Mel Bay's The Art of the Mountain Banjo (Fantasy) Review

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(More customer reviews)I'm amazed that no one has reviewed this yet. This reissue was published about ten years ago. I hunted down the old kicking mule copies via interlibrary loan years ago, and though the tab used on those original imprints was a bit odd, it was still readable. It's such a relief to see these arrangements in normal tab finally!
The book comes with a CD of the first Kicking Mule album, and that's almost worth the price of admission right there. I love those recordings--even if Art takes things a bit fast at times, he mixes up solos with a good choice of songs you're not liable to find anywhere else("Tennessee Line Hard Times", a variant of "Old Reuben"). One gripe is that they may as well have just added his second album as well for good measure.
I especially appreciate the mix of transcriptions of clawhammer with other picking styles. As much as we associate clawhammer with traditional banjo picking, there were other picking styles that pre-dated Scruggs. Art Rosenbaum seems to be the only one who gives these styles any air time. For example, I love Doc Boggs, and I learned a great deal about Boggs' style working out Art's transcription of "Country Blues"
If you're just a straight clawhammer player, I still think it's worth getting for those arrangments. The rest makes for a nice encyclopedia of oddball picking styles. So, I'll lead off with five stars.

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A complete survey of traditional banjo styles complete with tunings, playing tips, and the author's deft drawings. Progresses from easy tunes for the beginner to more difficult pieces. The styles include up-picking or Pete Seeger's basic strum; two-finger picking; three-finger picking; and what had variously been called frailing, clawhammer, knocking, rapping, overhand, fram-style, flayin' hand, and other Appalachian names, here called down-picking.

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