Of the many regular monthly columns in Banjo
Newsletter, the Beginner’s Corner has been a lifeline for beginners with
its supportive advice on everything from learning rolls to practice
strategies to taking care of your hands to you-name-it. Hosted by
Eddie Collins, the Beginner’s Corner is a must-read for students
of the 5-string banjo. The book, "Banjo: From The Beginning," contains each
of the Beginner’s Corner articles from 1994 to 2004 when the column was hosted by
BNL Associate Editor, Ian Perry. The book is available online
here
But the best online Banjo FAQs (Frequently
Asked Questions) page we've found is by Mickey Cochran, who owns
and runs Folk
of The Wood in Ruidoso, New Mexico.
Mickey is a musician and teacher turned music store owner who
has recorded two albums ("Pickin' the Cattleman's"
and "Historic Songs of El Paso") and has written about
a dozen instructional books and videos, including the latest
video, "Intro to 5-String Banjo."
On Mickey's Banjo Questions and Answer page
he offers up excerpts from customer queries that he has answered:
and much more.
Also, Mickey has an excellent section
about different popular banjos, including:
and more.
Finally, Mickey compares and contrasts
different makes of banjos:
Here are some additional banjo FAQ sites
(though not necessarily for beginners):
Andy Perkins has a set-up, repair
and restoration services page.
The Banjo Hangout has a forum for banjo players
with topics that include
playing, set-up, tab requests, selling instruments, etc.
Bluegrass Rules has a forum that includes
banjo topics. The Banjo-L site has a
short page on various banjo subjects, along with their banjo
player directory.
BNL columnist Scott Zimmerman answers
banjo-related questions on Paul
Hawthorne's site. These FAQ's were
mainly culled from Scott's responses to threads on the acutab-list
banjo discussion listserver.
Deering Banjo has a FAQ page devoted to
their Goodtime banjo.
You can find introductory pages on bluegrass
and clawhammer playing at
ezFolk.com.
Finally, Steve Tussel has a basic list
of banjo links, along with lists of
books, history, magazines, mailing list, and webrings, at his
website.
