Re: Banjo question


"Jim Hetley" wrote

Plenty of banjo players have used the head
as a drum. I've done it myself. So JF can have apoplexy doubled,
if
he so wishes.

I use the back of the Sobell or the Brook (www.brookguitars.com): they
both make a soft woody
sound and keep me amused while I'll not the centre of attention. I
would happily do the same to a banjo. I own a banjolin, but I'd advise
against them -- they go out of tune very rapidly and the short strings
make the sound very harsh. Get a cheap tenor, only about £120, if you
want to play with the banjo family. Dan Beimborn has a clip on his
website www.beimborn.com of one being played properly.

Let me tell you a story*. I have been presented to the Queen
(www.royal.gov.uk). She made me nervous. The other person who has made
me nervous is Stefan Sobell (www.sobellinstruments.com): I don't know
why, he's a charming man. I took the mando in for service and, in his
workshop, he handed me a feather-light, deeply, richly coloured
brazilian guitar back. The guitar it makes will
cost... probably ten thousand dollars or more. I admired... and then,
nervously, began to play the back like a bodhran. I still cringe to
think of it. I tried Martin Simpson's (www.martinsimpson.com)
signature Sobell guitar at
Norwich folk club and cured my GAS -- lovely but too much for me,
musically as well as in terms of pelf.

A quote about Sobell and his citterns, which are large members of the
mandolin familly: 'Stefan, you have saved folk clubs from the tenor
banjo.'

The other use for banjos is to hit people in the mouth, breaking off
their teeth and enabling them to leave a titanium pin and porcelain
crown on the Great Barrier Reef (www.gbrmpa.gov.au) over thirty years
later. Thank you, Nick Berryman (www.sticknrudder.co.uk). Of my bones
is coral made.

JF (www.floodsclimbers.co.uk)**

*Possibly again, but what the hell.

**Read an extract from The & Gentlemen's Club: I've been offered £5
for a chance to read the rest. Form an orderly queue.








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Relevant Pages

  • Re: Played a Sobell
    ... across a guitar by a builder that you don't normally see, ... His instruments are quite common round here, ... have acquired a Sobell mandolin and a couple of Gibsons (1924 A Jnr ... Which folk club is it you attend for Martin Simpson concerts btw Colin? ...
    (rec.music.makers.guitar.acoustic)
  • Re: sobell for sale
    ... Valleys has a beautiful Sobell for sale. ... The guitar is the 1999 Model-0 cutaway. ... I'll never forget Linus's remark after Sobell took a workshop at a UK ...
    (rec.music.makers.guitar.acoustic)
  • Re: sobell for sale
    ... Valleys has a beautiful Sobell for sale. ... The guitar is the 1999 Model-0 cutaway. ... I'll never forget Linus's remark after Sobell took a workshop at a UK ...
    (rec.music.makers.guitar.acoustic)