Recapturing The Banjo
Tell someone you play the 5-string banjo and you’ll get one of two responses: a mocking, grinning attempt at When I’m Cleaning Windows sung back at you, along with obligatory air ukulele, or a request for Duelling Banjos, the DELIVERANCE theme tune. Needless to say, we as a nation, know very little of this marvellous little instrument. And it appears there’s rather a gap in the American’s historical records too: one of the biggest preconceptions being the banjo’s traditional image as a white man’s instrument originating from somewhere among those blue Kentucky hills.Otis Taylor, one of America’s most original and distinctive blues artists, latest mission—the RECAPTURING THE BANJO CD and UK tour—is going some way to redressing this historical oversight, by bringing the music of several of today’s best black American banjo players to our shores. Joined by the likes of Keb Mo, Corey Harris, Don Vappie, Guy Davis and Alvin Youngblood Hart, perhaps better known in the blues world, this collaborative effort explores a range of black banjo-based music. From the traditional old-time American tunes such as the rustic Little Liza Jane, to rag-time, French Creole music, a reworking of Jimi Hendrix’s Hey Joe and hypnotic, electric blues composed by Taylor himself, the collection is surprising for its diversity of sounds and for its degrees of separation from the more well-known banjo-based bluegrass music.You’ll find the full version of this interesting article written by Helen Keen in the March 08 issue of Maverick Magazine…