Building New Banjos for an Old-Time World

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Building New Banjos for an Old-Time World

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Banjo music possesses a unique power to evoke a bucolic, simpler past. The artisans who build banjos for old-time music stand at an unusual crossroads ”asked to meet the modern musician's needs while retaining the nostalgic qualities so fundamental to the banjo's sound and mystique. Richard Jones-Bamman ventures into workshops and old-time music communities to explore how banjo builders practice their art. His interviews and long-time personal immersion in the musical culture shed light on long-overlooked aspects of banjo making. What is the banjo builder's role in the creation of a specific musical community? What techniques go into the styles of instruments they create? Jones-Bamman explores these questions and many others while sharing the ways an inescapable sense of the past undergirds the performance and enjoyment of old-time music. Along the way he reveals how antimodernism remains integral to the music's appeal and its making.

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Jones-Bamman provides a detailed description of the steps involved in building an old-time banjo: from the selection of the wood, to countless design decisions regarding aesthetics, structure, and tone, to choice of hardware, to designing pearl inlays, to the wood finish and final set up. These technical details, explained in the words of the banjo builders themselves, nicely illustrate the evolution of the craft of contemporary banjo building

Popular Music & Society

Jones-Bamman's book remains unique in its subject matter and approach and a valuable contribution to the deservedly growing body of literature on the instrument

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