There are many fine banjo players, but I've never heard anyone who could match Earl Scruggs. He's just amazing, and makes it seem absolutely effortless. RIP
No one can ever be Earl... But Russ Carson makes a pretty damn good job of it. In my opinion Russ is the new Earl Scruggs. Watch his videos on @81crowe. His playing is slick and flawless. Currently playing banjo with Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder. Awsome player.
I saw this group perform live several times. They put on such a clean but great act. Never a dirty joke, or anything off color. Just wonderful music and clean down-home humor thrown in. This is my all-time favorite band, and Earl Scruggs is one of my heros.
Earl was the epitome of a considerate, generous musician. Love the way he steps aside at 2:00, so as to share the spotlight with Jake Tullock doing his ending bit on bass. The man had an amazing musical talent and a natural gift of eye for "stage presence" -- also amazing considering this was the early days of TV.
I don't know how many hours I've spent listening to this song and trying to play it. The thing that amazes me is the ease at which he performs. Then the smile at 1:52, look ma no hands, and the grin.
No one sounds like Earl when it comes to driving the sounds of the 5 -string banjo, Especially with the right and left hand techniques that he employs. Earl's timing and definition in playing banjo rolls is impeccable- there will never be another one like him for making the banjo sound so wonderful and so good tothe ears! He is my hero and the standard we should all live up to as aspiring banjo players! Here's to you Earl! Thank you for talent and your standards!
The great majority of popular musicians can't read music at all, or do it quite badly. Learning by ear is a better way of doing it. Written music is largely an artifact of the era when music could not be recorded.
My grandpa despised of me reading music, he said it messed his picking up somewhere along the road. Idk what he means but I haven’t ever read music and I’ve been playing banjer for 9 years know plenty but never read tab
01:56 Such a blessing to see Earl smile big like that. Of course, he usually had that subtle "Mona Lisa" grin on his face. I just love Earl, and when I get to Heaven, I'm givin' him a big ole hug...... then I'll ask him to do Cripple Creek!
I agree, I'm in my early 30s and love his music more than the stuff of my generation. It makes me wanna go to the 1930s...although this is years later.
I don't reckon I've heard him do that number more than a couple times (once on the Foggy Mountain Banjo album and once on a radio transcription dating back from 19 and 53.
BTW I grew up in roanoke, va and Don Reno played banjo on TV there for years every morning mon thru fri back in the mid 50's thru about 1962 or so. Later on he played at a bluegrass show in nearby Fincastle, Va and the interviewed Don on the radio and they ask him if he still had that banjo he got in a trade with Earl Scruggs in 1948. Don said"yes I looked at it this morning to make sure it was still there because somebody stole the one I had been playing in my shows. I will use Earl's tonight."
Aside from Earl's effortless, jaw-dropping, beautiful picking, there is one thing that puzzles me about this video: The sound. I see only a single, tiny microphone and yet you can clearly hear every instrument in perfect balance, with rich, dynamic, ear-popping tone. So why can't we get this same kind of tonal brilliance with modern equipment? In so many modern bluegrass recordings you can barely hear the guitar or bass. What did we lose with the digital age?
Early bluegrass performers, and others in other genres, performed around what is known as a condenser microphone. It picked up everything in a 180 degree radius behind it (omni-directional) , but most especially that which was directly "at the ninety" (directly in front of it). That's why you see, and hear, whoever has the break, step up and the previous performer step back. You will see a lot of today's performers -- traditionalists, for the most part -- returning to that. There are drawbacks: I've always said if you play with a single condenser mic, you have to practice a lot of choreography, as well as your musical chops. Also, in a closed studio they're great, but in an open air situation, you have to be wary of what is in your immediate back. Any traffic, animal noises, etc. -- it gets it all.
@@tablature6121 : Actually, that's not a condenser mike, it was what the BBC called a "Labor Mike" made by Laboratorium Wennebostel which became Sennheiser later on. There's a big omni dynamic capsule in the base of the microphone and a pressure tube going from the head to the capsule. This gave a low profile on TV in the days before it was possible to make small profile condensers like we have today. You will notice how the musicians are moving around between marked cue points on the floor in order to adjust balances for solo parts. There's likely a spot mike on the bass but maybe not. But to answer @Whipsnade13, a lot of why this sounds good is because it's so sparse... there aren't a million instruments competing for space.
Man, they were all so talented. Paul Warren is amazing on fiddle, Earl is the master of banjo, hands down. And Josh was great on dobro and had a very nice singing voice too. What a great group.
Ahh, how sweet it is .. just to sit back here & take in this music & this fabulous footage of the band in action. I'm fixated & mesmerised .. by watching those magic fingers of Earl, Paul & Uncle Josh dance & skip across those strings & frets. Masters of their instruments .. virtuosos, one & all ..
In 1969 I saw Grandpa Jones working as a duo, having to come out and follow Cliff Waldron & Bill Emerson's great band..he walked up to the mic, and de-tuned his banjo and said "That's all I know of it!" (parodying "Flint Hill Special")....he had the whole crowd hysterically laughing--then he quickly retuned, and charged right into one of his great fast songs--grabbing the audience right along with him! THIS is a master shownam.
The close-up of Josh Graves is very helpful when learning "Groundspeed". And JOSH is the right one to emulate !Thanks for this great video, Banjostead.
Don Reno use to own this banjo. Heard an interview with Don just before he died and in reply to if he still had Earl's banjo Don said "yes i took it out and looked at it this morning. Somebody stole the one I had been using live last night so I will use the one I got from Earl tonight". Earl has the smoothest right hand. Plus, somehow, it always sounds unique. You can tell right away that its the great Earl Scruggs.
Good Picking Earl Scruggs, and all the other fine, fine musicians, that’s in the foggy mountain boys band. Earl told us all how to play a banjo the right way, and they’re all in the bluegrass festival in the sky.
This is the first song I learned on the banjo. It really isn’t as hard as people make it out to be, ofc no one beats the precious sound of Earl’s picking
Every finger picker i have ever met, this is one of the first songs they wanted to learn. And i certainly don't blame them. This is Earl Scruggs' style in all it's glory! :)
Yeah the yankee doodle dandy is on the version on Foggy Mnt. Banjo too. I grew up in Roanoke, Va and another banjo player I like use to play there every morning on TV. Don Reno. Just looked at a 1976 interview with Don and they showed two pictures of Don and Earl standing together. Don told us back in the day that when he got out of the Army Earl sounded so good that he decided to develope a different style with two finger and thumb runs and that he picked up the three finger way from Snuffy J.
I'd have never heard of these guys if it hadn't been for RUclips, and the kind and thoughtful soul who uploaded this and other Flatt & Scruggs & The Foggy Mountain Boys material. THANK YOU!!!!
Yep Ground Speed is the name. I've got the very LP record my father bought new in 1959 or 60 called "Foggy Mountain Banjo" by Flatt and Scruggs. It is all banjo songs. Lester or anybody sings at all. Ground Speed is the very first track. Home Sweet Home, Sally Ann, Sally Goodwin, Cripple Creek, Cumberland Gap, Ruben, Lonesome Rd. Blues, Little Darlin' Pal of Mine, Fireball Mail, Bugle Call Rag..well I can't think of anymore. But they are all on the album.
Yep, this is Ground Speed. Earl bought and learned to fly an airplane after a horrible wreck in the '50's, because of back problems. "Ground Speed" is the speed at which a plane is beginning to leave the ground.
brasspick Actually, that's rotation speed, or V1. Ground speed is an aircraft's speed read out on the ground and determined by wind conditions. For example, if I was flying a Cessna Skyhawk at 110 knots into a 10 knot headwind, I would be flying at 100 knots on the ground.
Ground speed is also a PTO setting on some tractors, where PTO rpm is determined by the rotation of the big back wheels (which determine ground speed), and not by engine rpm. Scruggs being from a rural background, I sorta figured that was the "ground speed" he was referencing with this composition, but later found out, "Nope", it was his plane's ground speed as opposed to its airspeed, as you well explained. Earl's homespun, rural demeanor and southern drawl may give a very incorrect first impression to a lot of folks (me, at one time). The man had a brilliant mind that ranged across many subjects, especially music.
Zedd Lee Only person I know to actually take their entire left hand off the banjo and effortlessly drop right back into the song as if nothing happened.
@@1930Granada The Banjo had reached Top Ground Speed, so he lifted his hand to feel the Breeze, while the momentum kept going, and landed it on a few Miles later, to continue the journey.
@@1930Granada lol ok..thnx for that...im not a native English speaker, so i didnt get the meaning of "Ground Speed". Nice to know... he was flying for sure:))
i love earl and scruggs as do my kids age 5 to teenagers and preteens, i like driving with their excellent music and my kids want their mommy to play just like them, what a challenge !!! cant see it myself but always up for it.
What?? Flatt didn't do too much??? They were all brilliant musicians, and they had a very special chemistry between themselves, hence a sound that will never be bettered. kind regards from Australia.
Three years late, but thanks, Straya! You're every inch as American in spirit as I am, I hope! Loving liberty, the fall of the crown and the incoming fall of the big nosed market economy that enslaves all of humanity. We shall be the pioneers of our worlds 👍
After learning to fly and buying his own airplane, Earl was, I guess, somewhat captivated by the 2 ways of calibrating your speed while flying: air speed and ground speed. When he composed this tune, that was the "Ground Speed" he had in mind. He interjected the "Yankee Doodle" lick in another song, as well: Bugle Call Rag. Probably others, too. The lick is very prominent throughout the theme from deliverance, Dueling Banjos, but he had nothing to do with that. Arthur "Guitar Boogie" Smith composed that tune.
@@1930Granada -- Reno may have shared credit for "Dueling Banjos", but Smith already had the thing laid down before they even got together to recorded it, originally called "Feudin' Banjos". : "'Dueling Banjos' is an instrumental composition by Arthur "Guitar Boogie" Smith. The song was composed in 1954 by Smith as a banjo instrumental he called "Feudin' Banjos," which contained riffs from "Yankee Doodle." Smith recorded it in 1955 playing a four-string plectrum banjo and accompanied by five-string bluegrass banjo player Don Reno..." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dueling_Banjos I really don't believe Reno had so much to do with the composition as maybe he did with arrangement. In fact, the very concept of "dueling/feuding/competing/whatever" instruments was nothing new with Smith, since that sort of thing had been going on for ages and across all genres. But it was the particular tune in Smith's composition, and the way it was played when recorded with Reno, that Eric Weissberg copied (as stated by Weissberg in court) that brought on the lawsuit by Smith, which he won, not Reno. "...which also led to a successful lawsuit by the song's composer, as it was used in the film without Smith's permission." Ibid.
Yes, Josh could play difficult breaks exceedingly well. This has alot of back-to-back rolls. I'm learning "Earl's Breakdown" and it is crazy fun ! Earl wrote some great songs.
Cousin Jake slapped the ending right on cue! One of the most rock solid and simple bassists ever! I hear a lot of Joe Zinkan in Jake's work ! But from what I hear he was heavily influenced by Joe, Junior and some others. I'd like to turn back the clock to those days!
+URNsane2use Realname Flatt and Scruggs had a syndicated TV show at the height of their popularity in the mid-late 50's. This is taken from that show. It is, or was recently, available on DVD from Amazon.
Yes. This from their syndicated show. They were never on Cas Walker's show, however Dolly Parton made her debut there at about 16. David West, a gentleman and a scholar, was the house band banjo picker when I lived in K-town. The late, great Red Rector on mandolin. Fine folks, all.
There are many fine banjo players, but I've never heard anyone who could match Earl Scruggs. He's just amazing, and makes it seem absolutely effortless. RIP
Alan High
Agreed. Bluegrass banjo begins and ends with Earl Scruggs.
No one can ever be Earl... But Russ Carson makes a pretty damn good job of it. In my opinion Russ is the new Earl Scruggs. Watch his videos on @81crowe. His playing is slick and flawless. Currently playing banjo with Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder. Awsome player.
What about Don Stover?
i learned almost all of his instrumental.. in my opinion Randy lynn rag , Earl breakdown was he best
@@1930Granada k
I met Earl at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago, he was very nice, asked me to sit and we talked banjo for a while.
Nice!
RiP fRieNd
I saw this group perform live several times. They put on such a clean but great act. Never a dirty joke, or anything off color. Just wonderful music and clean down-home humor thrown in. This is my all-time favorite band, and Earl Scruggs is one of my heros.
I’m so envious of you. I wish I could have seen him perform live.
Earl was the epitome of a considerate, generous musician. Love the way he steps aside at 2:00, so as to share the spotlight with Jake Tullock doing his ending bit on bass. The man had an amazing musical talent and a natural gift of eye for "stage presence" -- also amazing considering this was the early days of TV.
There’s no wonder why they’re the best ever. Just insane.
I don't know how many hours I've spent listening to this song and trying to play it. The thing that amazes me is the ease at which he performs. Then the smile at 1:52, look ma no hands, and the grin.
My family from Eastern Kentucky
And everytime we visit my grandparents they played this music..
I love it now as much as then!!!
No one sounds like Earl when it comes to driving the sounds of the 5 -string banjo, Especially with the right and left hand techniques that he employs. Earl's timing and definition in playing banjo rolls is impeccable- there will never be another one like him for making the banjo sound so wonderful and so good tothe ears! He is my hero and the standard we should all live up to as aspiring banjo players! Here's to you Earl! Thank you for talent and your standards!
What's amazing is how he could grasp musicality and yet couldn't read music. True mastery of the banjo.
The great majority of popular musicians can't read music at all, or do it quite badly.
Learning by ear is a better way of doing it. Written music is largely an artifact of the era when music could not be recorded.
My grandpa despised of me reading music, he said it messed his picking up somewhere along the road. Idk what he means but I haven’t ever read music and I’ve been playing banjer for 9 years know plenty but never read tab
No, true mastery OF MUSIC... not just banjo.
honestly dudes, these kings are "shredding" !!!!!!!!
01:56
Such a blessing to see Earl smile big like that. Of course, he usually had that subtle "Mona Lisa" grin on his face.
I just love Earl, and when I get to Heaven, I'm givin' him a big ole hug......
then I'll ask him to do Cripple Creek!
He looks so humble :)
I agree, I'm in my early 30s and love his music more than the stuff of my generation. It makes me wanna go to the 1930s...although this is years later.
I will do the same. RIP Earl the banjo man
I don't reckon I've heard him do that number more than a couple times (once on the Foggy Mountain Banjo album and once on a radio transcription dating back from 19 and 53.
they were all so incredibly talented...
@Whiteboy14 you obviously dont play music
This music always puts a goshdarn smile on my face and seeing such finger picking skills is always fun :D
BTW I grew up in roanoke, va and Don Reno played banjo on TV there for years every morning mon thru fri back in the mid 50's thru about 1962 or so. Later on he played at a bluegrass show in nearby Fincastle, Va and the interviewed Don on the radio and they ask him if he still had that banjo he got in a trade with Earl Scruggs in 1948. Don said"yes I looked at it this morning to make sure it was still there because somebody stole the one I had been playing in my shows. I will use Earl's tonight."
I am in awe of Earl Scruggs. He was true master. I love when he raises his hand at 1:54 and smiles - all without missing a note.
Earl revived the 5string banjo..foundation music at its best..ty Earl..
Aside from Earl's effortless, jaw-dropping, beautiful picking, there is one thing that puzzles me about this video: The sound. I see only a single, tiny microphone and yet you can clearly hear every instrument in perfect balance, with rich, dynamic, ear-popping tone. So why can't we get this same kind of tonal brilliance with modern equipment? In so many modern bluegrass recordings you can barely hear the guitar or bass. What did we lose with the digital age?
Early bluegrass performers, and others in other genres, performed around what is known as a condenser microphone. It picked up everything in a 180 degree radius behind it (omni-directional) , but most especially that which was directly "at the ninety" (directly in front of it). That's why you see, and hear, whoever has the break, step up and the previous performer step back. You will see a lot of today's performers -- traditionalists, for the most part -- returning to that.
There are drawbacks: I've always said if you play with a single condenser mic, you have to practice a lot of choreography, as well as your musical chops. Also, in a closed studio they're great, but in an open air situation, you have to be wary of what is in your immediate back. Any traffic, animal noises, etc. -- it gets it all.
@@tablature6121 : Actually, that's not a condenser mike, it was what the BBC called a "Labor Mike" made by Laboratorium Wennebostel which became Sennheiser later on. There's a big omni dynamic capsule in the base of the microphone and a pressure tube going from the head to the capsule. This gave a low profile on TV in the days before it was possible to make small profile condensers like we have today. You will notice how the musicians are moving around between marked cue points on the floor in order to adjust balances for solo parts. There's likely a spot mike on the bass but maybe not. But to answer @Whipsnade13, a lot of why this sounds good is because it's so sparse... there aren't a million instruments competing for space.
@@kludgeaudio Thanks for the info.
Very impressive. Love watching the older musicians play.
This man was a God with that banjo period!!!!!
Man, they were all so talented. Paul Warren is amazing on fiddle, Earl is the master of banjo, hands down. And Josh was great on dobro and had a very nice singing voice too. What a great group.
I love Earl's 🪕banjo pickin', he's a champ. @0:34 he almost got poked in the eye!😁🎻
Ahh, how sweet it is .. just to sit back here & take in this music & this fabulous footage of the band in action. I'm fixated & mesmerised .. by watching those magic fingers of Earl, Paul & Uncle Josh dance & skip across those strings & frets. Masters of their instruments .. virtuosos, one & all ..
Reminds me my Daddy when I was little watching Mr. Scruggs. Memories - how sweet.
Cousin Jake was sure slapping it home on the end as he always does!!
Just don't get better than those guys! Genius at work!
Earl Scruggs was the Buddy Rich of the banjo, the best that ever lived!
It's like a person trying to paint a Rembrandt,when Earl is Rembrandt himself,the original
Could listen to this 24/7. It's great ! Love Scruggs and Flatt !
what a joy to watch this master at work!
In 1969 I saw Grandpa Jones working as a duo, having to come out and follow Cliff Waldron & Bill Emerson's great band..he walked up to the mic, and de-tuned his banjo and said "That's all I know of it!" (parodying "Flint Hill Special")....he had the whole crowd hysterically laughing--then he quickly retuned, and charged right into one of his great fast songs--grabbing the audience right along with him! THIS is a master shownam.
Earl and Scruggs I love them both
Damn this man was a legend!
The close-up of Josh Graves is very helpful when learning "Groundspeed". And JOSH is the right one to emulate !Thanks for this great video, Banjostead.
Nice work! Currently learning as well!
are there words to explain this experience??😭😭😭 The energy in the room Is just imaculant
It's so beautiful 😭😭😭
Still listening 2021
Don Reno use to own this banjo. Heard an interview with Don just before he died and in reply to if he still had Earl's banjo Don said "yes i took it out and looked at it this morning. Somebody stole the one I had been using live last night so I will use the one I got from Earl tonight". Earl has the smoothest right hand. Plus, somehow, it always sounds unique. You can tell right away that its the great Earl Scruggs.
Good Picking Earl Scruggs, and all the other fine, fine musicians, that’s in the foggy mountain boys band. Earl told us all how to play a banjo the right way, and they’re all in the bluegrass festival in the sky.
I am a Nashvillian
Mr sruggs was the. Definention of a. Gentleman. As a 5 string picker,
He was my hero.
Incredible
Mama & Daddy loved Grand OLe Opry. I did too and still like some bluegrass.
This is the first song I learned on the banjo. It really isn’t as hard as people make it out to be, ofc no one beats the precious sound of Earl’s picking
WOW. This is absolute musical gold. Jackpot right here. Thank you for the upload.
Every time I hear this, I feel like getting my dress from the 60s on, putting on a straw hat, and dancing in my living room.
Do it, it'll be a blast :D
Every finger picker i have ever met, this is one of the first songs they wanted to learn. And i certainly don't blame them. This is Earl Scruggs' style in all it's glory! :)
Earl Scruggs is a pilot - he flew himself to band engagements, flew Angel Flights, etc. Ground Speed refers to getting from place to place quickly.
Oh wow!
Correction, ground speed refers to the speed over ground opposed to air speed, which are not the same.
I saw his last two performances at the Ryman what a privilege something i will never forget R.I.P. Earl
Wow, look at Earl smile! Haven't seen that on the other videos.
earl was the best banjo player who ever lived. or will ever live
God damn Earl was amazing.
This man was ahead of his time
Yeah the yankee doodle dandy is on the version on Foggy Mnt. Banjo too. I grew up in Roanoke, Va and another banjo player I like use to play there every morning on TV. Don Reno. Just looked at a 1976 interview with Don and they showed two pictures of Don and Earl standing together. Don told us back in the day that when he got out of the Army Earl sounded so good that he decided to develope a different style with two finger and thumb runs and that he picked up the three finger way from Snuffy J.
I'd have never heard of these guys if it hadn't been for RUclips, and the kind and thoughtful soul who uploaded this and other Flatt & Scruggs & The Foggy Mountain Boys material.
THANK YOU!!!!
THE JIMI . ... of his 05:30 .. Total class...!
Peace and strings men...
W0W W0W W0W what beautiful music 🎶 ❤❤❤❤❤ it is all I can 🥫 say
Awesome music!
Earl is the best I ever heard.
Yep Ground Speed is the name. I've got the very LP record my father bought new in 1959 or 60 called "Foggy Mountain Banjo" by Flatt and Scruggs. It is all banjo songs. Lester or anybody sings at all. Ground Speed is the very first track. Home Sweet Home, Sally Ann, Sally Goodwin, Cripple Creek, Cumberland Gap, Ruben, Lonesome Rd. Blues, Little Darlin' Pal of Mine, Fireball Mail, Bugle Call Rag..well I can't think of anymore. But they are all on the album.
The King.
I know earl's music some days ago, and now i love his music!!!
Straight 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥musical genius I love it
super the master at work
Nice job from all of them, thanks very much for posting this ~!
wicked awesome!
Yep, this is Ground Speed. Earl bought and learned to fly an airplane after a horrible wreck in the '50's, because of back problems. "Ground Speed" is the speed at which a plane is beginning to leave the ground.
brasspick
Actually, that's rotation speed, or V1. Ground speed is an aircraft's speed read out on the ground and determined by wind conditions. For example, if I was flying a Cessna Skyhawk at 110 knots into a 10 knot headwind, I would be flying at 100 knots on the ground.
Ground speed is also a PTO setting on some tractors, where PTO rpm is determined by the rotation of the big back wheels (which determine ground speed), and not by engine rpm. Scruggs being from a rural background, I sorta figured that was the "ground speed" he was referencing with this composition, but later found out, "Nope", it was his plane's ground speed as opposed to its airspeed, as you well explained.
Earl's homespun, rural demeanor and southern drawl may give a very incorrect first impression to a lot of folks (me, at one time). The man had a brilliant mind that ranged across many subjects, especially music.
Amongst my big collection metal and rock CD’s I proudly own two Flatts and Scruggs compilations😬.
Who''s making that banjo talk ? The one and only master EARL SCRUGGS !
that face he makes when playing the banjo he makes it all the time
seen it in other videos....he's so in Zen with his entire entity
Zedd Lee
Only person I know to actually take their entire left hand off the banjo and effortlessly drop right back into the song as if nothing happened.
@@1930Granada The Banjo had reached Top Ground Speed, so he lifted his hand to feel the Breeze,
while the momentum kept going, and landed it on a few Miles later, to continue the journey.
Ground speed is your readout on the ground as opposed to airspeed. I believe he was doing 400 knots.
@@1930Granada lol ok..thnx for that...im not a native English speaker, so i didnt get the meaning of
"Ground Speed". Nice to know... he was flying for sure:))
wonder how many hootenanny's these boys played in the good ole days
not a single missed note here either. FOR THE LOVE OF MUSIC
This is medicine for my soul
They just made it look so easy…
Mike Yerke
All the best players do! Unfortunately, it isn't :(
Right!!!
@@itsbanffdavehere *so true* exactly my thoughts!
Years of practice.
The Flatt And Scruggs are my favorite bluegrass band.
Yeah.....good stuff.
i love earl and scruggs as do my kids age 5 to teenagers and preteens, i like driving with their excellent music and my kids want their mommy to play just like them, what a challenge !!! cant see it myself but always up for it.
you understand that earl scruggs one person is? no offence.
yes I do I just like listening to flatt and Scruggs so just over excitement I guess
i live in Uruguay (a thousand miles away) and listen to this... good music has no frontiers of age and country
That ending 🥰
Nice job on that bass, Jake !
Goodbye Earl. Thanks for the music.
What?? Flatt didn't do too much??? They were all brilliant musicians, and they had a very special chemistry between themselves, hence a sound that will never be bettered. kind regards from Australia.
Three years late, but thanks, Straya! You're every inch as American in spirit as I am, I hope! Loving liberty, the fall of the crown and the incoming fall of the big nosed market economy that enslaves all of humanity. We shall be the pioneers of our worlds 👍
That was awesome!
the original banjo tone monster. good old Earl!
He was my fam too! My Grammy was Julia Owens Pinkerton!
Scruggs is my hero
Hey, Earl is showing off! You rarely see that! He is so cute!
Earl Scruggs was so bad ass that at 1:09 he got so bored, he started playing "Yankee Doodle" lick and still made the song sound amazing.
After learning to fly and buying his own airplane, Earl was, I guess, somewhat captivated by the 2 ways of calibrating your speed while flying: air speed and ground speed.
When he composed this tune, that was the "Ground Speed" he had in mind.
He interjected the "Yankee Doodle" lick in another song, as well: Bugle Call Rag. Probably others, too.
The lick is very prominent throughout the theme from deliverance, Dueling Banjos, but he had nothing to do with that. Arthur "Guitar Boogie" Smith composed that tune.
Tab Lature
Arthur Smith and Don Reno, a contemporary of Earl's.
@@1930Granada -- Reno may have shared credit for "Dueling Banjos", but Smith already had the thing laid down before they even got together to recorded it, originally called "Feudin' Banjos". :
"'Dueling Banjos' is an instrumental composition by Arthur "Guitar Boogie" Smith. The song was composed in 1954 by Smith as a banjo instrumental he called "Feudin' Banjos," which contained riffs from "Yankee Doodle." Smith recorded it in 1955 playing a four-string plectrum banjo and accompanied by five-string bluegrass banjo player Don Reno..."
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dueling_Banjos
I really don't believe Reno had so much to do with the composition as maybe he did with arrangement.
In fact, the very concept of "dueling/feuding/competing/whatever" instruments was nothing new with Smith, since that sort of thing had been going on for ages and across all genres. But it was the particular tune in Smith's composition, and the way it was played when recorded with Reno, that Eric Weissberg copied (as stated by Weissberg in court) that brought on the lawsuit by Smith, which he won, not Reno.
"...which also led to a successful lawsuit by the song's composer, as it was used in the film without Smith's permission." Ibid.
Yes, Josh could play difficult breaks exceedingly well. This has alot of back-to-back rolls. I'm learning "Earl's Breakdown" and it is crazy fun ! Earl wrote some great songs.
fiddle and banjo ROCKs
Ground speed is the speed over ground, vs air speed (indicated or true) is a plane's speed in the air.
I read an article where he was called the Eddy Van Halen of the banjo. 😂
wow. just wow.
everytime I hear this music I think of grandpa simpson ' they wouldn't be chasing us if you didn't have that bluegrass music on'. brilliant stuff
He takes his left hand off his banjo at 1:53 because that shit's HOT!
Of all the breaks Josh ever took, to me, this is the hardest-especially the bridge part.
I am going to learn this song on the banjo!!!!!!!!!
Cousin Jake slapped the ending right on cue! One of the most rock solid and simple bassists ever! I hear a lot of Joe Zinkan in Jake's work ! But from what I hear he was heavily influenced by Joe, Junior and some others. I'd like to turn back the clock to those days!
Yes, Joe Stead, he says it's called Ground Speed at the very first.
Yes. That is the right title.
Earl is my third cousin.. he will be missed
We loved him
Wow do you play the banjo like he did?
@@mullettjmable english
HEY EARLS MY GREAT UNCLE
We even have the same last name
Yes the title is Ground Speed. My favorite banjo tune.
Most likely on the Cas Walker Show in Knoxville in the 50s maybe early 60s
+URNsane2use Realname Flatt and Scruggs had a syndicated TV show at the height of their popularity in the mid-late 50's. This is taken from that show. It is, or was recently, available on DVD from Amazon.
Yes. This from their syndicated show. They were never on Cas Walker's show, however Dolly Parton made her debut there at about 16.
David West, a gentleman and a scholar, was the house band banjo picker when I lived in K-town. The late, great Red Rector on mandolin. Fine folks, all.
URNsane2use Realname no, that intro was by t Tommy cutrer in Nashville
I heard somewhere that they filmed this one down in Chattanooga.
Back when they dressed well with cowboy hats lol
YEAH!