A Banjo Guitar

JasonS

We have banjos at our local GJ jam from time to time. Tenor banjo works great for a lot of the repertoire and can fill the role of rhythm guitar, particularly helpful if you're short on guitarists and heavy on horns as the banjo playing la pompe can be MUCH louder than guitar. I play my tenor in Chicago tuning which makes crossing over from guitar pretty trivial.

Is it known what type of zither banjo Django played? Six string zithers in guitar tuning would have been popular during the early part of his career so I had always assumed that's what he played. Having a short chanterelle string probably wouldn't have been very useful for Musette tunes.

elianu

https://www.djangobooks.com/forum/discussion/comment/117979#Comment_117979

Coule have been something like this? I think they call this "gypsy banjo".It has a similar headstock to the one in the photo but I am not really sure about what he played.

JasonS

https://www.djangobooks.com/forum/discussion/comment/117983#Comment_117983

Isn't the banjo in the photo a six string? There are some higher quality versions of that photo online that seem to indicate it isn't a tenor.

The popularity of zither banjos predated the invention of the tenor banjo (~1915) so tenor zithers are pretty rare. Most example you'll find have 5 string (one short string) or 6 (guitar style). There was also a 7 string variant that saw short-lived popularity in the UK.

Here's an old thread with a little discussion on the topic: https://www.banjohangout.org/archive/250052

billyshakes

@elianu What became of that cool watermark/shell-like pattern inside the resonator? Shame it isn't visible normally, but did it clean up well? I believe they make clear heads such that you might show it off. Perhaps that will change the tone a bit, but if it looked cool in there, it might be nice to show it. With that level of detail, it is almost like they might have done that originally anyway?

littlemark

I would think originally, no. Because heads used to be made of calf skin. I agree a clear skin might be cool.

JasonS

That's correct, clear/mylar heads weren't introduced until the early 1950's. It's common for early 20th century resonators to have paintings and designs on the outside but a watermark like that on the inside may be unintentional or something someone added later on for fun.