Banjo: Learning to Play Chords on 5-String

Date: Sat, 20 Mar 2004 09:49:54 -0800 (PST)
Subject: banjo chords

Hello,
My name is Norm Bird, and I live in Indiana. I recently purchased a five string banjo and am like a beginner again, as I had one 15 years ago but gave up on it. Now, older and some wiser, am hoping to be able to play it this time. I am having a terrible time with chords. D7 especially as I keep getting dead sounds and have read about hitting the strings with fingertips only and not touching the others but still do it. Any easy fix?
Norm

Greetings Norm,

Chording can be quite difficult without personal instruction...there are many things to consider in right hand placement before attempting to play a chord on the banjo:

1. Make sure your thumb is placed behind the neck...not riding on the top...

2. Use only the very tip of your fingers when fretting...this will help you avoid touching adjacent strings which gives a string a dead thud...

3. Only push down the string, with the tip of your fingers, directly behind the fret...this ensures a clearer tone...

4. Practice playing one string at a time while chording to assist you in isolating problems...each string should ring loud and clear...if a string sounds dead, or is not ringing clear, focus on why...if you're fretting the string, you may not be pressing hard enough and you may not be playing close enough behind the fret...if it's an open string, one of your fretting fingers may be touching the string which stops it from emitting a clear tone...

Be sure to check out all of our links below...for further lessons and answers to playing banjo...Mickey

Date: Fri, 23 Jan 2004 22:45:38 -0500
Subject: question and thanks

hello!

first of all, thank you for providing a beginner like me with some free instruction. my banjo is so beautiful and i'm so happy to be trying out this stuff on it!
my questions are about the chords: i'm not always sure what finger of my left hand to put on what string. should i just do what is most comfortable for me, or is there a standard way to do it? also what do you mean when you say "D7" for some of the chords? I can read music but I still don't understand why sometimes you put just plain "C" but sometimes "D7" or "G7"

thanks again

anjana

Greetings Anjana,

Glad to assist:

This is critical...you really want to get used to, from the beginning, playing chords with the correct fingering...otherwise you may impede your playing in the future...

Open G Tuning:
C Chord First Position Open:
First Finger on the Second String (B) First Fret
Second Finger on the Fourth String (D) on the Second Fret
Third Finger on the First String Second Fret.

D7 First Position Chord:
First Finger on the Second String (B) First Fret
Second Finger on the Third String (G) Second Fret

G7 First Position Chord:
Third Finger on the First String Third Fret (all other strings are played open)

Hope this helps...we'll try to update our lessons section to include chordal positions on banjo...

Mickey