# Anyone wanna talk banjo? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 13, 2019, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-wanna-talk-banjo/831067 "2019-03-13T13:04:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2019, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-wanna-talk-banjo/831067/21 "2019-04-20T20:06:36Z")
I’m not a banjo player. But I play guitar, and something I’m dabbling in is playing five-string banjo parts on guitar. You tune the guitar to Open E (E-B-E-G#-B-E, low note to high note). Then you capo at the third fret, moving it up to G-D-G-B-D-G. Now, a five-string banjo is usually tuned to Open G. That’s D-G-B-D for the four long strings, with the short string tuned to G, one octave above the other G string. So the fifth, fourth, third and second strings on your guitar are now tuned to the same notes as the four long strings on a banjo, in the same order. And the first string on your guitar is tuned to the same note as the short string.\* You also have a low G note that isn’t on a banjo. I usually perform solo, and that bass note is useful to play rhythm guitar parts in between the banjo parts. Performing solo, it can be a challenge to keep the music from sounding all the same. So it’s nice, and convenient, to throw in a banjo song for variety when I’m tuned to Open E. I thought I’d discovered this, but it’s been around. There’s a really good guitarist in Sweden namd Martin Tallstrom who makes use of it. He plays a killer version of “Jesse James”. * * * \*I would imagine that if you’ve played an actual banjo, it would take some effort to get used to playing short-string notes on the opposite side on the guitar. ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2019, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-wanna-talk-banjo/831067/22 "2019-04-21T02:53:49Z")
Well, you can also just tune the guitar to open G, and forego the capo, and play mainly on the 4 highest strings. The G is still there on the 5th string, but it’s at the wrong octave for the banjo. The low D is still there if you want to go really low. Since I’d played in open G and D a lot before getting a banjo, the transition was fairly easy. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2019, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-wanna-talk-banjo/831067/23 "2019-04-21T03:02:04Z")
> [@scabpicker](#): > > Well, you can also just tune the guitar to open G, and forego the capo, and play mainly on the 4 highest strings. **The G is still there on the 5th string, but it’s at the wrong octave for the banjo.** The low D is still there if you want to go really low. That’s what’s nice about tuning to Open E and capoing at 3 – the first string is the right octave, and it can be picked as a grace note without being fingered, just like the short string on the banjo. The short string is a big part of the sound of the five-string banjo. It’s sort of like if you had a piano with a high note inserted among the lower notes. ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2019, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-wanna-talk-banjo/831067/24 "2019-04-21T15:40:04Z")
Yeah, my poor reading skills had led me to miss that you were talking about imitating the part, not just trying to work on picking a roll with no banjo. Sorry about that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anyone-wanna-talk-banjo/831067.md?page=1)