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Tenor Banjo Christmas Songbook
by: Lee "Drew" Andrews

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by Michael Keyes

When you take a lesson from someone who is as skilled and engaging as Angelina Carberry, you have to keep remembering that you are a student and not a spectator. The tendency in the presence of such talent is to watch the performance and not to pick out those aspects of her teaching that will benefit you. Several years ago I went to a workshop by Roland White that could have turned into request night had Roland not kept everyone on task. My session with Andy Statman had him playing virtually no tunes in an effort to keep on teaching. (He told me he did that deliberately in order to be able to teach.)

I attended the last big workshop that Angelina and her husband Martin Quinn (who is a very good banjo player himself) gave on their first trip to the States and it was part of the Augusta Irish Week at Davis and Elkins College, Elkins, West Virginia.

Angelina comes from a traditional Irish music family. Her uncle is a famous piper, her father taught her about the music and her entire family plays or sings. She learned the traditional way, first by osmosis and then by being taught the family tunes. Along the way she developed a wonderful smooth style noted for its emphasis on rhythm and lilt. Of course she is endowed with enormous talent and a wonderful touch.

Because of this, she taught us the way she was taught, by giving us tunes. (At the end of the class we sang this ditty, to the tune of Angeline the Baker: "Angeline Carberry, banjo on her knee, taught us all one hundred tunes but we can only play three.") These were not the usual session tunes- in fact she never played in sessions until she and her husband moved to Galway where she received her degree in Politics and Psychology. What we got were tunes she learned at home such as one she called "The Murphy Brother's Reel" because she got it from them and is not aware of the name.

Teaching a Tune

Here is an example of the way she taught it to us. First she played it the way she would in a concert to give us a feel for the tune, and then she played it slowly, phrase by phrase.

Murphy Brothers Reel Video
Download the video:
Murphy_Bros_Reel.mov

Murphy Bothers Part I mp3
Download the mp3:
Murphy–Bros1.mp3

We learned a lot of tunes this way including one session favorite, "Con Curtin's Big Balloon" (which refers to a pub of that name) not in the usual key of Em but in Dm which sounds a lot better on the banjo even if it has a scary key signature. She moved it to that key to take advantage of the lower register of the banjo (and not to scare away the average player.)

Murphy Bothers Part II mp3
Download the mp3:
Murphy–Bros2.mp3

Because it was in Dm, it presented a new set of challenges to most of us. But it also was a lot of fun to learn.

Here are the notes in both Dm and Em. In the video showing her right hand, she plays Con Curtin's Big Balloon.

Angelina Right Hand Video
Download the video:
Angelina_Rt_Hand.mov

But what I found fascinating was being able to ask her about how she plays the banjo. Typical of many elite players, she had to sit and analyze for a while. For example, her distinctive style is, in part, due to the fact that she does all of her triplets on the upstroke. For some of us that is a mortal sin, but while she exhorts us to use a down stroke triplet, she says she can't do one at speed. The result is a different sound for the triplet that blends in well with her constant variations and little surprises such as double stops (she didn't use that term in fact had never heard it before applied to the banjo) and little micro timing changes that make up her style.

If you look at the Murphy Brothers Reel video you can see her using up stroke triplets.

She also has one of the smoothest right hands you will ever see. One of my classmates, Arbo Doughty, is just learning to play the banjo. He uses a "chicken pecking" style similar to what a lot of rock musicians use. The result is a more staccato sound that does not fully exploit the range of his very nice B&D Silver Bell #1. Compare his hand with that of Angelina's and you can see the differences.

Right Hand Comparison Video
Download the video:
Rt_Hand_Comparison.mov

She also answered the question of whether or not she anchors her hand in that video. If you look really closely (and it probably won't show up well) you will see the pick moving in her very light grip. She plays with the black Clayton .50 mm jazz pick which I am liking a lot, her banjo has a Gibson type flat head rim, a solid rosewood bridge (she said it was Brazilian, but I could not tell), a 17 fret neck, and no resonator. Her right hand gets a lot of sound out of that banjo.

These are the sort of things that you can get out of a workshop if you look for them. Most elite level players are not aware of a lot of what they do, mostly because they are so talented that these things came naturally (a phenomenon called Free Lunch Learning) so they tend they ignore the details for the production of music. If you are going to learn, you have to look for these details on your own.

Resources

Angelina Carberry and Martin Quinn have a site at http://www.reeltrad.com/ where you can get all of her recordings and learn more about her.

Augusta Irish Week is here (http://www.augustaheritage.com/irish.html) and it was a blast. Here are a few recordings of sessions:

Session I mp3
Download the mp3:
Session1.mp3

Session II mp3
Download the mp3:
Session2.mp3

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About the Author

Mike Keyes, a native of Franklin, Tennessee, has played tenor banjo since 1957 and over the years has learned to play five string banjo, mandolin, and guitar. He earned his way through college and medical school playing in bluegrass and dixieland bands and currently plays in the Irish band "Maggie's Misfortune." He is an expert in sports performance and has written a book and over 200 articles on the subject.

His interest in Irish music started a number of years ago when effort to learn more about his musical roots led him to the discovery of session playing. Since then he has been to Ireland to learn more about the music and has taken classes and interviewed such banjo greats as John Carty, Charlie Piggot, and Gerry O'Connor.

His medical practice is in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin where he practices Psychiatry. You can email him at mikeyes@charter.net if you wish to discuss some aspect of the Irish tenor banjo or go to his web site at www.mikekeyes.com.

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