The Medusa Fora

Jan-Kolja wrote:Hi Hooperman!
I don´t think that it is possible to play most of Mr. Finers 5-String Banjo-rolls with a Tenor. Though there is no 5th String, which is used as a drone mostly playing a G you can´t get that typical country sound. But there are some Poguessongs which can be played with a Tenor, where Jem does not uses the 5th String:
Old Main Drag, Walzing M., Big and White City, Ghost Of A Smile and The Sunnyside Of The Street.
Cheers, Jan

I am currently playing the melody lines from "Streams of Whiskey" on my tenor banjo, and that works pretty nicely. Any single note riffs and lines can be managed on the tenor... just takes some work!

I have also seen him live with a Deering Crossfire Banjo which is some kind of a banjo-telecaster-hybrid. But in my opinion the Crossfire sounds really bad!

I completely agree -- that Deering Crossfire that Jem was using in '95 or '96 was a big MIS-fire. I'm not surprised he abandoned it -- it really lacked that distinctive 'banjo-y' ringing sound. I asked Jem about it once, and he told me that the Crossfire's big advantage was that it didn't have the feedback problems of regular banjos (he also mentioned that it sounded like "crap" when it wasn't plugged in.)

i play irish tenor banjo which is is tuned to GDAE, im a average player,but not played for years, im out of practice but i can still play along to most pogues tunes . songs in the key of C are difficult to work out,
question is about Jems 5 string banjo , what are his strings tuned to?and does he play the melody to tunes or chords

Hey de Burca!
Jems Banjo is tuned in open-G (gDGHD). In most Pogues songs, Jem plays banjo-rolls. Left hand: chords - Right hand: three-finger picking. It is also called Scruggs-Style. Check this out:

http://www.banjohangout.org/lessons/bro ... uggs+Style

But there are also some songs where Jems just picks the melody. For example Streams Of Whiskey, Waxies Dargle or Pachinko.

Cheers,
Jan-Kolja

Sorry. G-tuning is gDGBD!

Isn't it about time one of these tab book company's had a kick up the ass and
released a mandolin or banjo tab book for the brilliant pogues .I am sure i am not the only one who would appreciate a book like this.I have gone as far as i can with folkpunktab.com and the one at its link ( forget the name ) , I would like to learn the whole song instead of just the intro or the instrumental bit, surely Mr wood's or Mr finer don't just play these parts.Someone out there must know how to play verse's and chorus's like on streams of whiskey or thousands are sailing or any other great pogues song. There must be someone out there who can help me in my quest. e.g. like one of the pogues themselves.

Thank's Greg

gam wrote:Isn't it about time one of these tab book company's had a kick up the ass and
released a mandolin or banjo tab book for the brilliant pogues .I am sure i am not the only one who would appreciate a book like this.I have gone as far as i can with folkpunktab.com and the one at its link ( forget the name ) , I would like to learn the whole song instead of just the intro or the instrumental bit, surely Mr wood's or Mr finer don't just play these parts.Someone out there must know how to play verse's and chorus's like on streams of whiskey or thousands are sailing or any other great pogues song. There must be someone out there who can help me in my quest. e.g. like one of the pogues themselves.

Thank's Greg

I do actually agree with you, but I suspect such a publication would come about not from pressure applied by one of the Pogues but from some indication of market demand. I'm not sure who has the sheet music rights to our work at the moment (Wise Publications? Imp Music? Whatever the name is on the CURRENTLY available edition of "Best Of The Pogues" songbook is the best indicator) but it might be worth taking up the issue with whoever it is. Good luck if you do.

Thanks philip for your reply to my request, even you understand my problem.
The pogues music book is published by amsco wyse publications. Can not seem to find any imformation about this company on the web mayby someone out there does, if so please let me know.I would like to hear from other people to see what there views are on this subject, mayby we can put our heads togather and apply some pressure and get something done about this problem.

Thanks Greg

P.S. watched the story of fairytale of Newyork again last night on BBC3,
bloody brilliant.

Hi, folk's
Anyone out there know what kind of banjo roll's Jem Finer use's,as there are no tab book's or any web sites for tab around?Does anyone have any tab as i have only recently taken up the banjo and it's hard to try and work it out for myself.
Thank's Greg

Hey Gam!
Are there any special songs, youre interested in? Maybe i can figure it out for you!
Greetings,
Jan

Hi,jan-kolja
I have worked out how to play a few which i have sent to " fretplay " website.dirty old town seem's a bit dodgy now but the other two seem ok.But fairytale, broad majestic or any other's would be good !!!
thank's greg
P.S. where have i seen your name before.

Hey Greg!
I dont know...maybe in some of my rare contributions to this forum?
I am a bit busy at the moment, but i´ll try to post some banjo tabs for Fairytale and BMS by the end of week. Will have to figure them out properly and write them down...
All the best,
Jan!

Hey Greg!
I managed to upload some 5-String-tabs for Fairytale Of New York. You can find them on fretplay.com (hopefully in the next hours/days) when they add them to their archieves. BMS will follow in the next days!
Cheers to you,
Jan

Hi,Jan
Thank's for putting up fairytale banjo tab at fretplay website it's going to be a big help.Looking forward to having broad majestic too.Between us hopefully we can put alot more up there in the future,so if you work out any more it would be greatly appreciated.Once again a big thank you,and all the best.
Greg

There are some really good lessons for playing traditional Irish music on the 5 string over at http://www.musicmoose.org under the advanced banjo lessons section. They run through a few songs and some of the basics of playing triplets, etc.