I’ve been making some adjustments to the “Industrial” oil can banjo. It was bothering me that the volume on this banjo was lower than I wanted or expected. There are several factors that could affect the sound from the construction and weight of the can… Read More
I’ve made a neck blank for the next oil can banjo, but I’ve decided to put that aside for later and instead I’m going to try to make a mountain banjo similar to those described in the FoxFire book, a much different design than either… Read More
Here’s another new painting. This one is a round painting, a tondo if we want to get all Renaissance today. Here is The Source. This painting is oil on panel and it is 2 feet in diameter. This is by no means the first time… Read More
At one time I used to do long road trips with my friend East Texas Red. Our destination was the mountain west. We would spell one another off driving across the US getting out to the west as fast as we could. I remember one… Read More
Merlefest is an Old Time music festival that takes place each year at the end of April at Wilkes College campus in Wilkesboro North Carolina. It was named for ace guitar picker Merle Watson who died in a tragic farm accident in 1985. The festival… Read More
Tonight I’d like to offer up a Daily Dose of Big Rock Candy Mountain… Here’s The Katfish Four If you have never heard Baby Gramps this version will be an eye-opener for you…this gets cut off at the end but by then you’ll have the… Read More
The two oil cans I’ve been expecting arrived by today’s post. It’s time to make a couple more banjos. I drove out to Burlington this afternoon to visit a place called Exotic Woods. This place features 20,000 square feet, a showroom, warehouse and full machining… Read More
I love the quote that just came up on my WordPress dashboard, from crime writer Elmore Leonard: “I try to leave out the parts that people skip”.
Kenojuak Ashevak died Tuesday in Cape Dorset Nunavut at age 85. Perhaps you don’t know her name, but when you visualize what we think of today as Inuit art, the images you’re thinking of may well have been created by her. Kenojuak had all the… Read More
Old Joe Clark is a tune that just about every banjo picker plays at some time or another. It was known to have been sung by soldiers from Kentucky in WWI. There are written versions of the tune going back to 1918. The Joe Clark… Read More
27th Street 