Banjo - BEGINNER 5 STRING BANJO MASTERCLASS - Learn Banjo from Scratch - Banjo Fundamentals - Banjo

1. Beginner Banjo: in this course you're going toe learn core fundamental ideas about playing the five string banjo we're gonna play along with backing tracks all along the weight by playing along with backing tracks. It makes it easy and fun to progress to the next level. So if you're ready to have some fun learning to play the banjo, let's get started and we'll see you. 2. Intro Banjo: my name's check Millar, and I'll be your beginner Banjul instructor. 3. Parts of the Banjo and the tools we use: the first thing that we're gonna learn are the parts of the banjo and the tools that we use our finger picks. And let's start with her finger picks. First we have our thumb pick, which is a plastic pick in two finger picks, which are metal. They could be just about anything. Just make sure that when you get him, they're snug enough so that it don't fall off your fingers or move around too much. Now, Tora banjo, we start with the head of the banjo, which is much like a drum, and that drum is the thing that has tension in it that pushes sound underneath it, just like a drum. And then through this resonator that's around banjo pushes the sound right back out. Now, some banjos don't have resonator is, but this one does. Um, they're called open back banjos, and you can still find those in a five string banjo like this one. The other parts of the banjo that we're gonna talk about are the neck of the banjo and the top part of the neck, which features thes metal bars, which are called frets. And when we put it all together, it's called a fretboard all the way to the end Here. Now, this little black piece that's at the end is called a nut. And that's responsible for raising up the strings so that when we weigh a note, you can hear it ring out. Without that nut, all the notes would be dead, or they would be muted they won't be able to bring out. Then we have our fifth string tuner, which looks a little different than the rest of the tuners on this banjo. And these are kind of regular guitar tuners which aren't really typical of banjos, um, that have different types of tuners. But on this banjo that I'm using today, um, these air just regular geared tuners versus your planetary type of tuners at tune from the back. This is our tail piece. And this is where the strings run through over the top of our bridge. And the bridge is responsible for again raising up those strings so that the the banjo can ring out and for having little slots in them so that the strings confined their little places so that they're evenly spaced, who can play easily, get acquainted with the parts of the banjo, and we'll see you in the next lesson. 4. Right Hand Technique for the banjo: Now that we know the parts of the banjo, let's talk about a right hand. Now, in this course, we're assuming that you, the the student, are also right handed like I am. If for some reason you're a left handed banjo player, that's awesome. Just think of everything being absolutely opposite the way that I talk about in this course . Now the right hand is very important to have it in the right spot. And there's different, different things that you can do to give different tones from your banjo. Now, the first thing that we're gonna do is we're gonna have our pinky and a ring finger on her right hand, come down and touch the head of our banjo. Now, where do I touch the head of the banjo? It could be just about anywhere, right? While in typical bluegrass play, if you hear typical bluegrass banjo where the point of touching is gonna be right behind your bridge and you get a really nice, harsh tone there, Theo. Now, depending on how hard I push it, I might be able to get too much sound for this microphone that I have. It's picking up all the audio. Where is not going to sound good to the listener of this video? So what's gonna happen for me when I play through this course, I'm going to make sure that I have, uh, a less harsh tone. And how I do that is by getting my hand up a little farther towards this neck that we have up here. So the farther I get towards this neck, the more mellow the sound is and the quieter the sound is where I'll be playing right about here in this video. Siri's just know that when we're playing the rial bluegrass driving style, our plant is gonna be behind the bridge and sometimes is just a pinky plant. Were the ring finger is right in line with the bridge. Really depends on your particular instrument. What's gonna sound best when I talk about a plant? I'm making sure that these two fingers my pinky and my ring finger are close together, not spread apart. Now, these two fingers, they're gonna point directly down in a position where I want it typically under bluegrass setting. It's gonna be close to that bridge, and I'm gonna put a fair amount of down pressure. So my hand is going down towards the head of my banjo and then putting some extra pressure . The muscles that air inside this part of your hand should feel a little tot and have a little tightness to them. Because you really want to have a lot of good down pressure for this particular video. Since I don't want to. Like I said, Blowout, this, um, audio. I'll be having a little less pressure so that it doesn't crinkle and crackle the audio. So just know that you might see a really relaxed hand, but really, indeed, it should look a little bit more stiff as we press down our hands moving forward. So make sure you're practicing that, getting a good, real solid tone out of your band. Joan. All right, so now that I have my hand in the right spot and again for this video, Siri's it's going to move ahead. Just a hair. I'm gonna have my hand nice and taut, and then I'm allowing my fingers to be able to kind of move freely over the strings, and we're not playing any strings just yet, but we're just writing on the top of them. Just seeing how it feels once you get comfortable with having your pinky and you ring finger together, placing it pretty close to the strings, putting some down pressure on and just moving your fingers over the strings. Once you feel comfortable with that, we'll see you with the next lesson. 5. Right Arm Placement for the banjo: welcome back. And now that we know where to place our right hand, we have to figure out what we're going to do with our arm. Now, honor, Banjo, we have something that's called an arm rest and where your forearm is going to meet this arm rest and it's gonna go kind of right in the middle. It's gonna be set down, so your arm is gonna be raised up over the over the banjo. It all that's gonna set right down. And all in all, you're gonna have a little bit of a frame with your hand and your banjo. So, looking at this this way, you can see that little bit of a raise up of the wrist. Once I pushed down that a frame is going to start to go away. Now it's more straight, but it should start out with a little bit of a frame. Then I start to push down on the A frame goes away so that my wrist and my arm are flat with one another. All right, practice that. And once you get comfortable with that, we'll see in the next lesson 6. Names and Numbers of your Banjo Strings: Now that we're comfortable with our right hand and right arm technique, we're gonna start talking about the names of our strings and the numbers of our strings. The easiest way to learner strings is by number system, and the little a string that you have on your banjo is the first string. And then it goes up in number the farther we go up our banjo, so the bottom string towards the ground is the first string, followed by the second string, third string, fourth string and fifth string. The note names of our strings are D Dog. That's the first string, then be like boy, and that's the second string. The middle string is a G, and that's 1/3 string. Then the next drink up is the big fat string, which is the fourth string, and it's a D string. Then the little biddy string that's towards the top of the ceiling as faras it's released to your banjo is a G string, so you have to G strings, two D strings and one B string. All right, get to know your strings, see if can memorize them, and we'll see you in the next lesson. 7. Tuning your 1st Banjo String: we're going to start tuning Are banjo in These tuners that I have up here will turn counterclockwise or clockwise. One way they'll take the tone of the string and move them up, or they'll move them down. Now, sometimes banjos might have planetary tuners, and they work the exact same way you twist on one way and they'll tomb the instrument up and you turned him down, and then they'll take the tone and pull it down. What I'm going to do is I'm going to play my first string over and over again to give you some time so that you can match the pitch and get your banjo in tune. Here we go. Uh uh uh uh uh uh. 8. Tuning 2nd Banjo String: All right, let's tune the second string be and yeah. 9. Tuning The 3rd Banjo String: Now that we're done with B, Let's to in the middle string G. Uh huh. Uh huh. 10. Tuning The 4th Banjo String: ready to move on to the D string. The fourth string? Uh huh. - Uh huh. 11. Tuning the 5th Banjo String: We're finally at the last ring, Gene. - Oh ! Oh, okay. 12. Example - Forward Roll on the Banjo: Now that we have our banjo tuned, we're ready to play our first Ford role. And the good news is is that we're gonna do it on a G chord in a G corn by itself when we learn our first G chord means no fingers up here. So the Onley thing we have to focus on is our right hand, which is great. The first thing that we're gonna focus on is our thumb, our thumb pick. And before we get into the role, we're gonna just discuss pick, depth and specifically our thumb pick with her thumb. What we're gonna do is we're gonna get our plant. Just remind that when we have our plant, the more we get towards the neck, the more softer and prettier it will be, the more harsh and loud it will be down here by the bridge. For the sake of this video, I'll be about here. Half seas in between the neck and the bridge. So when we think of our thumb were going toe, just go down, says their thumb can't really do an up pick without placing our index finger. And our thumb together says is by itself it will primarily on Lee do down picks. Since it's only doing down picks, I'm going to think about lifting it up up over the string just slightly and then doing a downtick notice that I'm not actually hitting the strings at this moment. So what I want to do is I'm just gonna look down at my strings and you could do the same thing, just plucking in the air right over the top here strings. But look down at your strings and pretend like you're picking the fifth string. That's a string that's closest to the ceiling in relationship to your banjo, and you're slowly going to bring your thumb down closer towards the string by putting more pressure down on your hand. Remember when we use that a frame? And then we pressed it down until it flattened out a little bit. That's the same kind of a thing that you're going to use while you're trying to get your thumb closer to the string. So we're gonna press a little bit harder and a little bit harder and a little bit harder until eventually your pick just barely touches that fifth string. That's okay if you miss it a couple times, right? You're just kind of gauging where it for feels like when it finally touches the strings and we're gonna dio is we're gonna continue to get into the strings. And if you get too far out of the strings, you'll hear the pick hit the head and we don't want that necessarily. Even though you'll hear me do it on a regular basis, It was something we're going to try not to do at this moment in time. We're gonna try to just barely touch the strings. So it's just on riding on the top of the strings. Oh, on then back it off so that you're not actually touching the string again and you're riding on top of it and then you go back down and then you put barely touched testing again any more depth than that way Don't need at this particular moment, they're gonna be times when we want to really dig into a string and get a lot of volume out of it. We don't need to. At this moment, we're just trying to barely right on the top of that string. So that takes care for fifth string. The next string that we're gonna do is our third string, and that's controlled by our index finger or appointee figure. So are metal picked fingers are the things that go upwards so they never go down in these curls. That air in your finger picks are would What would happen is they just get stuck on the strings because that curl is kind of like a hook, and they never go down. The Onley come upwards in this kind of emotion, one of the other or both of the same time. So out and then the curl. So what's gonna happen is your thumb hits that fifth string. Then you're index finger. Your pointing finger is going to go upwards on the third string and much like we did the fifth string, we can just barely touch that third string way. Don't have to get a real hard where we end up touching that head first. You gotta grind the sound. You want a lift it up a little bit, but were just barely touching that string. It helps prevent us from touching other strings that we might accidentally hit too. So we're gonna do is we're gonna use the thumb toe go downwards on the fifth string, then upwards with our index finger on the third string s. So we're gonna do it together about this speed. One, 23 four down with the thumb up with knicks down the thumb with and notice what happens with my thumb. As I pluck up with my index, my thumb comes up. So I go down and then I pluck up with my index. But at the same time, my thumb comes up, gets ready to go down one more time, so it doesn't happen. I have to now spend time to get it up and over the string. But if I do it exactly at the same time that my index finger flux upwards, it saves me lots of time and helps us make us Plame or fluid. When we player banjo, I want to go down on my thumb up on my index down on the fifth string up on the third string way. Our next step is our middle finger going up on the first string. Let's just practice that by itself. Remember, we're not trying to get too deep into the strings, but just right over top of the strings. For some reason, you're hearing a really grinding sound when you're going up with your fingers or down with your thumb. You might have to change the angle of your neck so that it slides through the strings better, depending on the angle of your hands. And it's gonna be different with every human being. So you might have somebody who has their neck down here or somebody has their neck way up here. That's really kind of up to you, the way you're holding the banjo in your body style. Okay, so back to our plant, we're gonna get through that forward roll. So the first thing that's gonna happen is we're gonna go down on our fifth string with our thumb and our index finger goes up on third string, and then our middle finger goes up on our first string. Now, keep in mind this is just for practice for forward role. When we actually get into our forward roll, we're gonna start with her index finger instead of our thumbs thing. This is a good starting spot, so let's try it again. But now we're going to start with her index finger instead of our thumb and we're gonna start with her India's Middle thumb, Middle String, first string, fifth string and continue on you. Can you get bucked off? Don't worry. Just go back in the video. Start over again. Keep in mind as I played my middle finger after my index than middle. This time my thumb comes up right after that middle thing gets right in position to play my fifth string. So let's try it again. All right? Take some time. Really kind of take, you know, a couple hours. However long it takes you to really get a good handle on your forward roll on your open G chord, and when she feel comfortable with it, we'll see you in the next lesson. 13. Practice Session - Forward Roll -Increasing Speed - On the banjo: in this lesson, We're going to be practicing together, getting better and our foreign roles with our open G. Now, remember, there's no fingers down here, so you don't have to worry about it yet, Which is great. So we're just gonna do that forward roll. And remember, it was down on the fifth string with her index finger on the third string. And then we followed up with our middle first string, and we're gonna count this time. So every time that I count, it equals one time with one finger playing one strength. So if I count one to 34 I'm gonna play one note per time that I say one or two or three or four. So in this case, this is a good example. 1234 Someone gonna count when we're not gonna do anything quite yet, But it's gonna be your leading before we start to play. So I'll say one to three four. And at the end of four, you'll started with me. So here we go. So not playing yet. One to three. Four Go. 12341234 Keep going without counting. Great. Now let's do just a little bit faster. One, 2341234341234 Good. We're gonna make special attention and moving forward Any time that we do afford roll, we're gonna start with her index finger on the middle string, at least for a G chord. Don't know any other chords. So you know, like we're just gonna start with the index finger. Right? So a little faster. One, 2341231 23412341234 Keep on E right a little faster making sure that we're starting with the index finger. Middle string. 1234 Are you going away? Right now? Let's do even a little faster. 12341234 Sure, you're starting with 123123 Ah, a little faster yet. 12341234 And this is a challenge. Course. Wanna go even faster yet. 123412341234 Ready? Go in and way. Uh, all right. Get real comfortable with the speed that feels comfortable for you. You know, we went pretty fast there for beginner would do so just make sure that you're doing it where it feels comfortable. Challenge yourself to get to the next level, and you might need to be able to go through this video practice and with me playing over and over and taking get it up to that final speed, You don't need to get it up to that final speed before we move on. Just make sure that you start to feel comfortable when we play the banjo for the first time . It feels pretty foreign, So we're trying to integrate this banjo into what it feels like, and eventually it's going to start to feel more comfortable, more comfortable as you play. So just trying to get a little bit more comfortable with it. When you feel comfortable enough, we'll see you in the next lesson. 14. Example - Forward Roll with Backing Track for the banjo: The next step for us is applying what we've learned to a backing track. When you play with blacking tracks that ensures a couple things number one that you're forced to play in time. So that means you can't speed up and slow down. And if you lose your place, it's likely going to go on without you. And you'll either have to stop and start it over again. Or just stop and wait for the one beat to come along again. But for right now is probably easiest to start over again. No, when we say that it forces you to play in time, that means the backing track is 100% in time. It doesn't flow. It doesn't speed up. It doesn't slow down. And that helps us really kind of develop our timing so that we become a better banjo player . Faster. Number two. It's kind of fun. We get to hear a bass playing along with us and a guitar playing along with us, and it's almost like we're playing in a real band in real time, which is more fun than just, you know, practicing by yourself in your home or wherever you do your practice. So this is how we do it. The first thing that we're gonna hear when we play the backing track is we're gonna hear too long beats and those two beats air, really Just to get us ready mentally for the next quick four beats that are gonna come and those four beats give us an accurate description of how fast that beat structures of the song. So in the case that we have, we have tick tick those too long beats So tick, tick and then tick, tick, tick, tick. So those two long beats again, they get you ready like, Oh, it's starting. I'm getting my fingers in position, I'm getting my hands in position and then you ready yourself for that First on beat when the instruments start to play. So tick, take tick, tick And this is what it sounds like just by itself. Now that we know what that sounds like, I'm gonna give you an example of how fast your role goes to that amount of speeds of tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding din All right, so This is the audible sound, what that would sound like at 16 beats per minute. So at this point, you're not expecting to play along. You're just listening to see what it sounds like. So you know what to expect when we do our next lesson, which is gonna be the practice section. Quick, quick, quick, quick. Remember, when you start when you start, it's always with your index finger. 1 to 1 Teen 34 way. Now, if you're listening to a backing track on your on your laptop, it might be kind of hard to hear or on your phone. It might be kind of hard to hear the base, and sometimes that's the biggest indicator of us as beginning students staying on the beat . So it's almost always a better idea to have a good set of speakers or were earbuds that have a good bass response before moving on in lesson. It's not required, but it's gonna be easier for you moving forward 15. Practice Session - Forward Roll for the banjo: Congratulations. You've just made it to your first practice session. And what this means is gonna happen over and over. And whatever we learn, something new will eventually get to a practice session. And a practice session just simply means you're going to play along with me while I'm playing along to a backing track. It really gives you a good representation. You'll know if you get off time or off beat because you'll be able to hear and have a visual representation of what you're supposed to be doing. All right, let's get it started. This is your forward roll. Make sure you're starting on your index finger way. You can just start over again. Way. Are you going? Number four As long as you can. - Way . Way a lot, right? Take plenty of time to practice along with that practice session. I have included it here at 60 beats per minute. But if it's too fast for you, no worries. Just go down in the bottom of the in the course tools and you'll find the practice for the backing tracks for this practice session, which is labelled G just G because it's only a G chord in the backing track and choose a beast per minute that fits you. So it doesn't matter if you feel like you can play last faster than that right now, or if you need to slow it down. Or if 60 beats is just perfect for you, do a lot of practice feel comfortable, You know, perfect this before you move on, and once you feel comfortable to move onto the next lesson, we'll see there. 16. Example - Right hand Technique for the banjo: Now that we can do our forward role using their G chord, which is our open g cardinal fingers, we're gonna end up starting to use our fingers with her new chord. See, we have to know a couple different things about how to use our left hand honor. Banjo, the first thing that we're gonna think about is our knuckle systems on our fingers. So we're gonna think about our index fingers. You could just look at it. And we're using the top knuckle, the middle knuckle, and then the bottom novel. And the one that we're gonna use specifically for the banjo is where this crease meets the knuckle. So on the palm side, you can see this little crease from your perspective, and then it's gonna be right on the side. So just keep that in mind this little spot right there on your hand, then take your left hand and put it out in front of your body like your shaking hands with somebody like Hi, how are you doing? Except the only difference between this shaking somebody's hand is you're gonna get your thumb, and it's gonna start toe move out to the side and it doesn't mean your thumb moves by itself. Your whole arm and hand moved to the side. Right? Twist all from the elbow. So now it's like at a 45 degree angle. Almost 40 Gary five degree angles Really like this. So it's go, you know, a little less than 45 degrees. Now what you're gonna try to do is you're gonna find the spot on your banjo in between the nut and the first fret, and you're going to set your hand right by that crease on the neck of your banjo. Now, it's gonna be important that when you do this the first few times that your fingers don't do anything, they don't try toe, curl around and grab the instrument. You're gonna force yourself on Lee toe, have your thumb back your fingers forward, and you just reach up and touch the banjo without making any other movements just like that . That's it. That's all you do write. The next thing that we're gonna we're gonna do is we're gonna set our thumb down and making sure that the thumb doesn't curl around, making sure that the thumb doesn't push away from the banjo. That means, Ah, lot of folks. What they do at the very beginning is their thumb sets down and they want to push, and then they push away that will physically want to push with their thumb. It really just set it down and don't do anything other than setting it down and let it just rest. So our hand comes up, the thumb comes down and let's see where the thumb is. It's not on the back, but it's right on the top. So just kind of rest there, where the tip of the thumb is almost kind of touching that, um, nut. Now your thumbs might be longer. They might be shorter than mine. It's just a little bit of, ah, self guide at this point. All right, so the hand comes up, the thumb comes down and then the fingers curl around, and when the fingers curl around noticed that the fingers are in a 45 degree angle. They're not exactly straight up and down like the frets are, or the metal things that our own are fingerboard, but their forward a little bit Now. When we do this, we're making sure that our rest isn't bending one way or the other because, you know, truth be told, when ah lot of banjo players start, they want to try to make these movements with their fingers, and they try to make them with their wrist instead of with their fingers. So just think of your rest being straight this way and you risk being straight this way, you won't have any trouble. Make sure that the back of your palm doesn't end up touching the back of your neck, so that would be wrong. You're trying to keep it straight at all times. So again, really your part of this part of your hand where you the knuckles comes up, touches you, curl your fingers around, and you're not really trying to hit any frets or any strings. At this point, they're just kind of curling around. Wherever they go, they go right, and then that thumb comes down, and as long as your fingers kind of have this 45 degree angle from the strings, you'll be set 17. Example - C Chord and Chording Techniques - Banjo: all right. Now it's time to play our seed corn. We've mentioned that these metal things air called friends, and they're very important. And the string numbers are 12345 Our fingers also have numbers where we have the index finger being the first finger, the second finger, the third finger in the fourth finger. Our thumb doesn't designate a finger, so that's not off five or anything like that. Sometimes people who play piano, this is a one where it's really 1234 Kind of like kid math. Now where our first finger's gonna go is gonna be in the second string, and we're going to make sure that our finger goes all the way up to the front and touches the finger is going to make sure that it's not on top of the front and not in front of the front, but behind it and still touching so all the way up and touch it and then stop. All right, now that we have that, our second finger or our middle finger is going to go on the fourth string. But the second friend and again we're making sure that finger goes all the Web and touches that metal friend the same thing that's gonna happen with our third finger or are ring finger. And it's gonna be on the second front of the first ring. But making sure that it goes all the way up and touches the fret all the way up and touches the friend all the way up in the touches the fret. So the fingers that we're gonna use our index finger, our middle finger and ring finger and where they go is on the first front of the second string first finger, middle finger goes on the second front of the fourth string, and then finally, the ring finger goes on to the second fret of the first string. And if I strummed them just like this and I pressed down, uh, should have a C court, but let's talk about that court first. We're first going to just barely touch the strings, so the strings air kind of muted, and we're barely going to start to push down a little bit more and a little bit more until we have a good solid ringing out at the point where you can hear them ring out you no longer have to put any more pressure down on your strings because any more pressure is just wasted. And you can kind of kind of get some sore fingers if you press too hard. All right, we're gonna try to do now. That we know are C Chord is we're going. She's going to strum or trying to do our first role. So first roll looks like this. We're gonna have our thumb on that fifth string. Our middle finger is now going to go on the second string on and then the first the middle finger is going up on the first ring Eso again. That's the fifth string's second string for so But we went over in. This particular lesson is how to play a C chord and then how to make sure that were playing the right amount of pressure. When you're ready and feel confident that you can play that C chord, we'll see you in the next lesson. 18. C Chord Forward Roll for the banjo: in this lesson. What we're gonna do is we're going to take that seek order that we've just learned and we're gonna take it and we're gonna do a forward roll. The forward roll that we're gonna do is a little different than the forward roll that we've done with her. G chord RG cord waas our fifth string followed by our middle string The third string, then the first string on. But it's going to be almost like that except our index finger that usedto play the third string before now moves down one string to the second string. So it's gonna be 5 to 15 to one. All right, now, we're gonna take that C chord that we know, making sure that our fingers air all the way up to those fronts so that there's not fret space or space in between the fret and the finger. But they're going to move up and touch those frets, making sure that we're not a on top of the fronts or above the fronts, but behind them in touching. And that includes all the fingers. That role that we here is going to be some in next in ex mill 5 to 152 We're gonna do that , see? Role, and it's gonna be real slow about the speed. 1234 Start with the index way one more time, starting with the index about the same speed. This time. Let's do that. C chord with Ford role against starting with your index finger. I'm gonna do just a little bit faster about this speed. 1234 way and then again, just a little bit faster. And at any time, if it gets too fast, just pause this video practice a bit till you can get a little faster and then continued about this speed. 1234 way a little faster yet won t 34 on this time. A little faster yet 12341234 All right, practice your forward rolls on your C scale and we'll see you in the next lesson. 19. Practice Session - C Chord Rolls for the banjo: in this practice session, we're going to be playing along with the backing track and our C scale with a forward roll . Now it's gonna sound a little bit like this. Gonna have that big too long ticks following buying those four ticks and the speed isn't quite assed fast. As we ended on in the previous lesson, we're starting with her index finger. That backing track was at 60 beats per minute. For some reason, it's still a little bit too fast for you. No worries. Just go down to the bottom part of our course tools and choose key of C Onley. See, that means there's only see co ordinate and choose a backing track that fits your needs. So maybe a 50 maybe a 40 was too fast. And if you want some extra credit and you want to be able to try to play faster, you feel comfortable with that. Pick a faster speed, and when you're ready, we'll see you in the next lesson. 20. Exercise - Chords G to C Transition for the banjo: in this particular exercise, we're gonna be changing from the G chord to the C chord that open jean offenders to the C chord. We're gonna take this exercise and start at the G and go index to middle thin switch immediately to see and play on Leo's two notes and then go back Teoh way once you feel comfortable. What? That little transition will see you back here in the practice exercise. 21. Practice Session - G to C for the banjo: in this practice exercise. We've slowed it down to 50 beats per minute so we can give ourselves a chance to include that little transition that we had. So he had that middle finger followed by index finger and the middle finger followed my finger, and I'll try to call out our measure numbers. Remember, it's two measures of G and two measures of C, and it just repeats to measures of G to mention the sea to measure Sergey. Too much to see and so on and so on. And so so here we go G court first. All right, get some practice done. The next video is just of that 50 beats per minute switching back and forth from GDC just like we practiced. But it gives you some time to practice for yourself before we move on to the next video. Once you're ready, we'll see you there 22. Example - D Chord Forward Roll for the banjo: in this lesson, we're going to be learning a quick two finger D chord and that to Fender d Chord is going to start with my index finger on the second fret of the third string. And my second finger is going to go on the third fret of the second string. So we have a way. And naturally, we have opened Ito. We're going to roll the d chord just as we would any other cord Attn beginning here and we're going to use our index finger. We're gonna do it really slow together. So this speed 12 34 and just a little bit faster. 1234 All right. Just a little bit faster yet won t 34 on a little bit faster yet 1234 A little bit faster yet 12341234 Uh, All right, get some work done playing your d chord and doing some Ford Rose. Still starting with your index finger. We'll see you in the next lesson 23. Practice Session - D Chord for the banjo: in this practice session, we're gonna be using our d r two finger D, which we described in a previous lesson. And we're going to start with her index finger, as always, here at the very beginning of our practice. And we're gonna play about this speed a little faster, Teoh. All right, when you're ready and you're feeling like you can play your D forward roll starting with your index finger, let's do it together. - Way , way. Next video is a backing track so that you can practice your D forward role at 60 beats per minute by yourself. When you feel comfortable after using that video, see you next lesson. 24. Example - G to D Chord with Transition for the banjo: in this lesson, we're gonna be going back and forth between our open G chord and her two finger deport. Now, when we're rolling, just as we did before between G and C, we're gonna be left with two tones that we have to play over again. So in the key of G awas innocent, play those notes again and then we're gonna move on to D as I played G the's last year playing in on. Then I move on Teoh before I change my courts. I still have to play over again before I move on to G. That's gonna look like this on a d cor. I'm using my Finger de Corps and I'm using in this here after roles followed by two more times on Theo. We're starting our geek or starting with her for a role to no transition on moving to our d chord, starting with a the red transition. We're using her to tone transition and then four Realogy simply repeat that over and over. So practice going back and forth between a G card in open court and a two finger D chord, and when you're ready to practice trying to get up to speed, see you in the practice section 25. Practice Session - G to D Chord 60 BPM for the banjo: in this practice exercise. We're going to be doing G to the D chord, one cord forever to measure, so it's G d d g d d. So. So when you're ready to start, let's get going. Way, - way . - The name of this backing track is called G to D bluegrass, and you could find it in the bottom part of this course in the course tools, and you're gonna want to pick a E tempo that fits you. And no matter that's a little slower, a little faster or of 60 beats per minute is great, then no worries. Just move out of that next lesson. Practice with that back on, track a bunch. Then once you're ready, we'll see you in the next lesson. 26. Pull off G for the banjo: in this lesson, we're gonna be using a trick called a pull off. And you're gonna be using our second finger on the second fret of the fourth string, using her thumb pick and plucking it on. Then the finger that's on the string plucks downwards and off the saw. Now it's not up and away from the stream, but it's down through the string, walks the streets. Oh, uh, so let's hear that just by itself, I'm gonna pluck it with my thumb pick. I think I want to take my thumb pick and pluck her on by the pullout, which is a book. And then my index finger marks on the middle string really slow together. Ah, uh, again, Speed it up just a little bit faster . You can getting used to use in our new poll off. Do a lot of practice with that and we'll see you in the next lesson. 27. Pull Off Forward Roll G for the banjo: in this lesson. We're going to be using their forward roll along with our pull off that we just learned. Now we're going to start with our G Open. We're going to do four times in a row way the fifth time. We're going to use our index finger and then our middle finger. Uh, then we're going to use that middle finger on the second fret of the fourth string. And we're gonna do that a lot, huh? Followed by the beginning of my role again. And I come for for one more time. One on that begins minus from All right, do some work with that. Pull off while we're doing our open road with G. We'll see you in the next lesson. 28. Practice Session - Forward Rolls In with Pull Off - With Backing Track for the banjo: in this practice session, we're going to be using the G Onley G bluegrass back on track simply because the Onley cornered it is G and we're going to be using our hammer arms. Remember, it's counts of four rolls followed by our new road. And here we are, at 60 beats per minute. Ah, all right, do a lot of practice with your new pull off skill using your four G. As always, choose a backing track, then this your speed you don't always have to do this fast is we're doing it here. And there's always ways in the bottom left hand part of your screen. Either slow down or speed it up or simply just choose a a faster back on track for a slower backing track that fits your needs. Once you're through the next video, which is just that backing track for you to practice this skill with, we'll see you in the next lesson. 29. Example - G Scale Forward Roll for the banjo: in this lesson, we're gonna be using a partial G scale. That G scale is all going to be played on our third string, and we're gonna get used to using our index finger. Be playing these notes. The first night that want to play is just a simple open Jesus, uh, filed by the second from the fourth fret followed by Different. Now we're gonna go back down second friend open, Geo. So must like them One note at a time. 24 Fine. For now we're going to do with this scale is we're going to do with open role with each No , uh once you're ready to play that next note, we're going to play the second finger on the second. Now, when you ready to play the next note that fourth fret, we're gonna play there, and then we're gonna go to the next threat that you go back down to the forefront and second, Yeah, The fun thing about this exercise is that whenever I choose to do a different no And when I say choose to that means I can play any of these notes at. So it doesn't matter what water I play them is long as they're physically connected to the next note that you're gonna play. So we're not gonna jump around, but there's always gonna be connected by next s. I could either go down to the open door or playing this to after the two. I could only play open or the four from this for I can only play the five or go back down to so So once I have these notes kind of solidified where they are, my fretboard and ready to move on, uh, we're going to do is we're going to do this forward role. But the thing that's going to change is you're going to stop what you're doing and start a forward roll again with your index finger when we choose the next. No. So, for example, we're playing there, and now I got dumpling my middle finger some halfway through my role, and now I want to play my second fret on my third string in every instance off me, choosing to play a new tone. My role always start over again with my index in your So here's what's gonna be really slow , and you don't necessarily have to play long because my choices air my choices. I want you to make your choices in a little bit. So, Mr All right, do some practice with our new partial G scale on our third string of the G string and or forward role, and we'll see you in the next lesson. 30. Practice Session - G Scale - Forward Roll for the banjo: in this practice session, we're gonna be using our partial G scale to be able to play along with our G just g bluegrass back on track. So here we go. Now, remember, you don't have to follow exactly what I'm doing. I'm just showing you some of my choices so that you can get a feel for it. You can play your own choices even though our notes might clash while you play along. Great work now Practice along with Gene. Just backing track and choose back. Contracted fits your needs. See, if you can't play up to speed at 60 beats per minute in the next video, we'll see you next. 31. Example - Pinching for the banjo: in this lesson, we're gonna be discovering what pinches are and we're gonna be using our middle strings. The fourth string, the third string and a second street when we use these pinches we're gonna be learning are double stops out of our second and our third string. All right, let's start learning these double stops, the double stops that we're gonna learn. And we're going to use on Lee two fingers at once in this particular example. So my middle finger is gonna go on my second string and my index finger is gonna go on my and I'm just gonna pluck two of these notes at the exact same time after I have my two open strings that it would be used my index finger on the second string first fret and my second finger on the second fret of the third string. Oh, and I'm just going to use these two double stops. Bring it over Now I want to use this couple different ways when we use a thumb followed by the two fingers. My to pluck figures. That's where I use my thumb and my other fingers all after we get done with the Open pinch on my first finger on the first front selling your on the second front, and I'm gonna bring that same shape up one to France. So now my index finger is on the third Fret Oh, now I'm gonna use my finger and flattened out So now my finger, my index finger is on the fifth fret of the second and third Street and it's gonna happen again. But now on the next front now I'm going to go back to that same shape that I had before. So I'm on the eighth fret and the nine threat thing. I go up to the 10th and 11th fret Theo, finally on 12 threatened. I do another bar with in next. All those again I have open open Wanted to, um, three and four, uh, bar a bar. 89 10 11 on. Have the bar on 12. Let's go backwards. 10 11 89 bar of our three and four Want you somewhere? Do it in two different ways. In this particular lesson, I'm first going to be playing my thumb, but as an open drum for the interrogating my two fingers together my index in my little Teoh I'm simply gonna go up my scale or down the scale using my double stops whenever I want to way. No way. Uh, where do the exact same example. But now we're Onley pinching, using all three fingers at once. All right, this is a fun exercise. Go ahead and practice as much as you can. Using your double stops Fergie out of your second and third string using your pinches or your thumb and then your index and your middle finger you lost practice will see you in the next lesson. 32. Practice Session - Pinching in G for the banjo: welcome to a practice session where we're gonna be using double stops out of the key of G using our second and third string. And we're gonna be using a G just g backing track at 60 beats per minute. Keep in mind, I'm gonna be trying to keep it simple. What I want you to do is go up and down the scale, using your pinches using your thumb, followed by your index in your middle. However you want to do it, just know that when we're playing rippling, different us, we may clash at times. This no big deal because in the next lesson, it'll just be you in the backing track. This is just example here, some tones. - There's always do plenty of practice using your double stops out of our second string in her third stream, Uh, G scale and always choose the back contract if its best free again. This is the gene just g bluegrass. Back on track, he lost practice most you with the next lesson 33. Example - Backwards Roll in G for the banjo: in this lesson, we're gonna be learning how to do backwards roles, and we're going to do with an open G court. So we're starting the same way a forward roll out of our G WAAS index finger, middle finger thumb. Do just the opposite way, index. We're gonna try and just a little bit faster. All right, do some practice using your backwards role for open G. We'll see you in the next lesson. 34. Practice Session - G Backwards Roll - 60 BPM for the banjo: and this practice exercise will be using our G Onley G backing track at 60 beats per minute . And we're gonna be doing a backwards role. All right, take some time using your backwards role in the open G position. As I always choose the right back on track for you when you're ready to move through the next back, trapped in your ready to go past that 60 beats per minute. I'll see you next lesson. 35. Example - Backwards G Roll to Forward C Roll for the banjo: this lesson. We're gonna be going from a backwards role on a gene. All right, Do some practice trying to get up to speed to about 60 beats per minute, and we'll see you in a nice doesn't. 36. Practice Session - Backwards Roll G to a Forward Roll C for the banjo: in this practice session will be playing along with the backing track. It's 60 beats per minute and we're going with a back first role for GE. Two measures, then a 40 ver si two measures and just repeats itself repeats himself. So the backing track is G to see bluegrass. Ah, away. All right, do plenty of practice on your transition from backwards rolled before you. 37. Example - Forward to Backwards Roll up and down the neck for the banjo: in this lesson, we're going to still be using backwards and four rules. But we're going to be using a forward roll first, followed by backwards wrong and however use it is we're going to use it on a G scale That's on the higher register of our neck on our first string. The G tone that we're speaking up is this tone around here. So have a G toe on my 80 that's a whole step away. So it's really the dot that you see in the fifth fret 79 friends and then 10 threatened stars. We're going to go and then we're gonna go back to the front way. Theo. All right, we're gonna get used to playing these notes and we're gonna play really slow, and we're using her index finger, and we're just so getting used to playing that in next in your upwards. Theo, when you're ready, we're gonna be using a forward roll with it. But we're changing our roles slightly. Our role is going to start with our middle finger, middle finger that I'm just simply gonna go up this scale. But every time I go up the scale, I'm going to start again on my middle finger. Even if I'm in a different place in my role, I start the role again. I'm using my little finger. Oh, really? Slow against. You can see that middle finger start way . I've gotten used to playing that as a four role. I wouldn t go up the scale for the down scale. I'm going to switch to do backwards. Theo, wait here. Practice that. Trying to get through your GI scale. And as we go off the scale, we're gonna do a forward roll. We're gonna going down the scale. Where you backwards roll. We'll see you next lesson. 38. Practice Sessions - Forwards to Backwards Roll Up and Down the Neck - G and C 60 BPM for the banjo: in this practice session. I really want you to make your own choices as you're going up and down the scale so you have the power to be able to go up or down, or doesn't matter what I'm doing and s always if we're not exactly the same spot, we might clash with my sound like it's a little weird, but no worries. You have plenty of time in the next video people played just by yourself. This is only example for you to be able to play in time and hear some ideas that you might want to use later. So he regards 60 beats per minute, fours and backwards. As always, the next lesson is going to be that 60 beats per minute and it's a G to see bluegrass backing track. So for some reason, that's a little too fast free. Just go down to the course tools and choose a little slower one. If you want to try toe, challenge yourself and go a little faster. That's great. Just use a faster one. They're all down there at the bottom of this course, so whatever one you choose, just make sure you do a lot of practice and we'll see you with the next lesson 39. Example - Twinkle Twinkle Little Star for the banjo: in this lesson, we're gonna be learning Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star. It's a simple song, but it goes a long way to teach us how to make melodies while we're rolling with her fingers. Okay, let's go. We're going to use all of our notes that we're going to play with our index fingers. This is a pretty common thing. We started with our forward rolls with her index finger. We started our, uh, reverse roles with her index finger and now using these middle strings down to the bottom strand for really using these two fingers as melodic tones. Now we're going to use her index finger for every single one of the melody tones of this song, so make sure that you're using your index under each one, not the thumb and not the middle finger. So we have open colon and open is that they're extreme, followed by the third front of the second stream. Let's do that again. Open district, followed by 1/3 front of the second Street. I'm gonna take my third finger. It's leading up to the fifth fret on. Noticed each one of these tones. Guest 1123355 one asses the one on the second stream. So the Onley note that we have so far on the third string was made. A lot of the rest of the notes were probably early on the second string. 335533 Now we're back to that. Third Street must play that one more time. 2nd 1 on and we're switching strings to the third stream. All right, one last time through it, trying to memorize it. You having trouble memorizing? It's okay to write it down, kinesthetic learning. It's great if it's out of auto learning or visual learning. One of the three will serve you well, but either writing it down there will be tabs for this because we're really trying to memorize it in real time. And if we can't memorize it in real time, we'll just simply go back to the beginning of the video and go again. So let's continue. So we have the last time through 353 in the index finger. One open open second finger goes on the second fret of the street. Now we have to understand what this song is. This The first line is the exact, same as the last line. Twingo twinkle star about words like it in this guy, just like the first way, All right, so as long as we know the first part in the last part of the song, let's learn the second part of the song. We're going to start on that third fret with third finger of the Second Stream. Train Train Long Hello and on, that's all on the second string Train run on moved to third string. Play the second finger on the second. Fret. Do a little bit slower. So memorizing a little bit 33 That's what that figure on its on the first friend of the second Stream string and then to second finger on the second front on the G string. So if I play the first part of this song, the 33 So the thing we learned second actually happens two times in a row. So if I consider this the first in the night, play is a it's a now consider the next part that will be be happens again. The begin the night like a the first thing that we just played way. All right, take some time and really get to know the song. Memorize it. However, you need to memorize it. If your visual learner you're audible learner, if you need to write it down because your movement learner or condensed and kinesthetic learner. No worries. However, your learning is perfect for you. All right, so do some practice with that, and we'll see you with the next lesson. 40. Practice Session - Twinkle Twinkle with Roll for the banjo: Welcome back in. This is gonna be your practice exercise. We're not gonna have a backing track for State of the Sun is just the skill of being able to roll through Twinkle, twinkle, little star. So the very first note that we had was it's very indicative of our four role that we learned the very first time I have twice. The next part of the song is this three. But instead of using the middle string now for the role, we switch from 53125 to 1 because the note is on the second strength. Here's what it sounds like really slow between. The two knows now remember from previous lessons. As soon as I play the next note, I start my role again with my melodic tone. So it happens to sound like this one more time with those Ford roles. So those four girls were going, and now the next note the scale was back to all right. It was So follow it right down to those notes. No, you have two more notes in that case section. Let's roll through them. All right, let's do a part one more time. All right? the be part is way airplane that be part again, just rolling through it. So if I do the a part and then the to be parts it sounds like this. - All right. Now, the only part that's left with the sun is something that we've already played. So we're gonna go back to the A part. So all the way to the sun sounds like this way. All right, let's play a little bit faster. - All right, let's play a little bit faster. 41. Final Thoughts - Thank you for taking this banjo class: thanks so much for taking this course. Now that you're at the end, you've learned some very key fundamentals playing evangel that you can take with you wherever you go whether you decide to take private lessons or start band. But whatever you want to do, so make sure you do a lot of practice. Thes backing tracks air here for it always. And if you ever forget any of these core fundamentals, just go back to those videos and always be there for you. So play lots of banjo. We'll see out. 42. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 40 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 40 beats per minute. - Okay ? - Yeah , All right. 43. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 50 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 50 beats per minute. Good. - Okay . 44. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 60 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo : 60 beats per minute. 45. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 70 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 70 beats per minute. 46. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 80 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 80 beats per minute, - but 47. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 90 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 90 beats per minute. 48. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 100 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 100 beats per minute. 49. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 110 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 110 beats per minute. 50. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 120 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 120 beats per minute. 51. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 130 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 130 beats per minute, - Yeah . 52. Class Tools 1 - G Just G 140 BPM Bluegrass G Banjo: 140 beats per minute. 53. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 40 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 40 beats per minute there . 54. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 50 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 50 beats per minute. Okay? Yeah, - they 55. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 60 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 60 beats per minute there day there , - uh 56. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 70 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 70 beats per minute. Yeah, there. 57. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 80 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 80 beats per minute. 58. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 90 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 90 beats per minute. Uh 59. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 100 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 100 beats per minute. 60. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 110 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 110 beats per minute. Uh 61. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 120 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 120 beats per minute. 62. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 130 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 130 beats per minute. 63. Class Tools 2 - C Just C 140 BPM Bluegrass C Banjo: 140 beats per minute. 64. Class Tools 3 - 40 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 40 beats per minute. Oh! 65. Class Tools 3 - 50 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 50 beats per minute, - Yeah . 66. Class Tools 3 - 60 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo : 60 beats per minute, Yeah. 67. Class Tools 3 - 70 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 70 beats per minute, No. 68. Class Tools 3 - 80 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 80 beats per minute, huh? 69. Class Tools 3 - 90 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 90 beats per minute. Thank you. 70. Class Tools 3 - 100 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 100 beats per minute. 71. Class Tools 3 - 110 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 110 beats per minute. Thank you. 72. Class Tools 3 - 120 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 120 beats per minute. Thank you. 73. Class Tools 3 - 130 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 130 beats per minute. 74. Class Tools 3 - 140 BPM Bluegrass G and C Banjo: 140 beats per minute. 75. Class Tools 4 - 40 BPM Bluegrass D Just D: 40 beats per minute. Good, good. Go. - Good , - good , good. 76. Class Tools 4 - 50 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 50 beats per minute. Okay, - good , good, good, - good good , - , good, - good . 77. Class Tools 4 - 60 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 60 beats per minute, - but good , - good . 78. Class Tools 4 - 70 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 70 beats per minute good. 79. Class Tools 4 - 80 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 80 beats per minute, - but 80. Class Tools 4 - 90 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 90 beats per minute. 81. Class Tools 4 - 100 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 100 beats per minute good. 82. Class Tools 4 - 110 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 110 beats per minute. 83. Class Tools 4 - 120 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 120 beats per minute. 84. Class Tools 4 - 130 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 130 beats per minute. 85. Class Tools 4 - 140 BPM Bluegrass D Banjo: 140 beats per minute. 86. Class Tools 5 - 40 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 40 beats per minute boom. 87. Class Tools 5 - 50 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 50 beats per minute. - Okay , there. 88. Class Tools 5 - 60 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 60 beats per minute. Good, - okay . 89. Class Tools 5 - 70 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 70 beats per minute. - Who ? 90. Class Tools 5 - 80 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 80 beats per minute. 91. Class Tools 5 - 90 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 90 beats per minute. 92. Class Tools 5 - 100 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 100 beats per minute, Yeah. 93. Class Tools 5 - 110 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 110 beats per minute, Yeah. 94. Class Tools 5 - 120 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 120 beats per minute. 95. Class Tools 5 - 130 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 130 beats per minute. 96. Class Tools 5 - 140 BPM G and D Bluegrass Banjo: 140 beats per minute.