song even more after hearing Scott’s version, and I managed to bring in a few of his licks into my own playing. Yes, that’s right: I only steal from the best!
Click here to download Ground Speed version 1: Ground Speed sheet music
Let’s start with some Ground Speed lead details
Open up the sheet music and take a look through it. Remember that tablature is not a tool for sight-reading of music. Tablature is a memorization aid. Keeping that in mind, take a minute to digest what you see on the page. Get out your banjo and try to pick through the parts that appear a bit trickier. Can you figure out their cadence, their rhythms, their fingerings? All important things to get a handle on.
Look at measures 16 and 17. I call the lick that’s played in these measures the "down the neck fill-in lick". This is a very prominent lick that all banjo players play; you should come to recognize it just by sight. Any time that you need to fill time, you can insert this lick to do the job. This lick occurs again at measures 28 and 29.
Take a look at measure 25. This is a particularly effective way to lead yourself into a measure of C. What’s actually being played here is a G7 chord. Anytime you go from G to C, if you stick in a G7 before you switch to the C, this makes an effective passing tone, or walk, towards the next chord. Or, to talk about all keys at once, anytime you go from a 1 chord to a 4 chord, stick in a 1seventh chord before the 4 chord. It’s a very pleasant effect.
Ground Speed has two important hooks
When I first looked at this song, not long after taking up the banjo, I quickly gave it up. I couldn’t understand how to properly do one of the two "hooks" to the song. I had never heard a recording of Ground Speed, so I didn’t have a frame of reference. Once I got ahold of a copy, I understood what Earl was doing and I was able to tackle it.
Click me! Click me!
The first hook that I’m illustrating occurs at measures 2 and 3, and it’s perhaps the defining lick in this song. This hook occurs three times in the lead. Open up your sheet music so it’s visible on the screen, and then take a listen to this sound file where I explain the intro and the hook:
Click here for sound file: Audio explanation hook 1
Are you "hooked" yet? Take a look at hook #2
The next thing to illustrate is a super catchy, classic Scruggs lick that you need to add to your arsenal of banjo licks. Now, I don’t know if Ground Speed is the first song that Scruggs played this lick in, but it’s certainly a prominent lick in the song. (Hey you knowledgeable historians…care to answer that trivial pursuit question? What is the first song that Scruggs used this lick in?) This is a lick that fits a D chord context, and I hear it all over the place in lots of people’s banjo picking. I use it myself a ton. It is closely linked with Ground Speed, being the second of two licks that help make the song recognizable (hook 2 if you will).
Open up the sheet music again. This time, we’ll be focusing on measures 18-23, learning about a fabulous D lick:
Click here for sound file: Audio explanation hook 2
Spend some time with Earl
As you dig into Ground Speed, you’ll want to consider listening to Earl play it on the album as part of your learning prep. Listen to it over and over; check out Earl’s flawless timing, his slick speed, his smoothness, his tone. Get a feel for how the instrumental sounds. Absorb it into your psyche and become one with it. You’ll have a much easier time learning it if you do this. Plus your appreciation for the man, his genius, and his super-human ability will be all the deeper. Remember that you are now listening to the song with a new emphasis: you are now a banjo picker. Listen to it with a banjo picker’s ear.
This one song alone is likely to produce 3 or 4 blog posts, so hang in there and watch for a new blog post in this series once each week at minimum…sometimes more, depending on how much time I’ve had. We’ll be taking a listen to the song together and discussing some of Earl’s flair, and I’ll have sheet music for you that further dresses the song up to make it a real showcase number. We’ll also be discussing backup and rhythm issues, and much more.
Show Banjo Paul some comment love…
I’m relying on all of my readers to chat about these blog posts, right at the bottom of each one. If you have questions or need advice, leave your requests in the form of a comment below. If you have advice on something for me, or to correct a fact I got wrong, or to give me some trivia about the album that I didn’t already know, again…leave it as a comment at the bottom of this post. This whole project is an ambitious one on my part, and there is much I don’t know about this album. I’ll thank you in advance for your help. Oh, and don’t forget: you can subscribe to comments, which means you’ll get an email alerting you each time someone else leaves a follow up comment after yours.
Thanks so much! I hope we all learn from each other in this series. See you next time as we continue with Ground Speed, and as I always say: pick ‘em if ya got ‘em! Banjo Paul out.
The next blog post of the series is posted! To go straight there, click this link: Ground Speed part 2
Banjo Paul
“Wunse, I coodn’t even spel bango pikker…now I are one!”
www.banjosrule.com (main site)
www.mybanjolife.com (blog)
Click here: Ultimate Metronome
Wow Paul! This first entry into the series exceeded my expectations. I just finished going through the tab and sound files. The sound files were really helpful, and I can tell you that dragging us through this stuff at 60 bpm was crucial. While listening to Earl play those from the album at 140 or more beats a minute all I can do is enjoy the music, but to learn anything from it at this stage would be like asking Michael Jordan to teach me how to shoot lay-ups, and then have him show me by dunking from the free-throw line! So I liked your use of the metronome while you built up the speed throughout the explanation.
I also liked how you chose the defining licks of the song, and started us off there instead of going straight through the whole thing. Thanks for all that you do, George
Thanks so much George. Glad the article meets your expectations! I appreciate the feedback. It’ll help me as I write the next several articles. I’d like to also thank you again publicly for the idea for the series. It’s a great one and it’s going to be a lot of fun.
For any others reading these comments, don’t forget to refer to the introductory article that talks about the various tools that you should pick up to properly follow this blog series. Here’s a link to the article:
http://banjosrule.com/blog/my-banjo-life-article-series-kickoff-lets-dissect-a-great-banjo-album/ (copy that and past it into your browser if it isn’t clickable for you, or just go look for it on this blog’s main page.)
Thanks George!
This should be a great series. Good suggestion, George, and my hat is off to you, Paul, for taking on the task. I just thought I’d inject a bit of advice for your “blog patrons”…hope it doesn’t distract from your future plans, Paul. I’m sure you’ll correct me if it does. Anyway, to those of you attempting this tune…as you go through your picking, whether you’re using the printed tablature or the TefView, one thing you may have trouble with is trying to figure out the “greatest economy” of fingering on the neck. For instance, starting from the kick-off, your fingers will be holding a “D-Position” (sometimes called the “2nd Position) Chord Pattern, only you’ll be holding it up the neck so as to make a “G-Chord”. Naturally, for this particular piece of music, you don’t need the note you would, otherwise, get on the 4th String, with your Ring Finger. Therefore, there’s no real need to touch that string. That will leave your Ring Finger free to make the note on the 3rd String at the 9th Fret. Moving right along, when you have to jump up to the 12th Fret, you’ll be wanting to make those notes, on the 1st and 2nd Strings, with your Pinky and Ring Finger. Since your Pinky already rested on the 1st String, while holding the previously mentioned G-Chord, and since your Ring Finger will be free, after making the previously mentioned note on the 3rd String, using those two fingers to get the notes at the 12th Fret represents “economy of fingering”. Your Pinky really doesn’t have to ever be picked up off the 1st String. It can slide right on down to the 12th Fret. Since there has been no note struck on that string, immeadiately before making the slide, it won’t make the movement of the slide “ring out”, as it would have if you’d picked the string just before making the slide. Since the Pinky never loses contact with the 1st String, this should greatly assist your accuracy. As for the Ring Finger, since it lays right next to the Pinky, it will be assisted in it’s placement by that Pinky finger, which has already “found the mark”. I mention this because I’ve seen so many “poor performances” rendered by folks attempting to either “bar” those two strings with their Index Finger, or by lifting the Pinky and attempting to replace it with, what they may feel is, a stronger set of fingers. Those little notes aren’t all that hard to “fret’. (If they are, your banjo needs some “set up” done on it.) You shouldn’t need a stronger set of fingers. Besides, the more you use your Pinky and Ring Fingers, the stronger they’ll get and the more accurate you’ll become at using them. Moving along again, when you pull back down the neck to get your notes at the 10th Fret, keep using your Pinky and Ring Fingers. They are already positioned on the strings. As well, when you pull back down to make the notes at the 8th Fret on the 2nd String and the 9th Fret on the 1st String (which you’ll recognize as being a portion of your G-chord), while you will be lifting the Ring Finger and replacing it with the Middle Finger, your Pinky should maintain contact with that First String from the 10th Fret to the 9th Fret. The same is true when you pull back down the neck to get your notes on the 2nd String at the 3rd Fret and the 1st String at the 5th Fret. (You should recognize this as being a partial fingering of your “1st Position” G-chord.) Your Pinky can maintain contact with that 1st String. There’s no need to lift it…at least, not enough to break contact with the String. You may wish to lift it to relieve friction between the neck and finger, but there’s no real need to remove it totally from contact with the string. Maintain a light touch. As you learn new material, try to gain a sense of what may constitute the most “economical” way to use your fingers. Keep in mind not only the best way of going into the “fretted notes”, but also be aware of where those fingers must be after those notes have been executed. I feel this may be one of the major differences between really “hot” pickers and those who never seem able to get it to “click”. Most certainly, improper fingering, either on the neck or in the picking fingers, is the limiting factor as far as gaining speed. Now…Paul…clue us into some of those great Scott Vestal licks you learned! -Jesse
Hey Jesse, what a great reply and great advice! I appreciate your thoughts and instructions. Getting into this fingering is not an avenue I had thought of in writing that blog post. It seems that the articles are so long and there is so much information overload, that I just can’t go in every direction possible. I plan to field questions from people on topics such as this as they arise, and certainly I count on knowledgeable people like yourself to pass that info along. If you see something that I just didn’t have room to discuss, please jump in there.
Listen up everyone: Jesse hit the nail on the head when he spoke of working out the economics of fingering the banjo. It’s crucial. I have an almost identical phrase that I’ve used over the years: economy of movement. Similar words, same meaning. Take it to heart!
Alright, onwards and upwards!