1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
difficult transition to playing at speed, August 21, 2008
This review is from: Mel Bay Back-Up Banjo (Spiral-bound)
While in general the topic is covered well, the supplied audio tracks are difficult to work with. Licks and short demonstration sections are played very slowly so you can understand what's going on, but complete tunes that you'd like to play along with are only supplied at full speed. If you can do that already, you probably don't need this book. The audio is not in mp3 format and not easily transferred to a hard drive. Because it isn't easily available in mp3 format, one can't use a "slower-downer" program to build up speed playing along with the supplied tunes. Your only option is to try to play at breakneck speed to keep up with the supplied audio tracks for full tunes.
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0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Back-up Banjo by Janet Davis, October 15, 2009
This review is from: Mel Bay Back-Up Banjo (Spiral-bound)
This is a well thought out, well laid out book, with spiral binding. The binding I like, however could be * tighter/heavier since some pages do try to escape from the type of light spiral wire used.
It flows nicely from the Foreword, to Introduction, then Definitions, and General Guidelines. It, like many of these books seem to do, does not mention the * Tuning it uses. It may/will, if you are experienced, occur to you quickly upon glancing through it what the tuning is, since the chord formations work with Standard G Tuning. However, for me, new to Banjo, I had to do a little research for all the books I looked into (thank goodness for the preview, look inside feature).
It as well, wisely, skips over an attempt to teach music theory, only providing what is appropriate to make a connection with the instrument from her method on the content. (Get yourself a separate resource for that subject and review along with this book if necessary.)
I like the movable chord explanation early on (this is a "back-up" book). However, I wish it had as well included the "Notes" (Notation Names of the scale Notes used to build the chord) on the Fret-board collated to the finger positions (I like to verify and learn "the Neck" that way, 1-3-5 chord structure). It does comment the right hand technique as well. On a more personal user note, I however, as a carryover from Guitar would not shift the thumb to the middle or third string, I utilize my ring finger on the bottom string. This may not be a standard Banjo thing (how would I know); however it helped me come up to speed on the chord shapes faster since the right hand was locked in with the bottom three strings using the Index, Middle and Ring fingers with the Thumb only alternating from the 4th and 5th string. However, as a carryover from my Bass Guitar playing when playing the 16th note melodies I had to stop and think for myself a little bit in regard to using the Index, and Middle finger together to get the speed/flow needed in the right hand technique.
I like the interspersed "Fill-in" Licks to experiment with and break up the flow in an interesting way while traveling through this book.
I believe a Guitar or Bass Guitar Player seeking to come up to speed on an additional backing instrument could do it solely using this book alone (being a solid player in either of the two). Possibly a Bass Player might relate to this more quickly since the chord structure and whole "counting" thing is a must, more with them then the other (well, hopefully you know what I mean, they "set" the groove with the drummer and the rest follow--we assume anyway).
I am only up to page 33 of 238 (in a few short days of ever playing Banjo--Back-up) and have not (a bad habit of mine) sampled the two CDs included, therefore cannot comment on them. Nonetheless, I anticipate a very good experience using this book, thank you Janet Davis.
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