re: banjos (no harp)

[tom ball <havaball@xxxxxxx>]

My brother Steve (who plays banjo professionally) just sent me the 
following regarding banjo instructional material.  Hope it's helpful 
to the person who asked... -Tom Ball
_________________
Banjos huh?  OK..you asked for it.  Or maybe you didn't, but here it is
anyway.  I am assuming our friend's friend wants to play bluegrass banjo.
If that's wrong, then most of this won't do them much good.

There is some good stuff written by Janet Davis and marketed by her on her
website: http://www.janetdavismusic.com/    She writes the books and
publishes some of them herself, but most of her stuff is eventually
published by Mel Bay, so you can also find them there.  She puts out good
instructional material for all levels of players.  In fact, Mel Bay puts out
some good banjo books written by several well known players.

Murphy Henry puts out good material for those people who favor learning by
ear instead of by tablature...her website is:  http://www.murphymethod.com/

One thing..."Masters of the 5" is a great book...chuck full of tons of
interviews and useful information, but it isn't really an "instructional"
book....at least not for beginners.  There are a few more advanced tabs in
there, written by the featured players, but no real instruction.  Plan to
get this book some day, but learn to play some basic stuff first.  It was
out of print for years, but it's been resurrected, and is now published by
Acutab  http://www.acutab.com

The old Earl Scruggs book is always a real good source of tab for some of
Earl's most famous tunes, but personally, I didn't think the basic
instructional part was that great....it's several years old now, and I don't
know if they've ever updated it (probably no video, etc available).  The tab
in my old Scruggs book includes regular "music" notation...something you
probably won't find anywhere else.  I don't know if they left that out in
later editions or not.

You're right about Pete's (Wernick) tapes and books...they have been 
around a while too, but should still be good, and might be available 
from Homespun Tapes
at:  http://www.homespuntapes.com/  I think they also carry Tony's 
(Trishka) video's there too.

Tabs and tapes, etc, are all good, but I think they work even better if you
can find a good banjo instructor.  Nothing beats having somebody to show you
the basics in person.

Hope some of this helps your friend...OK to post this if you want,

Steve