Customer Reviews

Black Banjo Songsters of N Carolina & Virginia

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Archival, yes, but the music contained on this CD is more vital than you can imagine. It must be heard to be believed. Listening to the likes of John Snipes and Dink Roberts changed my life. This is banjo music to calm the weary soul...and give it just the bit of thrill we all deserve. Plus, buying CDs on the Smithsonian/Folkways label is a way to help them continue their valuable work.

Only two of the tunes on this CD, "Going Where..." and "Going Away...," are closely related to blues music, in both cases very early blues music. The other thirty tracks are honest-to-goodness 19th-century-style, pre-blues, non-blues folk music -- a whole earlier animal than blues music, which didn't arise until about 1900. For instance, "John Hardy" is about a real West Virginian who was hanged in 1894 (coincidentally the year Dink Roberts was born); "John Hardy" isn't a blues song, and no one has ever found evidence of _any_ blues song existing as early as 1894.

For 19th-century-style banjo, by musicians who were immersed in it during the 1900s to 1930s when they were young and it was still very well-known in some rural areas, you can't do better than this remarkable CD. Many of these banjoists learned their tunes first-hand from banjoists who were born around the 1870s.

If this is your cup of tea, some other wonderful banjoists who recorded similar pre-blues, non-blues folk music, all born in the late 19th century, would be Belton Reese, Jake Staggers, Nathan Frazier, Sidney Stripling, Bill Cornett, Will Slayden, and H.N. Dickens.

Wonderful CD--some bizarre song content that makes you glad that is in an unedited collection of songs. Free form thoughts just pouring out--you really feel like you are there sitting next to these people. This is authentic old music--not for people who sort-of like old stuff. I recommend this CD, it is one that I've passed around to 5 or 6 friends. Stuff most people haven't heard unless they listen to esoteric public radio broadcasts in the back woods at 6 AM.

Historically and musically speaking, this is an excellent disc. Aside from doing its part to help fill in this gap in America's musical picture, it also delivers some stellar performances.

This disc gives us not only a glimpse into the nearly forgotten world of African American banjo playing, but also snapshots of varying personal and regional styles.

Of the artists captured on this disc, Dink Roberts, his son James, John Snipes' instrumental pieces, and Rufus Kasey would get my votes for the top musicians on the disc, with Dink being the pinnacle. With as many banjo styles, playing styles, and personal styles as there are in the world, there are times during this disc when I feel like Dink has one of the ultimate, definitive tones and styles. His CooCoo is almost unrecognizeable from the tune you most likely know from Clarence Ashley, Hobart Smith, etc... yet it is every bit as interesting.

This is an essential disc for anyone even partially interested in banjo music and history, but purchasing it alone won't quite give you the full picture. To really maximize this disc, I recommend that you buy it in tandem with the excellent book, African Banjo Echoes In Appalachia (which is also available at this website). They are companion pieces written and recorded by the same woman and should be considered inseparable.

From the various CooCoos to the 2 excellent but differing versions of Shortnin' Bread, John Hardy to Georgie Buck, there are many stand-out performances in this collection.

I'm African American and learning how to play the banjo. I tried this CD out from the library and I was very impressed with the old time style banjo music from blacks. And I didn't know that Etta James played the banjo. The song Jaybird played by Ms. Jamess was so beautiful.

It's unfortunate that we don't see many African American playing banjos today and how they contributed the banjo to American culture.

The pickers and players on these recordings are not only preserving the history of the African American origins of the Banjo, of the African American origins of both frailing/clawhammer/knocking/rapping or whatever you want to call down picking, as well as Carolina two finger pikcing. Moreover, by issuing these recordings Scott Oddell and Cece Conway, helped these pickers to light the torch to pass the flame on. From all over the country and beyond, Black banjoists are reviving, extending and enriching what our elders here have done.

Today, one of the most dramatic innovative Blues performers, like Taj Mahal, Corey Harris, Alvin Youngblood Hart, and Otis Taylor have picked up the banjo. Otis will be coming out with a recording including Kep Mo, Alvin Youngblood Hart, Corey Harris, and New Orleans tenor and six string banjo master Don Vappie that seeks to recapture the banjo for Black folk in February 2008. The last several years has seen the resurgence of several African American string bands playing this music including the Carolina Chocolate Drops and New York's Ebony Hillbillies.


April 7-10 2005 at Appalachian State University with the able and friendly assistance of Dr. Cece Conway, we will be held the first Black Banjo Then and Now Conference. We united elder Black banjoists and fiddlers like those on these recordings as their virtual descendants among younger generations of Black folk from middle schoolers on up with t national and international scholars of the banjo, unblack banjo pickers and fiddlers.


While this music sounds bluesy, exhibiting their common African American heritage, this music is different from the Blues. It arose separately and probably earlier as a descendant of banjo sounds Africans brought to the New World and fiddling Africans who had played bowed fiddles in Africa who mastered the violin they found in America (although some made folk fiddles that were hybrids between African fiddles and the violin). Distinctly African in its origins, this music interacted with European-American folks sounds to produce the string band music that powered European-American rural and mountain folk dancing.

All the artists on this recording are from the generation of African Americans who developed the Blues in its second generation. Indeed, several of the artists including those with some of the most archaic sounds like Dink Roberts and Odell Thompson were also very skilled Blues guitarists. Several others here like Homer Walker have recorded great blues recordings elsewhere (see the digital library of the appalachian's magnificent online site for multiple recordings, interviews and pictures of all of the Virginia and West Virginia based artists here except Josh Thomas.) Speaking of Thomas, the bulk of his music remains unreleased, but his banjo playing was drenched in the blues and he recorded several blues songs.

These pickers in the Carolinas and Virginia, represent the last traditional expression of Black banjo playing that once was heard in New York City, San Fransisco, Chicago, New Orleans, and other cities as well in the country. Their music has inspired a new generation of Black banjoists that keep the banjo ringing.

Conway and O'Dell have even more recordings of Black banjoists prepared for a second double volume of this wonderful history making music

This CD is a great historical document showcasing, as the title says, black banjo songsters of Nth Carolina and Virginia namely John Snipes, Dink Roberts, Joe and Odelle Thompson and some others. Then why only 3 stars? Well as I said it's a great historical document but I found the recording quality and sound can at times be a little difficult to sit through. Don't get me wrong there are some great tracks here including Old Blue by Dink Roberts, Jaybird March by Etta Baker and Shortnin' Bread by Lewis Hairston to name a few. I would have liked to hear more of Etta Baker even though she is 'primarily' a guitar player. I bought this CD not long after getting into old time banjo (I play old time banjo myself) back in 1998. I already had the 'North Carolina Banjo Collection' (see my review), which is superior in my opinion, because it showcases more artists and styles, and I later bought 'Kentucky Old Time Banjo' (see my review) which I like best out of all three CD's.

Not for the faint of heart or the common folk music revivalist, this stuff is the real deal. You won't find anything like it anywhere ever again. Both the book and CD are excellent.

There's nothing like old timey black banjo music. I really like to listen to the melodies and rhythms that sound the least western. This is the dawn of American music. Track 30 is the strangest version of Coo Coo I have ever heard.