Forum - Banjo Ben Clark

How to not be the annoying banjo player at a jam

^^^ That! Use your ears, try to be tasteful.

And it never hurts to bring pizza to share.

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Points right there! We bring Tootsie Pops in abundance whenever we go to a jam. :grin: It stops the singers too, haha!

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You know, I was just thinking that I’m not sure how to tell people not to be annoying given, I can’t even avoid doing that myself when posting.

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Ooh, now I have to figure out a way to jam with y’all sometime :joy:

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Is that what it takes to get some of you to come to SPBGMA? :slight_smile:

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It’s not my choice to sit out on these events, I badly want to go to some. I just seriously have no way to do it, even if I wanted to more than anything I still couldn’t :joy: Hopefully I’ll be able to eventually though.

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I was kidding. :slight_smile: I know! We can’t go to everything either. Big family expenses and complications to travel - know all about it! Some people on here could easily tell us what we’re missing for never being able to make it to a Cabin Camp yet! And at least you feel like going to SPBGMA and think it looks fun :wink:

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Yeah, my family does some traveling every now and then but I typically stay home to take care of the animals. They just go to the beach etc, nothing fun haha. I’m really the only one in my family interested in these events so I don’t even really mention it.

It seems so fun. I’ve only met one fellow bluegrass musician, Mr Dragonslayer :joy:. It was a blast, can’t imagine being surrounded by them.

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That’s understandable. You’ll get to more places eventually I’m sure. In the meantime there’s a lot you can enjoy virtually as you know! If it weren’t for the virtual world I’d never have gotten a guitar lesson.

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Alright, my thoughts… I remember a book telling avoiding traffic ticket is to not to get on the roads. So, I think if you interact, you tend to annoy people. Sometimes you do not even have to say a word (how about that?)! But if someone get annoyed for a not-so-good reason, it is their problem! But otherwise, you adapt/adjust to not annoy people for silly reasons. That said, there are some fake annoyances (pretend to be annoyed) too! :slight_smile:

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No John, I do it on purpose. :slightly_smiling_face:

Actually, now is a good time to retell my banjo joke. I posted it in the humor thread, so if anyone saw it there, then sorry to be redundant.

How is a banjo like a homicide? Everyone’s happy once the case is closed.

The second one I can’t remember if I told it or not.

How is a banjo like a grenade? When you hear the sound, it’s too late.

With jokes such as that, maybe they belong somewhere other than the humor thread.

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Jim, haha… I do not play banjo but it only seems to convey the targeted people (the banjo players here) are very easy-going type! So I think that is good annoyance. :slight_smile:

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Great thread! I think there are a few points that resonate with me when starting out as a jammer. Rule #1 is be humble. Rule #2 is ask questions.

I’ve never encountered an un-welcoming jam group. Even the grumpiest of pickers tend to be friendly. Advice I overheard from Dr. Banjo himself was learn your rolls and just pick through them along with the chord changes. When you’re comfortable start reaching out for melody notes. I think that approach would be acceptable for a newbie at any jam. Sort of like my approach when i was a newbie guitar player (1) know G, C, and D chords, (2) know how to count to 4, and (3) boom chuck. It worked out great.

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