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Don Borchelt |
Posted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 1949
Size: 2,621kb, uploaded 8/9/2010 2:28:53 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Made this recording at Clifftop, 2010, with my pals Don Couchie and Jim Reed. They are two phenomenal pickers. Jim is playing his 1925 ball-bearing Mastertone, Don is playing Chip Arnold's 1969 Baldwin. I'm using my 1964 Ode. Jim just picked this up a few minutes before I recorded the session. Jim and I are playing three-finger style, while Don is playing clawhammer style.
6 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 1262
Size: 2,763kb, uploaded 7/23/2016 12:20:43 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This tune comes from the repertoire of famed Kentucky fiddler Ed Haley (1883-1951). Ed Britt and I recorded this back in November, 2014. Ed is picking clawhammer style on his OME Columbine, in open G tuning, capoed on the second fret. I am three finger picking my semi-fretless short scale Paramount, in an A variant tuning (aEABE).
4 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 1835
Size: 3,172kb, uploaded 9/7/2008 6:52:20 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Ed Britt and I went up to the Lowell Fiddle and Banjo Contest yesterday, and brought the remnants of hurricane Hannah with us. The contest was driven inside the high school, which cut down on the jamming. We did have a nice session with fiddler Barkev Kaligian, from Lexington, Mass. This is us playing in a hallway between the lockers and water bubblers. The recording is a little "boomy" as a result, but I hope still fun to listen to. This is the Stephen Foster Hard Times, recorded on my Tascam DR-1. I am playing my "new" 1964 Ode that Ed uncovered for me. I haven't put a semi-fretless plate on it- yet.
5 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 84
Size: 2,802kb, uploaded 7/3/2015 5:00:31 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
I played this tune last night at a jam session with some friends of mine, and recorded it on my smart phone, so I could upload it for the Old Time TOTW for 6/19/15. Okay, so I'm two weeks late, but us banjo pickers are busy people! Linda Henry and John Reddick are playing fiddle, Jerry Dallal is playing guitar, I am three finger picking on my 1902 Fairbanks Whyte Laydie, and Ed Britt is clawhammering on his Ome.
1 commentPosted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 498
Size: 1,614kb, uploaded 10/6/2012 6:51:31 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
For a region that has seen generations of young people move away to find work in far away auto plants and steel mills, and in uniform, the song Home Sweet Home has a deep meaning lost on most of us today. The song has been around since before the Civil War, and you will find it in the repertoire of most musicians whose roots are in Appalachia. It is most often played as an instrumental; the song is so familiar, the singing of it is unnecessary. This is from our Clifftop jam with West Virginia fiddler Ralph Roberts. Don Couchie is playing rhythm guitar, and I am following along with some three finger style old time banjo.
1 commentPosted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 124
Size: 1,313kb, uploaded 9/17/2022 7:08:26 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This is my contribution to the Old Time Tune of the Week for 9/16/22, suggested by Stephe3n Rapp. A good tune.
1 commentPosted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 1609
Size: 1,425kb, uploaded 8/11/2011 10:48:36 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This tune comes from fiddler Art Stamper. It feels like A Dorian, but it does not use the third degree of the scale, so it is hard to say for sure. My friend Tim Rowell recorded this tune with me at Clifftop 2011 one afternoon, at his campsite. He is playing clawhammer, while I am picking three-finger style. We both first heard this on Adam Hurt's inspiring Earthtones CD (engineered by BHO's own Paul Roberts), but ended up going back to Stamper to learn it.
3 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 1346
Size: 1,775kb, uploaded 9/28/2012 7:08:46 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
The very best fiddle tunes are often the plain and simple ones that you just can't get out of your head. Weeks after the jam that Don Couchie and I had at Clifftop with fiddler Ralph Roberts, I find myself humming John's Tune, an old time melody that Ralph learned from his grandfather. Don and I both felt that the moment spent picking that tune with Ralph was for us the best two minutes of the whole festival. Don Couchie is backing up on guitar, I am picking three finger style on my semi-fretless Tubaphone in open G.
3 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 1153
Size: 3,010kb, uploaded 8/2/2009 5:29:48 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
I just returned from Clifftop, where I had the honor and pleasure of camping next to BHO member Don Couchie, from North Bay, Ontario. We swapped tunes for most of the week. Don is an extremely talented picker, and can pick up a new tune far faster and better than I can. He had only played Last Chance on the fiddle for just a few minutes of warm up before I turned on the recorder. Just plain amazing. My Paramount semi-fretless is tuned aEABE.
2 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
[download]
- Play count: 1134
Size: 1,661kb, uploaded 5/11/2018 7:45:36 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Uploaded for the Old Time Tune of the Week for May 11, 2018. From the Mississippi Possum Hunters, whose 1930 recording was a sort of homage to Mississippi John Hurt.
4 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
[download]
- Play count: 1028
Size: 3,828kb, uploaded 6/10/2012 8:14:15 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This recording was made in my living room in 1998. The guitar player was Brian Clancey, who now plays in a duet with fiddler Robin Warren as Spirit Fiddle. We experimented a lot with the mixing together of finger picked banjo and finger picked guitar, a sound I really like.
2 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
[download]
- Play count: 545
Size: 1,337kb, uploaded 11/12/2022 6:00:51 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
I learned this C tune from a 1931 Okeh recording of the Mississippi old time string bad the Newton County Hillbillies, featuring Alvis Massengale on fiddle. It's a practice recording from a few years ago, uploaded for the 11/11/22 Old Time TOTW. I am three finger picking my 1928 Vega Tubaphone with a semi-fretless conversion neck, in double C tuning (gCGCD)
2 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
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- Play count: 1763
Size: 2,874kb, uploaded 10/31/2009 1:57:18 PM
Genre: Bluegrass / Playing Style: Bluegrass (Scruggs)
Well, there are some Richie Chaisson fans lurking out there, I just found out, so I rooted around my old digital files and found this recording of Liza Jane that Wry Whiskey recorded off the PA system, playing at a street fair one summer evening around 1999. Richie is on resophonic guitar, the late Gene Ketelhohn is picking guitar, and Tom Speth is on bass. I am playing my semi-fretless Paramount in open D tuning.
6 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
[download]
- Play count: 165
Size: 1,238kb, uploaded 3/19/2021 7:37:14 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
I fell in love with this tune when a friend of mine steered me to the recording of Wade Ward playing it on fiddle. I'm uploading it for the Old Time Tune of the Week for March 19, 2021.
1 commentPosted by Don Borchelt
[download]
- Play count: 122
Size: 1,008kb, uploaded 12/30/2019 6:55:41 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This is my first quick take on Melvin Wine's tune Lovely Jane, which I was inspired to figure out this past weekend after listening to Carl Baron and Janet Foster's wonderful versions posted for the Old Time Tune of the Week last Friday. This is clearly a close cousin to Doctor, Doctor, but more interesting.
3 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt, written by Owen "Snake" Chapman
[download]
- Play count: 158
Size: 1,319kb, uploaded 4/16/2018 5:17:05 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
I worked this up today for this weeks Old Time Tune of the Week. This comes form Pikeville, Kentucky fiddler Owne "Snake" Chapman. I am picking three finger style on my 1928 semi-fretless Vega Tubaphone, tuned in open D (aDF#AD). That's a MIDI practice track of my own making playing in the background.
3 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt
[download]
- Play count: 1099
Size: 2,806kb, uploaded 11/9/2012 8:16:05 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This is a tune from western Pennsylvania fiddler Sarah Armstrong, as transcribed by musicologist Samuel Bayard in his Hill Country Tunes collection, published in 1944. This recording comes from the Clifftop jam I had this past August with Don Couchie and Tim Rowell. Don is playing the fiddle, Tim is doing that neat low, growley clawhammer picking, and I am doing the three-finger picking on my semi-fretless Tubaphone in open D tuning.
Add CommentPosted by Don Borchelt
[download]
- Play count: 170
Size: 1,297kb, uploaded 8/28/2022 3:45:03 PM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
I worked this up just today as my contribution to the Old Time TOTW for 8/27/22. I worked it up from a recording of fiddler John Herrod.
1 commentPosted by Don Borchelt
[download]
- Play count: 213
Size: 2,314kb, uploaded 9/9/2012 9:00:48 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
Martha Campbell is a tune from the repertoire of Doc Roberts (1897-1978), a Kentucky fiddler who was one of the first to make records in the mid-1920s. This recording comes from my Clifftop jam with Don Couchie and Tim Rowell. Don is fiddling, Tim is playing clawhammer style in double C, capoed on 2. I am three finger picking in open D on my semi-fretless Tubaphone.
2 commentsPosted by Don Borchelt, written by Luke Thomasson
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- Play count: 771
Size: 3,105kb, uploaded 9/13/2012 7:55:39 AM
Genre: Old Time / Playing Style: Clawhammer and Old-Time
This old time waltz is generally credited to Texas fiddler Luke Thomasson. This comes from my jam this week with Ed Britt and Chris Muriel, who was in Boston on business and stopped by to pick a few tunes.
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