Be a Better Banjo Player: Where to Start

Start where you are right now. Use only the tools you have right now. Make the most of who you are and what you have. Right Now.

If you’re like most folks reading this blog, you’ve got a banjo, a set of picks, some banjo recordings and some banjo tab. You’ve also got a family and a career. And there are moments when you feel like it’s darn near impossible for you to learn to play as well as those other local pickers. You start trying to imagine what Earth will be like, far into the future, when you’ve finally mastered the banjo.

To paraphrase the ancient Chinese philosopher Tao Tzu – “The journey of a thousand jam sessions begins with a single forward roll.” With that in mind, I teach students to focus on what they can do, not what they can’t do. 

So, start by building on what you already know. You know the forward roll – and you know that you could always play it better.

My recommendation for a great example of the forward roll in action: the banjo break on the 1949 cut of No Mother or Dad by Lester Flatt, Earl Scruggs and the Foggy Mountain Boys. This is the same recording session that produced the classic banjo instrumental Foggy Mountain Breakdown. If you’re able to listen to the example I’ve recommended, great. If not, don’t let the perceived need to acquire yet another “thing” keep you from starting to be a better banjo player.

To play better, you need to listen better. Let’s use a forward roll on the open 5th, 3rd and 1st strings for this example. As you play the forward roll, listen critically for the following:

1. The spaces between the notes
2. The relative volume of the three strings
3. Pick noise
4. The tone you are producing
5. Tuning

I’ll cover each of these items in-depth in other posts. Remember that the journey of working to be a better banjo player is one that we’re all on.

What is something that you could do, right now, today, that would make you a better banjo player?