Billy Connolly - Cripple Creek

I'd nearly forgotten about Billy Connolly's banjo playing during his stand-up act. What with the wurzels, it's becoming a bit of a 70s kitch-fest, but here's the big yin doing Cripple Creek.

Hammer Time!

A tune from MC Clawhammer.

Don't touch this....

Cripple Creek

This is a picture of me delivering this years cider harvest from the Sowerby Cider Collective.




Cripple Creek


...and this is the cider drinkers national anthem for Trafford, see you soon mate!

More mandolin

Here's a couple more tunes my brother has been working on with his new mandolin.

Irish Washerwoman


Tune 2

Music Lessons with Stan

Stan Gee

I've been struggling along for the last twelve months trying to pick up the banjo basics from books (Tim Jumper - How to Play the Banjo) and online resources such as Patrick Costello's video workshops on You Tube and his Daily Frail workshops on the Tangier Sound blog. I think I've made quite a bit of progress on my own, but you just can't question something you don't get the hang of with a book or a video.

I've stared to realise from playing with other people that I'm OK if we play something I know, the way I know it, but if we play in another key I'm lost. I know there's a lot I don't know. So I've been looking for a teacher for a while, but there aren't that many in North Yorkshire. A few people recomended Stan Gee - see links.

Stan's the master of the strings, and loves American folk and country. He's blowing my mind at the moment with chromatic scales, modes and the structure of the major scales, but I'm sure in the long run it'll do me good. I'll keep you posted...

Wildwood (Reprise)

Had a go myself on the banjo, it's a bit slower than the mandolin version. It'd be great to try it out together.

Wildwood Flower

Wildwood Fouled

Sent this audio by a crazed mandolin playing speed junkie who, whilst in the throws of an amphetemine binge, decided to murder Maybelle Carter's Wildwood Flower.



Here's Mama Maybelle Carter doing it in her right mind.. rock it moma!

House of the Rising Sun

The Uke of Cornwall and his band sent this audio which was recorded at a recent gig, and a popart portrait of me. Cheers...

heroes - Justin Adams and Juldeh Camara

It's not banjo but it is blues. The way that Adams and Camara meld African and blues music is stunning, and they are great live. Juldeh Camara is a virtuoso who plays a range of gourd based instruments, some of which he plucks, that are not a million miles away from the gourd banjo. Their recent album 'Soul Science' captures the overlaps between blues and African styles and makes something special out of the two. There's a couple of tracks on the juke box at the moment.

12 bar blues drop thumbing

This is a version of the 12 bar blues in G but using drop-thumb.

12 bar drop in G

January Jam

Got together with my brother and a friend to celebrate his new mandolin. Lovely instrument and works well with guitar and banjo. Here's a couple of tunes we recorded this afternoon on my phone.

Camptown Races


Shortnin' bread sorta


Dirty Old Town

Heroes - Otis Taylor Recapturing the Banjo

I saw Otis Taylor and the Black Banjo Project on tour in 2008 at the Sage in Gateshead. I'd already got a banjo but needed something which would bring the idea of the instrument to life. Otis Taylor's project is quite political and wants to reclaim the instrument for black musicians, who might perceive the banjo as symbolising white rural music culture.

His approach is quite inclusive, and is a way of saying that this instrument is more than just the product and domain of white America. The Carolina Chocolate Drops seem to capture this attitude to reinvesting the banjo with its black, slave and African origins, but they do it in a way which highlights the vital, and often fraught, mixing of European and African music which ultimately led to the Blues.

oh susanna and 12 bar blues in G

A couple of tunes recorded with my new microphone - need to adjust the settings.

Oh Susanna


12 bars in G


The 12-bar blues has come out of this Daily Frail Workshop which I found quite handy and am still working on.