Click to download a FREE copy.
Several years ago I copped a teaching position at Ivy Tech Community College in Bloomington, IN (currently on sabbatical) under the auspices of the Center for Lifelong Learning, and among the courses I created was one I called Recreational Banjo – an introduction to the 5-string banjo. Being of the Scruggs school of banjo picking myself, the course focused on what we might call bluegrass banjo picking. Over the course of six weekly classes, each 90 minutes in length, my goal was to provide the basics of the Scruggs style as succinctly as I could, with a couple of well-known banjo tunes as project pieces (Cripple Creek and Foggy Mountain Breakdown). My cram course in elementary banjo turned into one of my most popular and well-attended courses, running every semester for several years.
Intending to keep the costs associated with the course to a minimum, Ivy Tech kindly provided me use of their copy machine to crank out handbooks for each student. I wound up writing the bulk of the handbook myself, generating graphics and diagrams as needed.
My banjo primer contained more material than I could ever hope to present in a six-week course, with an appendix full a lot of additional resources, some of which I pulled from StringDancer, such as my article on the importance of good practice habits. I recently decided to publish a stripped-down version of the handbook as an 18-page PDF that fledgling banjo students could use to get them started on this quintessentially American instrument. The PDF is a free download.
So if you have a 5-string banjo and want to learn how to play it, CLICK HERE to download the handbook, with my compliments.
