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Thread: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

  1. #1
    bass player gone mando
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    Default non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    I'm in a duo where we do a lot of blues and ragtime music from the 1920s and '30s. I'm on upright bass mostly, and mandolin somewhat - but listening to these old recordings, there is a lot of spoons. By which I mean, the rhythm section is some guy playing the spoons, and it sounds darn good. I know this is a crazy question to ask on a mandolin forum, but not sure who else to ask ... any leads to practitioners in the ancient art of playing the spoons?

    Here's an example of what I mean - Blind Blake doing That'll Never Happen No More in 1927 - I could do mando but the spoons part is so cool:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTCG3IdCrK4
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    Moderator MikeEdgerton's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Spoons are better by far in my opinion.
    "It's comparable to playing a cheese slicer."
    --M. Stillion

    "Bargain instruments are no bargains if you can't play them"
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    Mando-Accumulator Jim Garber's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Youtube is your friend, spoonwise (or otherwise):



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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    I believe the Blind Blake accompanist is playing the bones as opposed to spoons, but I am afraid I have no idea what the bones look like or how they are played - maybe someone else does?

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    Registered User Bob Visentin's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    "Bones" are really hard wood curve shaped like ribs. You hold two in one hand between your fingers almost like chop sticks and snap them together with a wrist action. With a little practice you can get a good snap or a nice roll.

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    Mandolin Botherer Shelagh Moore's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    I've had a listen too and it could be spoons or bones on the recording. "Bones" can be made of hard curved wood but are more frequently made of cow or sheep rib bones (see video). Here's a nice tutorial video by Dom Flemons of the excellent Carolina Chocolate Drops.


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    Middle-Aged Old-Timer Tobin's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Richard Moore beat me to it. The Carolina Chocolate Drops are the first group that spring to mind when I think of modern bands who use bones/spoons. I found it a tad distracting at first, but over time I have come to appreciate what it adds to their music.

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    Registered User maudlin mandolin's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Thanks for the informative video. Richard.
    The flip side of " That will Never Happen No More" is "Dry Bone Shuffle" which commences with Blake's exhortation "Lets go Bones!" The discography refers to "rattlebones"

  9. #9

    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Maddy Prior, vocalist with band "Steeleye Span", uses spoons to great advantage on many of her tracks

    I feel there is a difference to be drawn between "spoons", literally two metal table spoons, played either "back to back" or "one inside the other" (for a slightly different tone), and "bones", which these days are usually wood, but I remember seeing what looked like rib-bones being used in a folk club back in the '60's ... again, a slightly different tone.

    Much like the Irish drum (bodhran), needs to be played well to be beneficial but easily played to excess!!

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    Moderator MikeEdgerton's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    ...but easily played to excess!!
    And therein lies the problem.

    I play at a place now and then where folks just show up with spoons. Apparently someone once said "If you don't play an instrument just bring some spoons". I have a friend that is a true percussionist, he's a drummer and he also plays the spoons among a dozen other "folk" type percussion objects. He's good at staying in one place and not going crazy. He is a very rare spoon player.
    "It's comparable to playing a cheese slicer."
    --M. Stillion

    "Bargain instruments are no bargains if you can't play them"
    --J. Garber

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    Middle-Aged Old-Timer Tobin's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    I'll take an over-eager spoons player any day, compared to an over-eager tambourine player. It used to be that people who couldn't play an instrument would play the tambourine. It doesn't take much to play that to excess!

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    Moderator MikeEdgerton's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Quote Originally Posted by Tobin View Post
    I'll take an over-eager spoons player any day, compared to an over-eager tambourine player. It used to be that people who couldn't play an instrument would play the tambourine. It doesn't take much to play that to excess!
    Or bodhrán, or snare, or bones, or cajon, or whatever. All the same in my book.
    "It's comparable to playing a cheese slicer."
    --M. Stillion

    "Bargain instruments are no bargains if you can't play them"
    --J. Garber

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    Mando-Accumulator Jim Garber's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Quote Originally Posted by kypfer View Post
    I feel there is a difference to be drawn between "spoons", literally two metal table spoons, played either "back to back" or "one inside the other" (for a slightly different tone), and "bones", which these days are usually wood, but I remember seeing what looked like rib-bones being used in a folk club back in the '60's ... again, a slightly different tone.
    Those rib-bones you mention (either wood or actual bone) are what I know of as bones. Usually the player has two in each hand and holds them off the lap. Spoons are usually played sitting down and the player will use their legs/thighs or some body part to bang them on for the rhythms.
    ----Oops I see a couple of posters said that already.

    I use to play spoons in my old time band, often for Quebecois tunes. Funny story it I found the best wooden ones in a cooking goods store but had to go into a corner to try them out. Many of the patrons had no clue what I was doing. This was many decades ago when eccentric folk musicians were not the norm.
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    I also prefer wooden spoons, I made some of maple and they sound wonderful, full and solid. One is curved on the handle, the other straight. Made it more comfortable for me as I have small hands. I gave them to a friend many years ago who still has them.
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    wood butcher Spruce's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    ...if you've ever recorded spoons or tambourine, you'll soon grasp what the problem is--they are exceptionally loud...

    Like, Les Paul through a Deluxe Reverb on 6 loud....

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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Quote Originally Posted by Tobin View Post
    I'll take an over-eager spoons player any day, compared to an over-eager tambourine player. It used to be that people who couldn't play an instrument would play the tambourine. It doesn't take much to play that to excess!
    Or even worse, didgeridoo.
    And now there was no doubt that the trees were really moving - moving in and out through one another as if in a complicated country dance. ('And I suppose,' thought Lucy, 'when trees dance, it must be a very, very country dance indeed.')

    C.S. Lewis

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    Registered User Mike Snyder's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Takes a hefty dose of musicianship to do percussion well in an acoustic setting. That fact is lost on many washboard/spoons/bones players. I always set my instrument down when one shows up. If they can play, I rejoin. If not, I let them go at it until they wear out. Enthusiasm is a poor alternative to restraint with a washboard.
    Mike Snyder

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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Quote Originally Posted by maudlin mandolin View Post
    The flip side of " That will Never Happen No More" is "Dry Bone Shuffle" which commences with Blake's exhortation "Lets go Bones!"
    Lovely piece. I am confident there is a double meaning in there, a sideways reference to the "Valley of the Dry Bones" in Ezekiel.

    Around here we have several spoons/bones players. More actually than mandolin players.
    A talent for trivializin' the momentous and complicatin' the obvious.

    The entire staff
    funny....

  21. #19

    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Barry Patton has been a regular performer on bones at the Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, Ks. BTW, his uncle in Byron Berline, the legendary bluegrass (and more) fiddler.

    Barry makes and sells "rhythm bones" made from Osage Orange.

    Here's a segment on Patton from a Wichita TV program.


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    Middle-Aged Old-Timer Tobin's Avatar
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    Default Re: non-mandolin question - playing the spoons

    Playing the bones over Gold Rush?! I've heard it all now!

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