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In the 'Ride' books, Eric suffers a lot of ribbing for being a banjo player. For example, it is suggested he take up the harmonica because, compared to a banjo, only half the notes suck.
Today's Guardian contained a letter about musicians. Apparently, many people feel that an essential ingredient of being a musician is a sense of rhythm, whereas the real necessity is perfect pitch. Perfect pitch is defined as the ability to throw a banjo into a skip (dumpster) without touching the sides.
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I despise musicians. They
I despise musicians. They make me sick to the stomach.
My hatred is, of course, born of pure jealousy. How I envy anyone who can coax a single note out of a musical instrument and make it sound...well, musical.
I don't know if I have perfect pitch, but I could always work out the guitar chords to a song just by listening to it. Reproducing them was a different matter. My fingers simply wouldn't respond to the messages my brain sent them. After a lot of practice they managed the basic chords, though F sharp was permanently beyond their reach. Too many instructions, too short a time to comply with them.
I wasn't discouraged. There was always the bass.
Until I heard this...
http://youtu.be/z0BFzg2xyQM
Banjo players are wimps....
... If you really want to shock and offend you have to become a drummer.
Rhona McCloud
I've never been a particular
I've never been a particular fan of the banjo, but it doesn't offend me, either. But then, I like the hurdy-gurdy, so some people question my musical taste.
Hurdy gurdy
Now there is a wonderful instrument. One player worked with an acquaintance of mine, Jez Lowe, to produce some of the most beautiful music I know. Listen to the album 'Galloways'.
Cool! I didn't know of Jez
Cool! I didn't know of Jez Lowe. I can't find the album Galloways, but I've found the song, and some of the songs on it are on later albums to. The song Galloways, in particular, is clearly using a hurdy gurdy, and is quite nice.
If you're not familiar with them, you might want to check out the Quebec folk group Ad Vielle Que Pourra. Two of their albums picture a hurdy gurdy on the cover, and vielle is the French term for hurdy gurdy, so they named the band after the instrument. One of their inspirations is Breton traditional music, so it should be familiar to someone grounded in Celtic music, albeit sung mostly in French, which shouldn't be a problem for you.
Jez
He is someone I have known for around thirty years. He is a lovely man, and girl friends have gone rather weak at the knees on meeting him as he is a rather good-looking lad in the style of Donovan Leitch. He also writes wonderful songs tied closely to his home. 'Galloways' is about pit ponies, that towed the trucks in coal mines. I used to watch the ponies getting their sunshine over the school fence when I was a young girl.
On the radio
Yesterday, I was in a car for a bit, and had the radio on (about the only time I listen to radio, these days). The host of the show introduced the next song "Spitting Cousins, by Jez Lowe." So, he's not unknown over here.
Yay!
I love to see talent force its way past local play lists. Did I say enough times what a lovely man he is?
Well, this was a Celtic music
Well, this was a Celtic music radio show ( http://www.wgbh.org/programs/A-Celtic-Sojourn-224 ), so they look for the music where they can find it. While Boston does have some fine local sources, much of their playlist comes from closer to your part of the world.
Often, when you hear about artists, other than their works, it's because they're being jerks in some way. It's nice to hear that someone who makes good art, also turns out to be a good person. (Not that I think that's rare, it's just not the sort of thing one hears about, usually.)
More jokes
I got sent this:
http://www.scottishceilidhband.com/BanjoJokes.htm
Perfect pitch ...
... is a gift that not all musicians have (or need, I guess). My dad, a HiFi enthusiast when it was an esoteric pursuit followed by few, designed and built his own turntable. It was deliberately made to run at slightly more than 33.333 rpm as it was intended to make a speed controller for fine adjustment. A friend immediately detected its failing by noting that a piano note was A# rather than A natural. He was cursed with perfect pitch. He studied at the Northern College of Music as a pianist/organist and it greatly pained him that he was forced to take up the violin as a second instrument because the difficulty getting it tuned accurately.
I like Steph's definition the best, though. At least the current batch of musician jokes seems to let off viola players for some reason.
Me? All I can play is the fool and I'm a genius on the record player :)
I quite like bagpipes but nothing makes me switch off the radio quicker than the organ, piano accordian or string quartets. The piano is the only instrument that should be allowed to play solo IMO and that's final. Though I come from a generation that enjoyed George Formby playing his ukelele (or whatever it was) and singing comic songs.
Robi