Banjo Hangout Newest 100 Clawhammer and Old-Time Songs

From fiddler Howdy Forrester and Scottish composer James Scott Skinner, who recorded Rosebud of Allenvale in the 1920's.

TOTW 03/11/23: Waltz written by James Scott Skinner, also known as "The Rose Of Sharon Waltz" and "Rosebud Of Avonmore"

Phone recording

Partial performance from an interview of the Juggernaut String Band on Gene Shay's show (WIOQ) in 1978 in Philadelphia, PA. Peter Taney (banjo, lead vocal), Janet Bregman-Taney (fiddle, harmony vocal) and Carl Baron (guitar, harmony vocal)

After hearing RG's Run Mountain and the original recordings by Wade Mainer, I liked RG's 2-finger picking and learned it like he plays it. Listen to RG and hear the many lyrics sung about this moonshine tune about "Run Mountain, sugar on the hill."

This is one of the first fiddle tunes I learned to play on banjo. I made this recording fifty years ago at the Union Grove festival on the Van Hoy Farm in Union Grove, North Carolina, using a little cassette recorder I had with me. If I remember correctly, I was in open G tuning using C positions, but capoed on the 2nd fret. These days, i play it in open D tuning.

From the fiddling of Brad Leftwich on Bob Carlin's seminal CD Banging and Sawing. We can't figure out the title yet, but it sounds a bit ragtime to me.

Billy Kearney on Fiddle. Paul Perkins on the 5 string banjo! TOTW 2/18/22

Carl Baron learned this from an eastern Pennsylvania fiddler in the 1970's and still plays it with friends at a local folk festival. I know very few cotillions, but they all sound like good dance melodies, but also pretty tunes.

George Graham's Cotillion is a tune from the Jehile Kirkhuff, a fiddler from northeast Pennsylvania (1907-1981). Banjo - aDAde. Jehile Kirkhuff, fiddle and Carl Baron, banjo over existing recording.

Simple clawhammer version.

Slow 70bpm clawhammer banjo version for instructional purposes. Includes B part based on Steve Baughman's version on his Clawhammer Guitar instructional CD (very nice CD).

No, still not drinking....Here's the Tune of the Week from a Georgian fiddler, "Fonzy" Kennemur. Slowing it down make it kind of pretty. :)

A bit of Prohibition and Depression era history here, the poor farmer couldn't make enough money raising cotton. Four Cent Cotton led to raising corn instead for whiskey. Times haven't changed so much, sad to say. This arrangement comes from the early recording of fiddler Lowe Stokes.

Played on refurbished "frankenstine" banjo. Recording King neck fitted to a Saga aluminum pot with a skin head.