Tenor banjo - may bell queen

[steve V. johnson]

Hello again!

Here are some pix showing the headstock after the new tuner surgery.

The tuner washers just touch the nominative inlays a bit.

[steve V. johnson]

Headstock from the bass side.

The tuner ever-so-slightly hangs over the edge of the headstock.

[steve V. johnson]

Here's the back of the headstock. The ivoroid tuner buttons aren't as dark
as the original ivoroid ones, but maybe they'll darken with use, time, finger
grease. They certainly look better than the mother of plastic ones that came
with them. If anyone would like to have those (they're stock with the tuners from StewMac), please contact me. I have no further use for them.

[steve V. johnson]

Here are a couple of other views... the treble side.

[steve V. johnson]

And the bass side.

[steve V. johnson]

I've restrung it with .042, .032, 020p, 014. Pretty close to my bouzouki (42, 32, 20w, 16) and it's tuning up nicely and with a bold voice
and it's holding tune nicely. I think that I'd like to move up to a wound .020 on the A and probably up to a .016 on the E. There is a difference in timbre
between the wound and plain strings, so those changes may smooth out the difference.

The head seems to be pretty tight, the new strings didn't really dimple the top at all below the bridge.

The button screws on the tuners tighten or loosen the action of the tuners, not how they hold tune, I think, but how
hard one has to work to turn them. It's sort of like having locking tuners (like the guitar shredders use!), as one can loosen the button screws to
make it easy to tune and then tighten them again. LOL!! No, not really.

The action is pretty high, esp above the 7th fret. Next I'll take it to my local banjo guy, Rick Nagy at Roadworthy Guitar and Amp here in Bloomington.
He's met this one before, but hasn't seen it in a very long time. Mike Keyes' articles on the Banjo Hangout about tenor setups emphasize that the tone
ring needs to be parallel to the rim and he mentions some good points about the head tension and tuning. That's all a bit out of my reach, so I'll ask
Rick Nagy about all that.

Thanks,

stv

[Ken Olmstead]

You did good with the tuners. Looks like how it might have come at a higher price point. I did not chime in when guitar tuners were mentioned but I knew you would do the "right" thing! That is a beatiful instrument! Those are some realativly heavy guage strings you have on there though!! Did you trade your gym membership for the banjo?

[steve V. johnson]

Thanks for your kind words!

The guitar tuners idea is probably a good one in some circumstances... I know some folks struggling with very old and beat-up open-back tenors complete with abused and hinky tuners who may be able to benefit from it... #I've told a couple of 'em about it, anyway.

I found a thread on the Banjo Hangout (sorry if I'm repeating myself) that Mike Keyes had begun about setups used (or neglected) by players of Irish trad music on tenor banjos. # Some of the respondents' string gauges for ITM tenor banjos went from .038 to .044 on the G string and from .010 to .016 on the E string. #Mike mentioned in an email with me that my bouzouki gauges might be an ok place to start.

As to the gym membership, a fan of the Lopers band gave Dave McConnell a Deering six-string 'banjitar', and right after the first time I played it, I renewed my gym membership, just to be in shape to hold the thing, much less carry it! # #It almost made it onto a couple of songs on our new CD, but didn't quite make the cut. #At least in part because nobody wanted to carry it to gigs. (We already carry too much stuff...)

Thanks,

stv

[Chip Booth]

Based on this image from page 1 the Dharma Initiative is obviously trying to use banjo players to infiltrate the Mandolin Cafe.

[steve V. johnson]

Hey Chip,

I can't claim to be a "banjo player" and I don't watch "Lost" either...

I had to look up the Dharma Initiative! lol!!

Wool Chinese sculpted rug circa mid-70's, bought in Mill Valley, CA, when I was a recording studio mgr out there.
We have skylights that sometimes make it tough to find a place to get a pic w/o glare, and on that particular day, that spot
worked. #I regretted the background motif (thought it distracted from the banjer pattern), but I wanted to get it out so folks
could help me with the infos.

I will confess that I enjoy the Tibetan Buddhist community here in Bloomington...

stv

[Steve L]

Okay Steve, It's been long enough. How does she play and how does she sound?

[steve V. johnson]

Hey Steve L, thanks for asking.

It sounds great, so far! #I haven't played it in ensemble yet, so the relative 'loudness' is not measured, but it seems real loud at home.

The tuners hold very nicely and, while still a tad trickier than my guitars, zouk and mandolins, are quite usable. # It has quite a ring and
sustain, overtones, with or without the resonator back, and that's not a thing I hear from other banjos, so maybe I have to put a sock inside it...



I do know two other banjo players who do that, one with an open-back and
the other with a resonator back on their tenor banjos, but it seems like such
a joke to actually -say- (that is, -write- it).

The G and D strings, at 40 and 32, sound great. The A is a plain 18, and I think a wound 20 (my usual zouk size) would be better, as there is a bit
of a wide difference in timbre between the 32 and the 18p. Of course, another response would be to go lighter on the low strings... It has a 14 E
string, and I feel that's light, too, but we'll see...

A couple of folks have expressed concern over the string sizes and damage to the neck, but from Mike Keyes' thread at the Banjo Hangout on tenor banjo setup, it seems that others have gone heavier than this. Mike said that he thought that my zouk set (42, 32, 20w, 16) would be a good place to start.
The neck has not changed shape at all under this tension.

Which reminds me... If I were to keep this one, I would probably change
the frets. I think bigger, modern, tang-topped frets would suit the bigger
strings better. The tiny old bar frets are very short (certainly relative to my
other modern instruments, and even small and short compared to the ones
on my '36 Kalamazoo KM-11 flat top mandolin), and slightly larger ones
would feel better and probably help a player move faster. But that's a change
for later.

We had a lot of last-minute calls for gigs this past week, so I didn't get to
take the MBQtb downtown to our local banjo guru-tech, Rick Nagy at Roadworthy Guitar & Amp. I'd like him to look at the head tension and the
action, which is high.

I think I recall him saying before that to change the neck angle, the neck would need to be shimmed against the ring, or something like that. The
bridge feet are quite thin already, so there's no taking those down and
everything else seems to be fine, so I think that the neck angle is the only
place to address the action height. It's usable to the fifth fret, but at the seventh there begin to be tning issues. I haven't measured the height, so
I can't tell you simply how high it is.

The head is skin, and seems quite tight and healthy to me, tho I really don't
know relative head tightness, from inexperience. I don't think that this is
the original head... There's a label on it (I'm not at home just now, so I can't
go look and tell you what it says), but it looks a bit newer than the 1920's.

Mike Keyes said that the Grover tailpiece, the original, that's on it now would
be of great value to some bluegrass banjerists, and that I could sell it for a pretty bag o' pennies (so to speak), and that a contemporary tailpiece could
be a nice benefit, but later for that. Same for a different bridge.

Other than a head check and the action adustment, I think this one's ready
for sessions. I don't think that I'm the guy to play it, tho I try from time to time, but I am eager to hear some of the better players around have a go
on it.

I originally got it for TJ Hull, the Culchies fiddler who now lives in Milwaukee.
He thought he'd go looking for a Gibson '20's tenor (some particular model
he'd heard about), but I've been keeping him informed on the changes, and
so when this one is all right it will go back up to him.

So there 'tis... I'm really happy with it and TJ and I have agreed on what will
happen with it if he chooses not to keep it. I may become a banjer player yet...



Again, thanks for asking! I'd like to post again after Rick has seen it and after, I hope, we have sorted the action a bit better.

stv

[Steve L]

Sounds good Steve. #High action seems to go with the territory for some of these older and relatively inexpensive banjos, though the area of the 1st seven frets we (I trad guys) tend to play in is usually okay. #Having a good wooden bridge made might go miles toward helping once you know what can be done with the neck angle.

I'm sort of in the camp of thinking those gauges are pretty heavy, but I tend to take Mike Keyes word as the gospel in these matters so there's that. #Going a bit lighter might not only be easier on the hands but put less pull on the neck as well. #

I had a skin head on my Weymann 150 ( an 18 fretter) and it sounded great but was a nightmare to keep in tune. #When I changed out the head, I got some funny overtones that I couldn't adjust out. #I remembered when i played in rock bands with drummers, they would often tape about a one inch wad of paper towel in a particular spot to stop this sort of thing. #I tried this in various spots on the underside of the head and found an area where it stopped the overtones without costing much in the way of volume. The banjo looks a bit like it had out patient day surgery, but it works!

Try to dedicate some time to playing the banjo. #It's really a ball to play melody in a session and be heard!

[mikeyes]

Steve,

I just did the math on your string setup.

I used String Tension Calculator, one of many such tools on the net. #Plug in the numbers and see what you come up with. #I came up with nearly equal tensions of cgda and GDAE.

Even the standard strings can cause neck bowing in a 19 fret instrument with no internal bracing. It occurs over a very long time and if it happens, it happens. #Most of the time, since ITM is usually played out of first position, it is not that bad, but I always hate to see it.

[steve V. johnson]

Steve L sez, "High action seems to go with the territory for some of these older and relatively inexpensive banjos, though the area of the 1st seven frets we (I trad guys) tend to play in is usually okay."

I read somewhere else on the Cafe that a famous player said something like 'There's no money above the seventh fret anyway...'

and...

"I remembered when i played in rock bands with drummers, they would often tape about a one inch wad of paper towel in a particular spot to stop this sort of thing. "

Yep, I've done that, both with performing drummers and in the studio (but usually with drummers who didn't know how to tune their kits very well...), and
there are variations, one of the best -and- most novel involving the use of a sanitary napkin, which, when taped in just the right spot, can make a drdum just sound wonderful.

Ahem... I did some experiments with some white artists' tape, which leaves no residue at all from the adhesive, and I do think that there's a particular
spot that might be productively damped with a bit of tape.

I haven't been able to get down to Roadworthy yet... I hope I can this week!

Thanks,

stv

[steve V. johnson]

Hi Mike,

Mike Keyes wrote, "I just did the math on your string setup.

I used String Tension Calculator is one of many such tools on the net. #Plug in the numbers and see what you come up with. #I came up with nearly equal tensions of cgda and GDAE."

Excuse me if I'm being dense, but ... is that good? #It would seem, on the face of it, to suggest that the MBQTB may well be comfortably at home with these... # I've used tension calculators, but not on this one.

There seems to be a chorus of voices out there telling me to lighten up... #So I'm likely to do so, at least a bit.

I have no particular investment in stringing this thing as heavily as I can.



stv

[mikeyes]

If the GDAE tension is about the same as the cgda tension, then whatever damage that string tension will do is the same. There is no sense in using lighter gage strings if they make your banjo sound bad. Most people will look at the gages of the GDAE strings and come to the conclusion that these strings have more tension. That would be true if they were tuned an octave higher (which you couldn't do, anyway) but the GDAE tuning is much lower than the cgda tuning so the tensions equal out most of the time.

I have had similar gage strings on a number of banjos for up to 7 years now with no damage done.

If you are concerned, by all means go to the D'Addario J63i set, but I doubt that you will be pleased with the sound they produce.

Each of my banjos has a slightly different set of strings on them. I usually buy strings individually (although my main banjo just happens to do best with the D'Addario OM set) so they have different total tensions. None of my G strings exceed 44 and most use 42 with the E strings usually in the 12 range. The others are variations of 30-32 and 18-20. String the instrument to your liking, after all, you are the one who has to play it

There is no one magic string set out there. Like bridges, each string set has to be tailored to the banjo. I remember seeing a short scale banjo that had a 56 G string and a very odd assortment of other strings including a silk and steel A string. The owner insisted that this was the only way to string any banjo. It sounded OK to my ears.