RE: Jaxn's New Banjo and the balance of banjos at MWGF

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I have an old Ludwig 4-string, and my son has a Rogue starter 5-string.
 
Note: Do not try to talk 6-string banjos at Banjo hangout. :zoinks:

The better ones are Deering and Goldtone. Deans get booed, but I don't know how much of that is brand prejudice. Luna also makes a 6-string banjo. There might be some others, but those are the four I am most familiar with.
 
It's hard to make a good 6 str. The bass strings of a guitar and the flexable banjo head don't play together easily. It takes some real quality construction, plus a good bridge and setup. Without that, the bass strings tend to be muddy and without sufficient definition.

The best sounding cheapos I've heard were the old 60s and 70s Framus. They used to show up regularly in pawn shops and secondhand stores but it's been a couple of decades since I've seen one. They may not be so cheap nowadays.
 
I've got an openback Deering Goodtime that I can't keep in tune--I think I need to tighten the head. I play a little bit on each of our albums, but never get it out for jams or anything because of the tuning. Not to mention I can't play much on it. If I had a Wilco-style loft to keep all my stuff in, I'd get one of those 6 string banjos in the stable--I often want to put something like that on a record, so I make do with the 5 string, which sometimes means I've got to transpose the line up an octave, which isn't always the same.
 
Chicken Man said:
I've got an openback Deering Goodtime that I can't keep in tune--I think I need to tighten the head. I play a little bit on each of our albums, but never get it out for jams or anything because of the tuning. Not to mention I can't play much on it. If I had a Wilco-style loft to keep all my stuff in, I'd get one of those 6 string banjos in the stable--I often want to put something like that on a record, so I make do with the 5 string, which sometimes means I've got to transpose the line up an octave, which isn't always the same.
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I didn't have tons of problems with my Goodtime, but the old joke is that a banjo player spends half his time tuning and the other half playing out of tune. I had a really good banjo set-up guy in Baltimore, and found one here too. Head tension makes a big difference.
 
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