Thanks Ben! Can’t wait and thanks so much for breaking this down so even I can learn it!
Discuss the Banjo lesson: Bag O' Licks– Tony Wray Banjo
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I’m still working on this lesson, and have applied it to a couple of songs but am having trouble transitioning from g to c if the c is only one measure long. But I have come up with a few things that work, so all is good. It’s fun to apply this stuff and it’s real rewarding when I’m able to piece it together by myself.
Check out the lesson I just posted this morning, too!
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Oh man! This is way above my level, but I’m trying to stuff all of this knowledge and these licks into my pocket anyway…
Conceptually, to fit these into a chord progression-- I’m not sure I could quite do that on my own on the fly, without arranging it first, but hopefully being able to throw these in will come with time as my muscle memory for different rolls and licks develop…
Thanks Ben! With the Utility Roll lesson, this is super helpful info!
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These Licks are “Wray Cool” and combined with Banjo Ben’s tabs gives a foundation to work from. I noticed that Tony performs a bit of ‘freestyle’ at the beginning of the Video. In particular, there is an Ascending triplet pattern followed by a DESCENDING pattern. I thought this was super cool at the 21-26 sec. point in the intro video. Here is the TAB as I heard it and played back on my banjo for anyone that might want to try it. I incorporated this roll into Ben’s backup mp3’s in the “Backup Banjo Utility Rolls” and sounding good!
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Wow, just wow. We tried using these backup licks in our living room just now on “Will The Circle Be Unbroken” for an instrumental giving my kids a chance to alternate picking the melody over it (Guitar, Fiddle,Mandy). literally ALL of these Wray licks fit in and just sounds so cool; not only the overlay lick, but fitting in the ending licks on the turnarounds. . Now I know why Banjo Ben was laughing in the Intro. Trust me, you’ll get some mileage out of these licks. These licks really put solid rocket boosters on our Band. I feel like we’re just beginning to “leverage” these licks.
Thanks so much for this Lesson!
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I think that this works really well if the original 5th is a pick-up, not one, also. 4 or and of 1. I think of everything as cut time, because 2 is easier for my banjo brain than 4.
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Good point Luke. I also often like to think in ‘cut-time’ or just imagine sixteenth-notes.
I agree, in a weird way, it makes thing easier for me, too
Hello Banjo Ben. I am a 13-year-old banjo player from San Antonio, TX. Your videos are very inspiring to me. It would be great to meet you sometime. This video has some incredible licks in it!
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Welcome Daniel!
Great lesson
Please it would be greatly appreciated if Tex Critter taught another lesson on jamming.
Thanks
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Hard to believe this lesson was posted to the site way back in October 2018. Back then I had a hard time getting my head round the utility roll let alone tackle any of the licks. Well I made some measure of progress tonight and for the next month or so this is going to be my next assignment for study. I seem to be getting my mojo back, it’s been a difficult year for me, just found it so hard to focus on anything. Hopefully this will help get me back on track.
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Let us know how it goes!
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Progress will be slow for sure. Some tricky licks there, some I might not even attempt, we’ll see.
Late to the party but this was awesome!
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Great stuff, soooo what about the stuff in the preview that didnt get covered? all them runs and fills beyond the stuff covered in this series?
Ha, there’s a bunch of them, huh?! I’ll have to get Tony in for round #2.
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