Thanks for your warm welcome!  My interest in minstrel banjo is primarily historical.  I've been researching and writing about a variety of banjo pioneers such as Frank Converse and his contemporaries.

Best regards to all!

Thanks Terry, One more road to explore on this life long musical journey.

Thanks for your welcome, I intend on building some fretless banjos in the future and am happy to have this resource.

Thanks Terry. I'm glad I found the Minstrel Banjo group.

Thansk, Terry.  Great to be a part of this place.

Thanks so much for sharing the Nylgut gauges. I'll keep in touch.

Check out my proposal. One thing not specified (this is a very short

introductory version of what I'd like to partner with many to do) are

the ten primary categories of banjo music:   •Minstrel, •Classic Fingerstyle (The American Banjo Fraternity is the primary conservator of the urban banjo ca. 1860-1915),

•Rural and Old Time; •Plectral Jazz (tenor and plectrum); •Bluegrass; •The Folk

Music Era; •Celtic; •Cutting Edge (those pushing the envelope in all categories);

•Classical Music (my specialization); •Brochure%20Page%204.pdfFingerstyle Jazz (Pat Cloud, Béla Fleck's overtures with Chick Corea, etc.)

Thank you, Terry. People call me Jim, as in www.suzanneandjim.com. Jim Hale

No, not yet.  It's something we were discussing last week.   We have to figure out how to produce one (a good sounding one!) - and I have major insecurities about being good enough to be recorded....but that's my own thing, right?    So you vote we should, huh?

Thanks for the welcome.  I've been doing historic reenactments of 1830-1860 time period in the Pacific NW for a few years and wanted to add more music to my presentations.  Got a fretless gourd banjo built by a friend and am having a great time with it.  Still very much a novice, so I am always looking for new tips and ideas.  I am glad ou have this site.

Terry,

Thanks for your welcome. 

I am interested in the historical development of minstrel songs.  I am a member of MBSGB (musical box society of Great Britain).  I have a box pinned in 1841 with the tune sich a'gettin upstairs.  Said to be an English Morris tune, but believed by many to have been brought here in 1836 by Thomas D Rice. He also played and sang it when performing as Julius Caesar Washington Hickory Dick in a show called 'Yankee Notes for English Circulation at the Surrey Theatre London  in 1843.

Border Morris teams dance it as Getting Upstairs and interestingly border morris sides usually black up for their dances. Check out Benji Kirkpatrick on Utube playing getting upstairs for a great and accurate performance (according to the 1841 arrangement on my musical box) .  I do not play banjo but I'm interested in tunes that were so popular so many years ago.  My box sounds today exactly as it did when new in 1841 or 1842. that's why I wanted to join your group!

Terry: Thanks for the welcome. Not sure if you ever got the pictures of me with the 6-string. If not, when I get around to posting a picture for this forum I'll use one of those. I had it with me at the Antietam gathering over the weekend, where it attracted a lot of comment. Peter Szabo (did I spell that right?), who has the original, was there and pronounced it very authentic.

I have your picture on my website. I still think about that banjo a lot. I bet it DID get a lot of comments!!

Thank You, Terry.

Can't wait until my new banjo arrives!

Gerald

"Bell, thank you for the greeting. Delighted to have an opportunity to look around this site, and learn about the banjo's extraordinary musical heritage."

Terry , Looking forward to next saturday :< )   And many there after , Thanks !

Thanks for the info. And, I've already been on your site a number of times! If I decide to take the plunge call you up :)

Hi Terry

Did you say you had some tambourine kits you were making up? If so I'm in and how much? Dave

Hi Terry. Thanks for your message. Have now finished the banjo and learning a number of tunes thanks to Mr Twiss. The Appalachian clogging my partner dances does not really go with minstrel tunes because of the timing, but she plays melodeon as well so we are looking at some duets with that combination, which could be interesting.

Just got my Bell Banjo .yesterday, today I have been attempting to figure it out.  worked on a couple of songs.  my goal is to learn how to play my own songs on it.

Hi Terry - how are you feeling these days? I hope your well. Did you get a chance to work on my banjo and tambourine kits yet.

Dave Sharp

G'day Terry,

I have sent you a few emails on your business site email address but haven't had a reply so I thought I would check here that you are still ok and all is well in the Bell family.

Do you have a delivery date in mind for my banjo?  I think you were up to painting it just before you got unwell. All the best H

Hi Terry - Waiting with baited breath hoping to get the banjo and tambourine kits. Lets me know when you can.

Dave Sharp

Terry;

I am putting together what I hope will be a performance/lecture program for our local library. I won't be presenting anything scholarly but wish to present a point of departure for anyone who would like to travel on the banjo path.

Good intentions, but.

I don't want to use photos to illustrate the main development of the instrument.

I want to use the actual instruments; ergo performance.

Do you know of anyone in possession of an akonting that they would part with for a reasonable price? Or plans for making one? Gourds are plentiful here in Missouri and we sure got many kinds of wood in great abundance but I can't tell from youtube videos or Elderly's ad just how the durn things went together.

I have taken the neck you made for me and put it together with an all wood head somewhat like a bucket but reversed with the wood base sanded very thin and used as the top. It has good tone and great volume. I'm on youtube playing a couple of numbers on it, Old Man Below and maybe Sail Away Ladies. Possibly Pretty Polly.

I took the rim you fitted the neck to and gave it back its original neck. So I now have two un-fretted banjos.

Still learning.

Thanks,

Tom Meisenheimer

Hi, Terry,

I've been meaning to send you an email for a couple of weeks.  I got the Stichter (the one from ebay) put together just fine.  I ended up using tea for a stain; probably a lot lighter than a commercial stain, but it does give a nice reddish cast to the maple.  I've worked making parts for harpsichord kits in the past, and I can say that the banjo went together really well. Sounds good, too.  I'm very happy, though these guitar-playing fingers still aren't doing very well on stroke style.  Thanks so much,

Chris.