Banjo | Cameron DeWhitt | Intermediate/Advanced | Period 3 | Week 3 (July 21-26, 2024)
Day 1: Left Hand Positions and Building Muscle Memory
The banjo uses some of the strangest tunings of any instrument, ever. Because of this, it can be difficult to create an intuitive and flexible vocabulary. In this class we’ll cover:
● How and why to play in left hand positions
● The difference between vertical and horizontal positions
● Making boring decisions in advance so you can make interesting decisions in the moment
Day 2: Learning Tunes on the Fly
There are THOUSANDS of tunes in the Old Time repertoire; too many to learn independently! To have fun as an old time banjo player it’s important to know how to jump in and play when you don’t know the tune. In this class we’ll cover:
● How playing by ear is 90% educated guessing and how to educate your guessing
● A practical theory of how melodies are constructed
● Which notes to leave in and which to leave out as a banjo player
Day 3: Ghost Strokes, Anticipated Notes, and Rhythmic Variation
Clawhammer can feel like a cage sometimes, but there are certain techniques that can help you bust out. In this class we’ll cover:
● Ghost strokes: what they are, how to play them, and where to put them
● How to use anticipated notes in combination with ghost strokes to give tunes forward momentum
● How to apply rhythmic variation while maintaining a tune’s basic integrity
Day 4: Playing Up the Neck
There are 17 frets on most old time banjos, but we often stay below the 9th, even though there is so much lovely tone up the neck that’s waiting to be unlocked. Those sounds are more accessible than you might think! Let’s demystify the upper register of your banjo. In this class we’ll cover:
● How to play in vertical positions up the neck instead of searching around on the 1st string
● How to maintain tone and character in the upper register
● How to alter a melody to make it more playable in the upper register
Day 5: Students’ Choice!
I’m leaving the last day unstructured so we can cover whatever questions arise throughout the week. We can review previous classes, talk about old time in general, banjo setup, or whatever else you’d like to cover before the end of the week.
About the Instructor
Cameron DeWhitt is a clawhammer banjoist and Old Time musician living in Portland, Oregon. They play banjo and sing with Morgan Harris and George Jackson as Tall Poppy String Band, whom Country Queer dubbed “an old-timey, queer supergroup.” Cameron is the innovator behind pitchfork banjo, a three-finger clawhammer technique that allows them a unique, improvisatory approach to old time banjo music. They are also the host of Get Up in the Cool, a weekly old time music and interview podcast, featuring conversations and musical collaborations with today’s most influential traditional musicians, such as Jake Blount, Laurel Premo, Tatiana Hargreaves, Bruce Molsky, Adam Hurt, and Dirk Powell. As an interviewer, Cameron acts as audience surrogate, asking illuminating questions to Old Time’s best and brightest while telling the larger story of the tradition’s modern era. And with over 7 years and 350 episodes, Get Up in the Cool is one of the largest and fastest growing archives of new traditional music recordings. When they’re not performing or podcasting, they produce the online video instructional series PitchforkBanjo.com and teach private lessons and workshops online and in-person in their home.