Show us your tenor banjos

**Larry S Sherman** · Jun-20-2008, 11:57am

I have seen a few pics in several forums, but maybe this would be a good place to compare banjo styles and to comment on features, volume, tunings, etc?

I have one tenor banjo, an Orpheum #3 Special. It's fairly fancy, with a carved neck heel and some nice inlay. It's an open back (built in the pre-resonator days).

I tune it GDAE...octave mandolin style, and play the same material I would on a mandolin, although older jazzy stuff and ragtime sounds best. I don't play Irish stuff...at least not yet.

Larry

**Larry S Sherman** · Jun-20-2008, 12:01pm

The neck is made out of holly wood.

**Larry S Sherman** · Jun-20-2008, 12:05pm

My buddy brought over his Orpheum #1

**Larry S Sherman** · Jun-20-2008, 12:06pm

The two together:

**Celtic Saguaro** · Jun-20-2008, 3:30pm

Here's my B&D, the same one in my avatar

**Celtic Saguaro** · Jun-20-2008, 3:33pm

The Senorita was a budget model, but mine has a few extras I haven't seen on others like a tone ring. #The head stock has a big C on it, but I haven't seen any references to a C model Senorita.

**Celtic Saguaro** · Jun-20-2008, 3:41pm

It's a 19 fretter. I tune it GDAE. #The action is high for tuning it CGDA, but it's fine with regular tenor banjo strings tuned octave mandolin style. I'm not sure the geared tuners are original. #But they've been on it a long time. #The tail piece is a replacement, a Paramount style which I moved from another banjo.

From the Serial #, I believe this tenor banjo is from the late 1920's and thus before the time of the Gretsch takeover of Bacon.

**Chris Biorkman** · Jun-20-2008, 3:42pm

You know this isn't the Banjo Hangout, right?

**Celtic Saguaro** · Jun-20-2008, 3:44pm

They don't know about the GDAE secrets there, surely.

**Thomaston** · Jun-20-2008, 4:41pm

Originally Posted by (Celtic Saguaro @ June 20 2008, 16:44)

They don't know about the GDAE secrets there, surely. #

They have a section for styles other than bluegrass and old-time. It covers, Irish, jazz, whatever. There's a good number of tenor players over there... Mike Keyes is very active there in the Irish threads.
I just got back into playing the tenor myself, after focusing almost exclusively on tinwhistle for the last couple of years.
I got a Gold Tone IT-250 this week... lovely banjo so far. Mine is just like this one except mine came with a Renaissance head installed:

**Celtic Saguaro** · Jun-20-2008, 6:08pm

Just joking with the person who brought it up.

**lucho** · Jun-20-2008, 6:39pm

I do have three tenor banjoes, a 17th fret Vega little Wonder TB (1929), a 19th fret Roy Smeck Harmopny TB (1950?), and because of its nice case I just bought another 19th fret english Lorenzo TB. You could see photos of my banjo collection with comments about its history in my hometown Valparaiso, Chile at http://festivalpo.blogspot.com/2008/04/banjo-era.html. I do play them mostly stringed as GDAE, using fiberskin and standard remo heads. Formerly I used skin heads but when you change location tuning and humidity play against its use... and fiberskin is not that bad....

**Larry S Sherman** · Jun-20-2008, 7:32pm

Originally Posted by (lucho @ June 20 2008, 19:39)

You could see photos of my banjo collection with comments about its history in my hometown Valparaiso, Chile at http://festivalpo.blogspot.com/2008/04/banjo-era.html.

There's a problem with your link. I think it will work from here.

Larry

**Spruce** · Jun-20-2008, 7:47pm

"My buddy brought over his Orpheum #1"

I love my 1918 Orpheum #1....
Here's a pic:

**steve V. johnson** · Jun-20-2008, 11:16pm

You can see a bit of the one I have in the May Bell Queen thread. I'll post some more pix when I get it back, it just had its tuners
modernized.

The two Orprheums are really interesting, I really like how the headstocks are different, the #3 is so nicely articulated from the #1,
and they still look distinctively alike! Very cool.

Boy O boy, there are some fancy banjos out there... A friend of mine had a job once photographing some tenor banjos for an estate
sale. The fellow who had passed had more than a dozen, and most of them were really encrusted with gold and MOP. Amazing.

Thomaston, I recommended a Gold Tone CCIT "Irish tenor" banjo for a friend and she's carried among several continents, it's needed
very little care and sounds great. All manner of banjo mavens have oooh'd and aaah'd over the sound and playability of it. The Gold
Tone tenors can be very good.

Mike Keyes introduced me to the Banjo Hangout because I was looking for information on replacing the tuners on the '20's May Bell
Queen, and the folks over there were just about as nice and well-informed as folks here, and generous with their infos, too. Nice joint.
There seem to be plenty of tenor banjo folks there.

Many thanks,

stv

**Pete Martin** · Jun-21-2008, 2:01am

Bacon and Day Silver Bell Montana #3.

**Larry S Sherman** · Jun-21-2008, 5:09am

Originally Posted by (petimar @ June 21 2008, 03:01)

Bacon and Day Silver Bell Montana #3.

Nice leg-operated mute!

**Thomaston** · Jun-21-2008, 9:24am

Originally Posted by (Celtic Saguaro @ June 20 2008, 19:08)

Just joking with the person who brought it up.

Oh, I know.

It is mostly for 5-string players; I was just being anal at the time.

**Michael Wolf** · Jun-21-2008, 10:41am

Originally Posted by (Spruce @ June 20 2008, 20:47)

"My buddy brought over his Orpheum #1"

I love my 1918 Orpheum #1....
Here's a pic:

[QUOTE]

I first thought that this is a picture of a early Raggaeband, since the Tenor Banjo played a central role in the development of the Raggae in the early years.