I criteri di selezione della seguente discografia sono dettati dal fatto di privilegiare gli albums dove il banjo sia lo strumento principale o abbia una parte predominante o metta in mostra musicisti con una tecnica caratteristica, unica o per molti versi fondamentale nell’evoluzione tecnica ed artistica dello strumento.
Gli LPs, raggruppati cronologicamente per periodi decennali o ventennali, comprendono le antologie, i lavori solisti e le string bands di old time tradizionale (*) o revivalistica (*+), di pre-bluegrass (**), di bluegrass (***), di avanguardia o progressivi (****).
Riguardo ai gruppi, il banjoista in causa è indicato tra parentesi dopo il titolo del disco.
Molte formazioni, specialmente di bluegrass, e parecchi artisti – il materiale inciso in questo caso è estremamente abbondante e valido – sono stati tralasciati non per particolari demeriti artistici ma esclusivamente per salvaguardare l’economia domestica del lettore interessato. Vorrei infine far rilevare ai non iniziati che tutte le antologie qui segnalate, nessuna esclusa, sono di assoluto affidamento, di importanza basilare e possono rappresentare un sicuro eccellente punto di partenza.
1920s-1930s
-County 515, Various Artists, A Collection Of Mountain Banjo Songs & Tunes *
-Folkways RF-51, Uncle Dave Macon, From Original Masters *
-County 505, Charlie Poole & The North Carolina Ramblers, Old Time Songs *
-Folkways RBF-654, Dock Boggs, His Twelve Original Recordings *
-County 524, Da Costa Woltz’s Southern Broadcasters (Ben Jarrell, Frank Jenkins) *
-County 405, Hillbillies (John Rector, Jack Reedy, Walter Bowman) *
-Old Homestead 113, Carolina Tar Heels (Dock Walsh, Clarence Ashley) *
-County 543, Earl Johnson & His Clodhoppers, Red Hot Breakdown (Emmett Bankston) *
-Rounder 1032, Georgia Yellow Hammers, The Moonshine Hollow Band (Charles E. Moody) *
-County 532, Leake County Revelers, Saturday Night Breakdown (Jim Wolverton) *
-Puritan 3001, Tenneva Ramblers (Claude Slagle) *
-Old Homestead 142, Coon Creek Girls, Early Radio Favorites (Lily May Ledford) *, **
-County 404, Wade Mainer & The Sons Of The Mountaineers **
-County 406, Roy Hall & His Blue Ridge Entertainers (Clayton Hall) **
-Herwin 208, Cannon’s Jug Stompers (Gus Cannon, banjoista di colore, pre-blues e blues)
1940s-1950s
-Folkways 2342, Rufus Crisp *
-Folkways 3828, Pete Steele, Banjo Tunes & Songs *
-Rounder SS-06, Bill Monroe, Lester Flatt, Earl Scruggs, The Original Bluegrass Band ***
-Rounder SS-05, Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs, The Golden Era ***
-Rounder SS-18/19, Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs, The Mercury Sessions, Vols. 1 & 2 ***
-Rounder SS-9/10, Stanley Brothers, The Columbia Sessions, Vols. 1 & 2 ***
-Rounder SS-03, Osborne Brothers & Red Allen ***
1960s
-County 701/717/757, Various Artists, Clawhammer Banjo, Vols. 1, 2 & 3 *
-Elektra 7217, Various Artists, Folk Banjo Styles *+, ***, ****
-Elektra 7238, Various Artists, New Dimensions In Banjo & Bluegrass ***, ****
-Elektra 7276, Various Artists, Old Time Banjo Project *+
-Folkways 2314, Various Artists, American Banjo-Scruggs Style **, ***
-Starday 104, Various Artists, Banjo In The Hills ***
-County 713, Fred Cockerham, Tommy Jarrell, Oscar Jenkins, Down To The Cider Mill *
-Folkways 2380, Uncle Wade Ward *
-Folkways 2351, Dock Boggs, Legendary Singer & Banjo Picker *
-Folkways 2368, Roscoe Holcomb, The High Lonesome Sound *
-Folkways 2360, Frank Proffitt, Sings Folk Songs *
-Folkways 31015, Cousin Emmy (alias Cynthia May Carver) *
-County 712, Coon Creek Girls (Lily May Ledford) *
-Folk-Legacy 32, Hedy West, Old Times & Hard Times *+
-CBS 17699, Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs, Foggy Mountain Banjo ***
-King 615, Stanley Brothers & The Clinch Mountain Boys ***
-Gusto 5020, Don Reno & Red Smiley, 20 Bluegrass Originals ***
-Folkways 31031, Country Gentlemen, Going Back To The Blue Ridge Mts.(Eddie Adcock) ***
-Elektra 7265, Dillards, Live-Almost (Doug Dillard) ***
1970s
-Kicking Mule 204, Various Artists, The Old-Time Banjo In America *, *+
-Kicking Mule 213, Various Artists, Southern Clawhammer Banjo *, *+
-Kicking Mule 209, Various Artists, Melodic Clawhammer Banjo *+
-Rounder 2016, Various Artists, Ain’t Gonna Rain No More (tutti banjoisti di colore)
-Rounder 0065, B.L. Lunsford, G. Pegram, R. Parham, Music From South Turkey Creek *
-June Appal 009, Buell Kazee *
-Heritage 28, Kyle Creed, Liberty *
-County 748, Tommy Jarrell, Come & Go With Me *
-Arhoolie 5018, Uncle John Patterson, Plains, Georgia Rock *
-Kicking Mule 113, Art Rosenbaum, Art Of The Mountain Banjo *+
-Puritan 5012, Pat Dunford *+
-Rounder 0115, Mac Benford, Backwoods Banjo *+
-Flying Fish 009, Red Clay Ramblers, Stolen Love (Tommy Thompson) *+
-June Appal 015, Plank Road (Al Tharp) *+
-Takoma 1037, Billy Faier, Banjo ****
-Rounder RB-1, Bill Keith, Something Auld, Something Newgrass… ***, ****
-Rebel 1506, Country Gentlemen, Award Winning (Bill Emerson) ***
-Rounder 0006, Country Cooking, 14 Bluegrass Instrumentals (T. Trischka, P. Wernick) ***, ****
-Rounder 0044, J.D. Crowe & The New South ***, ****
1980s
-Heritage 39, Various Artists, Old Five String *+
-County 777, Virgil Anderson, …On The Tennessee Line *
-Merrywang 1953, Fleming Brown, Little Rosewood Casket & Other Songs Of Joy *, *+
-Flying Fish 27271, Bertrand Levy, That Old Gut Feeling *+
-June Appal 038, David Holt, It Just Suits Me *+
-Rounder 0132, Bob Carlin, Fiddle Tunes For Clawhammer Banjo *+
-Rooster 120, Cathy Fink, Doggone My Time *+
-Rounder 0124, T. Trischka, B. Keith, B. Fleck, Fiddle Tunes For Clawhammer Banjo ***, ****
-Flying Fish 046, Peter Wernick, Dr. Banjo Steps Out ***, ****
-Rounder 0171, Tony Trischka, A Robot Plane Flies Over Arkansas ***, ****
-Rounder 0121, Bela Fleck, Crossing The Tracks ***, ****
-Rounder 0160, Johnson Mountain Boys, Walls Of Time (Richard Underwood) ***
-Sugar Hill 3727, Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, Rides Again! (Terry Baucom) ***
Pierangelo Valenti, fonte Hi, Folks! n. 14, 1985
