Old Time banjo players use a number of different tunings as a matter of course, compared to bluegrass pickers who typically use one standard tuning and do all their work within that.

First you have your basic G tuning, and if you capo up to the 2nd fret and tune or spike your 5th string up to A from G, you have A tuning.

There is Double C tuning, which is handy for quite a lot of fiddle tunes. If you capo up in that tuning, you get to Double C capo 2 or Double D tuning.

Then there is Sawmill tuning, used for modal tunes. It is also called G modal or with the capo on 2, A modal. Sometimes it’s called mountain modal, just because.

Most clawhammer players familiarize themselves with the tunings I mentioned above and so they learn three sets of fingering (if you use a capo, the fingering stays the same).

Last year at banjo camp I learned a couple tunes in Standard C tuning. That looks like G tuning except you tune the 4th string down a full step.  Again with the capo, you have Standard D tuning. I’ve been learning Arkansas Traveler in Standard D.

Beyond this it starts getting both confusing and interesting because there are in fact dozens of old time banjo tunings that have been used in this musical tradition. Some of them are named after certain tunes such as Sandy River Belle tuning and Cumberland Gap tuning. Of course there are multiple tunings that go by the same names just to be confusing. One player’s Cumberland Gap tuning is another player’s Sandy River Belle tuning.

Here is what is likely a partial list of old time banjo tunings. This is from the Zepp website. There are a staggering number of possibilities. I wonder if there is anyone out there who can play something in all of them?