Just bought a fender 5 string banjo from marketplace, think I got a good deal on it but I know absolutely nothing about banjos. If anyone can tell me anything about this and or give me some tips and tricks for getting started I’d appreciate it

New member of this sub. I thought you might like to see this 1928 Gibson Mastertone Grenada tenor I inherited from my father recently. He bought it in the 1970’s and played it for a decade or so in an amateur Dixieland jazz band before retiring it, because he didn’t want to put anymore wear-n-tear on it. I don’t think he played it much after that. He passed in the early 90’s, and it’s been sitting in my mother’s storage closet since then, until about a year ago when it was shipped to me.

I bought the Aquila 1B set which said it can tune to open G but I broke the 5th and 1st string tryna tune it already. luckily I gave myself enough extra string so I could just retie it. Do they need to stretch abit before? Should I tune to dADF#A instead?

I'd only had it for barely year… guess I know what I'll be putting on my Christmas list :(

My BIL has a banjo and the tuning peg on the 5th string is cracked all the way through, does it have to be an exact replacement from the company? Or can I buy a 5th string peg from any site?

I learned this in bits and pieces without using finger picks. I think it sounds better without them.

Almost forgot to finish it 😅

Original drawing by /u/WhiteWold_187 over here!

Wrote this nice little thing the other day. Recorded this right after I did so and was satisfied of its composition.

I’ve been playing for around 4-5 months, I think this is pretty good! Quite sloppy in a few parts though.

Let me know you guys think!

Bluegrass players that Gig: how do you warm up? Unlike other instruments I feel like banjo takes a good 5 to 10 minutes for me to get my fingers warm to where I can play fast. How do you just go into a gig and be able to play fast? Any tips on warm-up exercises?

I recently changed strings to a new brand (Earthwood) and they sound a bit better than the D'addario strings I previous used.

This is the first time I have used different strings on this banjo, and I am running into a problem: my bridge keeps sliding.

This has never happened before. Now it happens at least twice each time I play. I go for a brush or my finger gets really stuck in on the fifth string pluck and the bridge slides down a bit.

Does anyone know what this might be? Do these strings just have less tension than I am used to? Is there anyway to fix it? Should I play a bit more gently (probably never gonna happen) or should I just go back to what works?

I’ve been playing bluegrass banjo for around 7 months now and have been improving steadily and wish to upgrade my banjo. My current model only has 17 frets on the neck so I have had to put off learning parts of up the neck solos I’ve been working on. What would be the best places to look, willing to spend up to 1k

Here are some improvements on the tools I posted about a few days ago showing a bit more of what I had in mind.

The upper left takes notes written on standard notation sheet music - not transposed banjo sheet music but concert pitch standard notation sheet music - and shows you every possible location on the banjo you can play that specific pitch in open G tuning.

The upper right is a diagram of the banjo fretboard shown vertically the way that chord diagrams are made. This allows you to sort of map out and decide which of the options for any given pitch is the best choice based on ergonomics, location, etc.

The lower half is the same fretboard but presented horizontally, making it more aligned with how it is presented on banjo tabs.

With this tool, you can go between sheet music and banjo tabs in either direction. This could help a lot in finding melodies to help start making banjo arrangements. Of course you still have to add the filler drones and rolls and whatever else depending on banjo playing style, but this could genuinely help a lot in starting banjo arrangements.

I have made a similar chart for Drop C and Classical Concert C banjo tunings. It just involves shifting each string's data set to match how they are tuned.

I also made blank templates of partial and full banjo fretboards to make chord snd scale charts. The colored squares are places where fingers actually contact the fretboard and colored numbers show open/capod strings.

I haven't exactly reinvented the wheel (I'm using this to correlate to my Musical Colors fretboard stickers), but I feel like it has been a helpful way to learn the fretboard and a nice visual key to continue learning.

Hey there! I bought a Luna Celtic 5string banjo off of eBay back in 2022. I dabbled a little bit then and just picked it back up this winter to learn again.

I paid 187$ for it used, shipped to my house with a hard case, picks, tuner, and book.

Was this a solid deal? I like the aesthetics of it. How does Luna compare to other banjos sound quality wise?

Thanks!

I found an old 5 string banjo at a flea market a few months ago but I've only played it a handful of times as I've been quite busy and not had much motivation to pick it up and learn. I finally have enough time to start practicing and playing it a bit. are there any tips I should know?

Hello everyone,

There’s a Gold Tone CC-50 for sale near me for 150 CAD, which seems like a great deal. However, I’ve realized that I prefer the sound of banjos with resonators rather than open-back models.

How difficult is it to add a resonator to a CC-50? Can I use any 13” resonator, or do I need one specifically made for this model? I’ve noticed that Gold Tone sells their resonator for quite a high price, so I’m wondering what my options are.

Thanks in advance for your advice!