Forum - Banjo Ben Clark

Alright, let's get it going

Let’s pick us a tune together–do a fiddle tune first. @mcreisz, what’s the best way to do this?

Count me in. BAnjo, guitar, or bass fiddle.

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this sounds fun! I can do electric bass or rhythm guitar…
paige

I have a fiddle, but no one here has been mean enough to me to make me have to play it. I’m most at home on banjo, but might be able to swing guitar or mando (or electric mandola or upright bass) depending on the song.

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I could be lured into this project.

You’ve done it before, haven’t you? Can you help get us started?

I have done it before. I can host the project once we pick a song and tempo.

You’ve got the first step, announcing it and gathering folks. You need to pick a song and tempo. In the past we’d usually get things laid out for who was doing what on the rhythm tracks. Then, see how many folks want breaks and on what instruments. The cool thing about a fiddle tune is you could do about as many breaks as you want. You can also split breaks if you get too many folks. Once you have an idea of what you’ll do, someone can make a click track or jump straight to a rough rhythm track. You include a sharp sound at the front so whoever is mixing can line up the various tracks (this will make sense once you see the initial click or rhythm track). You collect the various tracks, mix it, master it and you are done.

We used Kompoz for a while. Kompoz changed and we skipped it on the last one we did. You can go either way on that (I haven’t tried Kompoz for a while… it might be improved). If you don’t use Kompoz, you can just use DropBox or something similar to exchange files.

Looks like you have a couple options for upright bass already. That’s awesome. Larry is in on it, that’s huge. He’s great at every part of it.

It’s helpful to have one person “driving the bus” to keep things moving. Larry would be a great choice because of his experience and talents.

I vote @lpayton100 then. Larry, pick us a good ol’ fiddle tune, please.

Ben has several of these in his lessons.

http://artistworks.com/blog/10-favorite-fiddle-tunes-student-blog

Aw, man, picking the tune is a lot of pressure. Anybody got a song they’re already working on?

It’s not a fiddle tune, but how about “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” in G? We could get the whole Nitty Gritty Dirt Band “everybody together!” vibe toward the end.

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That’d be easy for me on banjo. I already got that lesson down.

If we have to stick to a fiddle tune, what about Old Joe Clark? I’d love to dive into some of the cool stuff The Purple Hulls do near the end on the CD.

On a separate note… 3am?! Do you ever sleep?

We should write some additional solos, though you could definitely use the one I taught. I didn’t sleep last night, no.

You don’t think we should all take turns playing the same break? :smiley:

BTW, I love “Will the circle…” Good call!

Maybe I can capo up on the 12th fret so it sounds different. :stuck_out_tongue:

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“Circle” is a great choice. Everyone who’s interested should be able to get in on that one.

Let’s figure out how many musicians want to take a break so I can set up the starter track.

I’m in. Working on a banjo break right now. If other banjo players want in, I’m happy to play something else.

Since the verse and chorus are basically the same, are you thinking just 1 of those as a break for each player?

Yeah, that’s what I was thinking…we can just keep handing it back and forth. On the last one we could all play the melody in our own way and put them all together.

singing-together-portrait-happy-girls-guys-microphone-karaoke-bar-34414607

I’m in for banjo on “Will the Circle”. Just started working on a one verse break. How does it work?