Banjo bridge notches

[John Dallas]

Hello, Forum!

I'm just in the process of fitting new bridges to two banjos. One banjo is an open-back strung with nylon throughout, the other a zither-banjo with nylon 3rd and 4th strings and the rest steel. I'm using bridge blanks, so I can cut the notches myself.

So my question to you luthiers is, what shape should the notch on the bridge be - especially in the case of the thick, nylon 3rd string?

I've thought of a V-shaped groove cut with a knife or chisel; or a square-sectioned groove, e.g a cut with an appropriately thick saw-blade; or a half-round groove with the same radius as the string, cut with a rat-tail file. Would any of those methods achieve a good result - or none of the above?

Cheers,
John

[Stephen Neal Saqui]

John,
1. First thing to know is the notches should be shallow, NOT deep. But just deep enough that they don't pop out of the slot when you play.
2. A small fine file is best. Use the sharp edge for thin strings and a round edge for the wound or fat strings. You could also use a sharp knife...but keep reading...!
3. Angle the file back a bit, say 25 degrees from horizontal. The strings should sit on an edge in the slot that is on the front side of the bridge...the side that faces the head.
4. The idea is that the plucked note should have a clean sound, not a hissing or buzzy sound.

I doubt that the zither-banjo should have nylon strings on the 3rd & forth. Those should be wound steel strings.
Best to take the instruments to a shop where "folkies" or Old Time music folks hang out...If you find that crowd someone will know what you need in the way of strings. The open back banjo could very well have nylon or steel. If it's a fretless banjo, all the more reason to have nylon.
Hope that helps.

[John Dallas]

Stephen,
thanks for the tips!
I'd heard that one about sloping the file to get a clear cut-off for the string. It was good to be reminded that the notches should only as deep as absolutely necessary. So a saw-cut is not optimal ...

As to the strings: I doubt whether American folkies or OT folks would have much to say about zither-banjos - they're a very British thing. The old English banjo tutors I have in my possession - by Herbert Ellis and Emile Grimshaw - state clearly that the zither-banjo has wire 1st, 2nd and 5th, the 3rd and 4th being gut and silver wound on silk, respectively. And that translates to plain nylon 3rd and wound nylon 4th nowadays! The Clifford Essex company in East Anglia sells sets of strings in this combination specifically for zither-banjos. I play Windsor and Dallas zither-banjos, and both play and sound well with the mixed steel/nylon string sets.

Of course, the better the strings contact with the bridge, the better they sound - hence my question!

Cheers,
John

[Stephen Neal Saqui]

John, Thanks for in info on the zither-banjo. I thought it was one of those odd-ball instruments from the 20's that almost nobody plays. I stand corrected!

All the best,
Stephen

[John Dallas]

Stephen,
You mean, like a Ukelin?
No, the zither-banjo is functionally just another 5-string banjo, but with a few peculiarities. First, the short 5th string runs from the 5th fret under the fingerboard in a tunnel to the peghead, so there's no side peg in the way of your thumb when going up the neck. And since 5 pegs look a bit unbalanced, they usually have guitar tuners, with one machine unused.
Then there's the pot: it's more like a resonator, with the tone ring and tension ring set inside it on brackets. This gives the zither-banjo more sustain than an "Ordinary Banjo", or even a resonator banjo, so you can play more legato on it. That's why it was the weapon of choice for the English banjo virtuosos of the decades around 1900. And the steel high strings give it more presence than the then usual gut. I mostly play classical arrangements of art-song tunes on mine, or use it for song accompaniment.
Here's one I restored some time ago (a Windsor No. 5):

Cheers,
John

[Stephen Neal Saqui]

John,
You know, sometimes one gets to thinking he's seen it all, but I've never seen one of these come through my shops in 45 years! How can that be? But you can bet I'm gonna pass this on to my banjo friends...I hope to hear one too, some day.

Thank you! ....just made my day!

[Jon Whitney]

And here I thought that the British simply didn't know how to build banjos the correct way

[Stephen Neal Saqui]

John,
I just came from looking at the zither-banjo website. Are there current makers? It's certainly not that difficult to make the necks that way. This summer I'm going to share this with a good friend who's a banjo nut. He loves Bluegrass but also likes to play all kinds of music...he's a snowbird and in the summer we get together frequently to eat and pick. I'd like to see how the pot is made. Got any photos of one assembled and apart?

[John Dallas]

And here I thought that the British simply didn't know how to build banjos the correct way

Well, back in the 19th century, they did build ordinary banjos. But then a young American by the name of Alfred Cammeyer came over, pedling his new invention, the zither-banjo. Apparently the British professional banjoists liked it, and the British manufacturers (several of them) saw a market for it, so it caught in the UK. For some reason, it didn't catch on in Cammeyer's native USA, so it remained a British phenomenon.

AFAIK, any UK banjo manufacturers nowadays cater mainly for the Bluegrass community, building resonator banjos. I have seen a couple of Eastern European banjo-mandolins or ukulele-banjos built on the zither-banjo principle, but no new full-scale 5-strings. Classic banjo playing is a niche, and there are enough good vintage zither-banjos to go round.

@Stephen: The zither-banjo is not really suitable for one-off handcrafting. The main feature is the "bezel", which is made of cast metal, and is a combination of tone-ring and tension-hoop with brackets for attachment to the pot. So you'd have to involve an iron foundry in the process. The wooden pot has to be made to fit snugly round it.

Cheers,
John