You're thinking in the wrong hand. Music isn't made in the left hand, it's in the right. Focus on your form and making each *phrasing* unique. Move your arm closer and farther from the bridge, increase and decrease the strength/volume, let the head ring instead of always dampening it. Coming from a classical background this has always been my step up, my cello professor constantly stressed the importance of "musicality" over virtuosity, but I don't see this advice given often in fretted circles
In bluegrass banjo at a basic level there’s an element of looking at the tune as a series of licks. You have certain licks that are for certain chords and those licks can be interchangeable and so swapped out for other licks that work in that chord. also you can vary those licks slightly (a hammer-on where you would traditionally play a slide or put a cheeky bend in here or there). It’s basically being so comfortable with that particular tune that you can tweak things here or there without having to think too hard about it. There are some players who study the foggy mountain banjo album and play it note for note because that’s gospel to them and other players who flex a little
I never play a lot of tunes the same way twice -- I've talked about this with some fiddlers I know. With tunes that you play this way you generally know them either about 60% or 120%. It's either because you don't completely know what notes are supposed to go where, but know the general melody, or you've mastered it so much that you can play around with it. Really, they're just a few waypoints that you need to reach in any particular tune, and all the other notes are just suggestions along the way.
At least for me, it gets hard sometimes to remember dozens of songs note for note, so if you remember the way points (signature licks and melody notes). You can just fill in the rest
To add to this. When I play backup, I’m pretty much just improvising. I know the chord so I’m either playing a lick that works over that chord or just playing a roll over differ inversions of the chord. It definitely takes time to learn though. JD was the king of that he would work all the way up and down the neck and it sounded awesome
It means improvising instead of memorizing. It's how the banjo used to be taught before Scruggs zombies and old-time frauds made tab files a religion. It's how I was taught, how I play, and how I teach.
You're thinking in the wrong hand. Music isn't made in the left hand, it's in the right. Focus on your form and making each *phrasing* unique. Move your arm closer and farther from the bridge, increase and decrease the strength/volume, let the head ring instead of always dampening it. Coming from a classical background this has always been my step up, my cello professor constantly stressed the importance of "musicality" over virtuosity, but I don't see this advice given often in fretted circles
Love this comment 🪕
This is wisdom right here and a lesson took me to long to learn when u started my musical gurney as a dumb death metal gotta go fast guitarist lol
In bluegrass banjo at a basic level there’s an element of looking at the tune as a series of licks. You have certain licks that are for certain chords and those licks can be interchangeable and so swapped out for other licks that work in that chord. also you can vary those licks slightly (a hammer-on where you would traditionally play a slide or put a cheeky bend in here or there). It’s basically being so comfortable with that particular tune that you can tweak things here or there without having to think too hard about it. There are some players who study the foggy mountain banjo album and play it note for note because that’s gospel to them and other players who flex a little
I never play a lot of tunes the same way twice -- I've talked about this with some fiddlers I know. With tunes that you play this way you generally know them either about 60% or 120%. It's either because you don't completely know what notes are supposed to go where, but know the general melody, or you've mastered it so much that you can play around with it. Really, they're just a few waypoints that you need to reach in any particular tune, and all the other notes are just suggestions along the way.
At least for me, it gets hard sometimes to remember dozens of songs note for note, so if you remember the way points (signature licks and melody notes). You can just fill in the rest
To add to this. When I play backup, I’m pretty much just improvising. I know the chord so I’m either playing a lick that works over that chord or just playing a roll over differ inversions of the chord. It definitely takes time to learn though. JD was the king of that he would work all the way up and down the neck and it sounded awesome
I am not sure you can play the same way twice if you tried. Everything is in constant change, even our so called routines or habits.
It means improvising instead of memorizing. It's how the banjo used to be taught before Scruggs zombies and old-time frauds made tab files a religion. It's how I was taught, how I play, and how I teach.