We're happy to welcome Catherine BB Bowness, from the band Mile Twelve, back to Deering Live to give where she is going teach us about "Movable Harmonic Shapes" on the 5-string banjo. These are shapes such as chord positions or intervals that you can move all the way up the neck of the banjo, thus opening up the entire fingerboard for you. We will also talk about Mile Twelve's new upcoming release "Close Enough To Hear". Be sure to tune in to watch this Steve Martin Banjo Award winner play and t...
Jan 25, 2023•1 hr 11 min•Ep. 81
Michael Miles is back on Deering Live to demonstrate and teach us about how rhythmically versatile the clawhammer style of playing the 5-string banjo can be and how this style can be utilized to play many different genres of music. Michael is a master clawhammer player and well-versed in many musical styles so be sure to tune in and learn. During the conversation, Micheal discusses Latin rhythms and refers to a chart. To download the chart, please go to https://tinyurl.com/u6pjx9we To learn more...
Jan 11, 2023•1 hr 23 min•Ep. 80
Jake Blount is an award-winning musician and scholar. He is a recipient of the prestigious Steve Martin Banjo Prize, and a two-time winner of the Appalachian String Band Music Festival (better known as Clifftop). He is a specialist in the early folk music of Black Americans, and his latest record, The New Faith, was released on September 23, 2022 as part of Smithsonian Folkways Recordings' African American Legacy Series, in collaboration with the National Museum of African American History and C...
Nov 30, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 79
On this episode of Deering Live we will dig into the life and music of 5-string bluegrass banjoist Rudy Lyle. Rudy Lyle played banjo with Bill Monroe's Bluegrass Boys and made major contributions to bluegrass banjo but has largely been forgotten. Banjoist and member of Peter Rowan's Bluegrass Band, Max Wareham decided to help change this and wrote a book that talks about Rudy's career and banjo style and includes easy to read banjo tab of Rudy's playing.
Nov 17, 2022•56 min•Ep. 78
Deering Live is honored to host the Steve Martin Banjo Prize 2022! Jamie and David from Deering Live will be joined by special guest Alison Brown as we reveal the 2022 Steve Martin Banjo Prize winners. This episode of Deering Live is presented by the Freshgrass Foundation and Compass Records.
Nov 08, 2022•1 hr 25 min•Ep. 77
Larry Bellorín hails from Monagas, Venezuela, and is a legend of Llanera music. Meanwhile, North Carolina-based Joe Troop is a GRAMMY-nominated bluegrass and old-time musician. Currently based in the Triangle of North Carolina, both men are versatile multi-instrumentalists and singer-songwriters on a mission to show that music has no borders. As a duo, they perform a fusion of Venezuelan and Appalachian folk music on the harp, banjo, cuatro, fiddle, maracas, guitar, upright bass, and whatever el...
Nov 03, 2022•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 76
Mark is most well known for being one of the most in-demand bass players in bluegrass but he is also an outstanding clawhammer banjoist! In 2021 Mark put out a fantastic new recording with fellow old-time musician Bryan McDowell entitled GRIT & POLISH. Listen to Mark and Bryan play and talk about working together, the differences between old time music and bluegrass, and more.
Oct 27, 2022•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 75
Enda Scahill is the primary banjo player with We Banjo 3. He is a fantastic Irish tenor banjo player and highly respected teacher of the tenor banjo. Enda offers a wonderful series of lessons on playing the Irish tenor banjo on his Patreon page, which we encourage you to check out.
Sep 30, 2022•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 74
Colton Crawford is the banjo player from Canadian roots music four-piece, The Dead South - A rock band without a drummer, a bluegrass band without a fiddler. Their sound, built on a taut configuration of cello, mandolin, banjo, and guitar, speeds like a train past polite definitions of acoustic music into the grittier, rowdier spaces of the bluegrass world. Colton is a Deering Artist who plays both clawhammer and three-finger style, using a Vega Little Wonder and Saratoga Star as his main tools....
Sep 01, 2022•1 hr 8 min•Ep. 73
Making her long-awaited debut on Deering Live, Mean Mary James joins us to talk about her new album 'Portrait of a Woman (Part 1)' Mary has a truly fascinating story and as well as being a fantastic banjo player also boasts guitar and fiddle in her resume and is equally skilled on all three. This promises to be a truly entertaining episode!
Jul 28, 2022•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 72
We welcome back the 2018 Steve Martin Banjo Award winner, banjo player for the Grammy-nominated Grascals, our good friend Kristin Scott-Benson! Kristin will be talking about what she looks for in a bluegrass banjo and the journey of tone that she considers when playing different banjos. And we will have a special announcement at the top of the show!
Jul 20, 2022•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 71
Jake Sawicki is the banjo player for the self-described thrash grass band, The Native Howl who hail from Leonard, MI. Their 2016 release of "Thrash Grass" unleashed the newly-coined genre of the same name, combining the aggressiveness and intensity of thrash metal with the melodicism and precision of bluegrass. Jake is here to talk about pushing the boundaries of how a banjo can be used, appearing on the TV Show "No Cover" and spending the last few months touring with shock rockers GWAR....
Jun 23, 2022•1 hr 2 min•Ep. 70
We're very excited to feature the longtime banjoist for Alison Kraus & Union Station, Ron Block, on Deering Live. When it comes to bluegrass banjo, Ron is simply one of the best in the business. His feel, tone, and timing drive the music that is rooted deeply in tradition but continues to push it into the future. Ron has a new album coming out July 1st with Irish tenor banjo master Damien O'Kane called Banjophonics. We'll be talking about this album as well as digging deep into how he achiev...
Jun 09, 2022•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 69
British clawhammer virtuoso Dan Walsh joins us on Deering Live to talk about his unique take on clawhammer playing, and whether clawhammer should be regarded as a technique or a genre. Dan is a long-time Deering artist and if you are not familiar with him, he has a fascinating approach to playing banjo. This episode will be well worth tuning in for!
May 26, 2022•1 hr 17 min•Ep. 68
Trajan "Tray" Wellington joins us on Deering Live on the eve of his greatly anticipated solo effort, "Black Banjo". In this episode, Tray talks to us about the inspiration behind "Black Banjo", and discusses his own experiences as a black banjo player in bluegrass music.
May 12, 2022•56 min•Ep. 67
Michael J Miles is a composer and musician who grew up in the heart of urban Chicago and teaches at the infamous Old Town School of Music. His inner jukebox spins with 500 years of pop songs on late night radio, infused with conversations about poetry, politics, and singing around the piano with his Irish family. These songs turn into setlists, and compositions and as they say, the rest is history. To quote his own site, "There are those who represent the American Songbook or one particular styl...
Apr 21, 2022•1 hr 11 min•Ep. 66
Deemed a "banjo virtuoso" by the Washington Post, Adam Hurt has fused several traditional old-time idioms to create his own elegantly innovative clawhammer banjo style, having been introduced to the instrument at age eleven in his native Minnesota. A respected performer and teacher of traditional music, Adam has played at the Kennedy Center, conducted banjo and fiddle workshops at many venues around the country and abroad, and been featured on the cover of Banjo Newsletter. Since moving south in...
Apr 07, 2022•1 hr 20 min•Ep. 65
Max Allard is a gifted young 5-string banjoist in the 3 fingerstyle. He has been the winner of the 2018 RockyGrass Banjo Competition and the 2019 FreshGrass Banjo Award. He performs as a solo artist, in a duo with his brother Otto Allard, and has toured the midwest with the Minneapolis-based progressive bluegrass band Barbaro. Max has a new album out called "Odes / Codes" that was produced by banjoist Jayme Stone. He is an extremely good young banjo player. He is currently studying composition a...
Mar 24, 2022•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 64
Our good friend Hank Smith returns to Deering Live this week, where we will discuss composing non-bluegrass music on 5 string banjo and tonality. Hank is a Deering artist and plays a Deering Maple Blossom. He also puts the "Hank" into 'Hank, Patty & the Current', who are one of our favorite bands!
Mar 17, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 63
Detroit Brooks is one of New Orleans' top session and touring guitar and banjo players on the scene. He has toured around the world and recorded or played musicians such as Dr. John, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Donald Harrison, Charmaine Neville, and many more. Detroit is deeply concerned with keeping the traditional music of New Orleans alive. He created the Danny Barker Festival which celebrates the music of Danny Barker and brings groups into the schools of New Orleans to teach about the banjo in New O...
Mar 10, 2022•58 min•Ep. 62
This week we're featuring Tony Furtado on Deering Live. Tony has been away from the banjo scene for a while but in 2021 he came storming back with his banjo-focused release Decembering. Tony is a monster 3-finger style banjo player and has recorded with Alison Kraus and many others.
Feb 16, 2022•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 61
Victor Furtado is a monster of a clawhammer banjo player who while deeply understanding and respecting the old-time tradition, has developed new techniques to bring this style into the modern acoustic music space. Victor has won numerous awards including the 2019 Steve Martin Prize For Banjo. We are excited to feature this young banjo wiz on Deering Live!
Feb 03, 2022•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 60
5-string banjo master Ryan Cavanaugh returns to Deering Live this week! In this episode, we will explore how to comp chords for 20th-century American music styles other than bluegrass. Ryan will show you examples of how to voice chords on the 5-string banjo for styles such as traditional New Orleans jazz, swing, bebop, modal jazz, funk, and rock & roll.
Jan 27, 2022•1 hr 9 min•Ep. 59
Ken Perlman is a pioneer of the 5-string banjo style known as melodic clawhammer; he is considered one of today’s top clawhammer players, known in particular for his skillful adaptations of Celtic, Appalachian, & Canadian fiddle tunes to the style. As well as touring throughout most of the English-speaking world, Ken is a recording artist, a banjo camp director, and author of multiple widely used banjo instructional books. His latest recording is called Frails & Frolics, while his latest...
Jan 13, 2022•1 hr 11 min•Ep. 58
Ben Wright is a founding member of the Henhouse Prowlers, taking the band on the road for more than 15 years and proudly leading Chicago’s robust bluegrass scene. The Prowlers have recorded 8 albums and tour relentlessly, having garnered a large following across the planet. The band blends their own original material with songs written in multiple languages, learned from their extensive travels. In 2013, the Henhouse Prowlers began working with the US State Department as musical diplomats, to da...
Dec 09, 2021•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 57
This week on Deerling Live, we are joined by Bob Taylor, co-founder of Taylor Guitars. Greg Deering and Bob Taylor have known each other since the late 1960's when they were both key members of the American Dream cooperative - a collection of musical instruments repair specialists and builders here in San Diego. In this episode, we sit down with Bob Taylor, Greg Deering, and Janet Deering to learn about the remarkable story of two of the worlds most respected names in stringed musical instrument...
Dec 02, 2021•1 hr 22 min•Ep. 56
This week on Deering Live we are happy to have classical banjoist, John Bullard. John is a classically trained musician and has published several books including Bach For Banjo. Come listen to him play and share in a transformative revelation: to experience the artistic marriage of banjo and classical music.
Nov 18, 2021•1 hr 5 min•Ep. 55
We are excited to feature bluegrass banjoist Mike Munford on Deering Live this week. Mike is a past IBMA Banjo Player of the Year winner and currently plays with the Grammy Nominated band Frank Solivan and Dirty Kitchen. Besides being one of the top banjoists on the scene today, Mike is also a very highly regarded banjo setup technician. Get some of your banjo setup questions answered here!
Nov 11, 2021•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 54
This week on Deering Live, we are giving you the chance to ask questions to our panel of guests from Deering. Ask anything to CEO Jamie Deering, COO Jamie Latty, and Master Builder Chad Kopotic. They are ready (and slightly nervous) for your questions! Anything about the company, the banjos, maintenance, and them as people. Favorite foods, musical tastes, hobbies, sports teams...almost anything goes.
Nov 04, 2021•1 hr 3 min•Ep. 53
We are excited to feature progressive banjoist Andy Thorn of Leftover Salmon to Deering Live this week. Andy is a killer player who continues to push the banjo envelope. Hailing from North Carolina, Andy honed his skills in scene that included players such as Ryan Cavanaugh and Rex McGee. In time, Andy moved out to Colorado and waded deep into the Colorado jamgrass scene, eventually landing the banjo chair in Leftover Salmon which he has held for over a decade. This is sure to be a fun and inspi...
Oct 28, 2021•1 hr•Ep. 52
