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A Time of Thanks and Remembrance

November 18, 2015

To Fete a Feat of Feet

As the BRC founder and spouse ready to travel to The Lone Star State for a Thanksgiving weekend with the grandkids, there is a long list of things big and small for which to be thankful:  Family, friends, fellow musicians, and our appreciative audiences who generously donate to the Children`s Hospital. A recent and frequent addition to our Sunday afternoon benefit gigs is a young lady who jumps up on the stage and dances her heart out for the audiences who then loosen their pursestrings to donate eagerly to the Children`s Miracle Network.lua

 

The band calls her “Dancing Girl”, and her mother tells us that the little whirlwind has no formal training in her footwork.  Check-out and enjoy the below video link (IMG 0029) and decide for yourself whether this prancing little lady is Irish step dancing or clogging- or both. Thank you, Dancing Girl!

IMG_0029            (Ed.) Kiddo`s a natural…

 

A Legend Remembered

Last month, a giant in the Bluegrass world passed away, and the banjo community worldwide respectfully remembers Bill Keith as an innovative genius and craftsman. A friendly and unassuming guy, Keith was a pioneer in developing the ground breaking melodic style of picking the 5-string which increased the vocabulary of the banjo manifold. He brilliantly designed the inboard D-tuner pegs which bear his name.

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In this 1963 photo, a young Bill Keith is holding a classic archtop bow tie inlay Gibson Mastertone. The brother of the BRC founder purchased an identical vintage banjo in 1963 and generously gave it to the BRC founder 20 years ago, and it still delivers the volume and timbre to power-through a bluegrass band in full flight.


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Keith not infrequently lectured on the harmonic mathematics of Bluegrass music and is pictured here with the BRC founder who attended one of these insightful and fascinating seminars at a banjo camp several years ago.

Farewell Bill,  and thank-you for all you taught us.

 

BRC Activities

Banjotropolis Update

November 1, 2015

Living in far flung corners of the US, the BRC Executive Committee held its annual meeting by conference call  this year to avoid travel expenses. Old Business included analyzing the perennial financial shortfalls of the workshop which operates at a deficit of $125 per month.

From Texas, the CFO predicted the fiscal future of the enterprise as foggy, and no fiduciary strategies were promulgated to rectify the chronically negative revenue stream.  The Senior Vice-President of Sales moved to refer this thorny agenda item to a subcommittee , and the ex officio member from the Board of Directors volunteered to chair the subcommittee. The motion was so amended and approved .C&C

Under New Business, our CEO in Chicago updated the Committee on his utopian “Banjotropolis”” societal vision for a futuristic City on the Hill. He offered his own recent photo documenting that banjo graffiti was beginning to appear on street light utility boxes on Main Street, Hometown, USA.jjSt.

 

 

 

 

 

During the subsequent hot chocolate break, the CEO performed a song for the Committee that he penned to celebrate his magnum opus and its emerging art form heralding a banjo culture as alluded to in his first  BRC website post of May 08, 2011 (for song video click IMG 7611 link).

IMG_7611             (Ed.) Impressive….

In his report on Research and Development, our Director of R&D in Missouri encouraged all members of the Committee to closely reevaluate the clawhammer style of picking the banjo, as a studied assessment  of this technique had stirred his thinking in new directions of growth.

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He confessed that his imagination was so fired by this focused  examination of frailing, that he even dreams now of banjos at nap time and wakes up marvelously  refreshed.rorocrib2

 

 

 

 

As there was no other business, the meeting was adjourned by acclamation. While the Executive Committee officers returned to their respective family circles to prepare for Thanksgiving, the ex officio Board member closely studied clawhammering as recommended by her cousin (click below trim2 video link).

P.S. trim2             (Ed.) Kid can flog those strings…….

P.S. Check out the BRC “Peace Dove” banjo on eBay Nov. 1-7.

 

 

G&F Band

Banjos on Halloween?

October 14, 2015

The Gainor & Friends band  recently performed a sunset gig for the Children`s Hospital at a nearby community autumn street festival amidst sweltering Indian summer temperatures.  As darkness quickly enveloped the venue, the perspiring musicians paused for what proved to be a strangely eerie photo next to a disembodied bronze bust.  “We have no eyes,” protested a singer in a subsequent e-mail. “Looks like the zombie apocalypse,” complained a fiddler. “Beware of bluegrass goblins, ” lamented a guitarist gravely.FullSizeRender-2

 

 

To placate the alarmed pickers, the BRC founder circulated last year`s reassuringly cheerful band photo at the festival (where chilly  weather had us shivering despite windbreakers and caps).

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Still unconvinced that there were not unearthly spirits roaming in the gloaming during this year`s creepy picture, our bassist wondered. “Like a cross, will a banjo fend-off vampires?”

Nope, not a ghost of a chance. Have you gone bats?

Bio

Fiddling the Blue(grass) Danube Waltz

September 30, 2015

In search of an Old World cousin of the banjo, the BRC founder spent dappled days of autumn tracing the meanderings of the cobalt blue Danube River through eastern Europe. In Budapest, he briefly paused his quest to play harmonica with a friendly Gypsy fiddler.

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While visiting a farm for show horses near the Austrian border, the BRC founder and fellow travelers enjoyed the up tempo music of an Hungarian folk band during the dinner hour. A masterful musician feverishly played the cimbalom– a forefather of the American hammer dulcimer. After the meal, a tiny old man (seated center far behind the quartet) shared his memories of living under the heavy bootheels of the German and then Soviet occupying forces during his youth.

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In the cobblestoned medieval city of Cesky Krumlov, a Czech trio dressed in 16th century garb performed lilting Renaissance  tunes during an evening feast at the end of the tour (click to enlarge).fiddle3

 

 

Alas, the trip proved to be a cavalcade of violins. But, no banjos were found-  like the one held by the unknown picker in this archival photograph of rural Americana . Can you identify the fiddler?uncpen

 

 

 

 

 

Answer: Bill Monroe`s fondly remembered Uncle Pen.

Cell Perches & HVO

FDR and the Banjo and Eleanor

September 16, 2015

For treatment of his polio affliction, Franklin Delano Roosevelt was a regular visitor of Warm Springs, Georgia. Not infrequently, he was entertained by performances of local musicians. In  November of 1933 after taking office as President for the first time, FDR was treated to the banjo talents of Perry Bectel. The Chief Executive autographed the calfskin head of the entertainer`s instrument which was later featured in a news article affiliated with radio station WSB- The Voice of the South. After spending decades forgotten in a closet, the banjo head was rediscovered a few years ago by the family and sold online as a collector`s item. It has been displayed at the American Banjo Museum in Oklahoma City (click to enlarge).fdr4

 

 

 

 

On January 25, 1933, only five weeks before his first inauguration, Roosevelt was filmed listening to Bud Wright`s Fiddle Band play “Soldier`s Joy” as requested by the President-Elect.

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In the below fascinating video link , watch the film editing closely as FDR`s beloved daughter Anna (striped shirt) magically appears next to him in the clip at 22 seconds and then inexplicably disappears from the close-up footage at 44 seconds. During the stressful war years, Anna lived in the White House and was the go-between for FDR in one of his amourous extra-marital relationships, a topic of the 2012 movie “Hyde Park on the Hudson” starring Bill Murray as FDR and Laurie Linney as the President`s distant cousin Daisy who narrates the film.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2zJU-d5Seg

No stranger to music appreciation, Eleanor Roosevelt listens to young Pete Seeger, a US Army draftee in uniform, serenade the guests with his banjo at the opening of the United Federal Labor CIO canteen in Washington on Valentine`s Day in 1944.seegar4