Historical question about banjo strings

[Jody Stecher]

I'm finding that my recollection of the sequence and circumstances of the early use of metal strings on banjo is murky. Maybe the historians here can help.   In the 19th and early 20th century it was recommend that 5-string banjo players use violin strings. At some point the metal 1st string (E) became an option for violin and became more common than gut E.  Is this the origin of  the use by some banjo players—Joe Morley comes to mind – of the first banjo string being metal while the others were soft material?

My impression is that 4 string banjos (plectrum, tenor, and the tango banjo) were strung only with wire from the start.  Is the use of metal strings on plectrum banjos the precedent for their use of an entirely metal set of strings on 5-string banjo?  

[Jody Stecher]

No one knows?  

[Joel Hooks]

Sorry Jody, I did not see this the first time around.

RE Morley, yeah, there was a mention in the BMG about him using a wire first but he almost immediately went back to gut or tropical. 

The wire first for violin is pretty well documented.  War related shortages forced a concert violinist to use a wire first, this made it "okay" and others followed.  I don't remember the details but it would not be hard to find. 

Clifford Essex and Emile Grimshaw were both wire firsters. As manufacturers and sellers of product, it seems to me that their promotion of wire firsts were more motivated by that point of view, particularly based around war related shortages. 

I have, to my own satisfaction, concluded that there were a few factors that resulted in wire being common on the regular banjo in the US. 

1) Compromise due to climatic conditions. 

In period publications, before pick playing, using wire was only recommended when playing often outdoors or in very humid climates. 

2) Pick playing.

We start to read about pick playing in the late 1890s.  Picks are heck on gut strings.  Many early pick players would use a wire first or second.  Eventually wire won out for pick playing.

3) War caused shortages.  Gut string shortages caused by WW1 is also well documented in period publications. Better wire than nothing. 

4) Economics. 

Wire strings were cheap.  Sometimes as much as a twelfth the cost of gut. 

5) Pick playing.  Circling back to this as this is the final straw that ended gut in the US. 

Each of these cases are a compromise.  It seems that banjoists would have rather used gut if it was cheap, stood the wear of the pick, and did not break on damp days.

Nylon has solved every one of these compromises. 

[Trapdoor2]

Joel has dived into string history further than most. The gist: evolution of tech, war (causing shortages of gut and advances in metallurgy, etc.), economics & the constant evolution of the banjo to suit the ever-changing popular music scene, etc., etc.

Of course, the plectrum-banjo was just a minor variation of the 5-string. The use of hard plectra (tortoise shell) tended to wear out gut strings quickly. Early strummers (Blackface Eddie Ross, etc.) were using their bare fingers on gut prior to 1900 (in a style much like that of later Uke players of the 20s and 30s). The advent of plectrum playing also coincided (roughly) with WWI. Advances in tech allowed suitable wire to be made cheap enough to become an economical replacement for gut with "cheap" and "available" eventually outweighing "tone". I would hazard a guess that ZBs were the first to break the screen-door ceiling, specifically requiring at least two diameters of wire (1st/5th and 2nd). I've read (somewhere) that Cammeyer originally used gut/silk but at some point, went to the mixed set.

Not like there weren't wire-strung instruments before that. Mandolins and Citterns (and others, I'm sure) had metal strings for centuries prior to banjos...

So, I wouldn't characterize plectrum playing as a "precedent". Wire strings were available for the 5-string before the Plectrum became popular. The resistance to change (inertia) from the established norms is very strong...but not as strong as Econ 101. Supply and Demand rules. Evolution is slow. Neanderthals like me enjoy using gut, simply for putting the "baa" back into the Baanjo.

[Jody Stecher]

Thanks Joel and Marc.  This clears up quite a bit for me. A question remains: how did the wire first string come to be used as the only metal string on a 5-string banjo?

My speculation is that it came about because some banjo players were using violin strings and when the wire 1st was what was available that's what they put on their banjo. But I may be anachronistic and/or Just Plain Wrong.

[Joel Hooks]

I don't think the violin has anything to do with it-- having its own parallel situation, shortage caused by WW1. 

Also, Cammeyer was using wire in the 1880s (as were others as they were for sale). 

The evidence suggests that the first was replaced with wire because gut or silk firsts break.  FVE would break them on stage and keep some in his pocket to replace them.

Breakage was a problem and is why we see all the "no knot" or Cooks Suregrip patent tailpieces that make stringing faster.

Add to that war caused shortages and the humidity of England-- it is pretty easy to see the reason. 

I also believe that one of the reasons the Zither Banjo was so popular in England was due to the small head (less affected by humidity) and wire strings (don't break, only rust). 

[Jody Stecher]

I see. Sort of. The puzzle for me is why only the first string was metal. Why not the 5th or other strings?  I suspected the violin because of the parallel situation of only one string being wire.  But maybe this is a coincidence. 

By the way, wire strings do break. Their favorite breakage occasion is on an instrument as it is being played in concert, especially if the gig is of some importance to the player.  Their favorite breakage point is pretty much anywhere. They  break at the nut, at the tailpiece, on both sides of the  bridge, and anywhere between the nut and bridge.  They break from contact with acidic fingers, jagged picks, rough spots wherever the bridge makes contact with something, and for no apparent reason. Sometimes they break just sitting on a stand or laying in a case.

The most dramatic wire string breakage I have witnessed was when Scottish fiddler Alasdair Fraser borrowed my fiddle and bow.  He bowed so vigorously that he  sawed my wire 1st string in half. 

Joel Hooks said:

I don't think the violin has anything to do with it-- having its own parallel situation, shortage caused by WW1. 

Also, Cammeyer was using wire in the 1880s (as were others as they were for sale). 

The evidence suggests that the first was replaced with wire because gut or silk firsts break.  FVE would break them on stage and keep some in his pocket to replace them.

Breakage was a problem and is why we see all the "no knot" or Cooks Suregrip patent tailpieces that make stringing faster.

Add to that war caused shortages and the humidity of England-- it is pretty easy to see the reason. 

I also believe that one of the reasons the Zither Banjo was so popular in England was due to the small head (less affected by humidity) and wire strings (don't break, only rust). 

[Jody Stecher]

.....and since the thin 1st string was more subject to breakage than the others that would explain why it and only it was replaced with wire by the players mentioned. The 5th string was the same or similar diameter as the 1st but was not being constantly pressed upon by fingertips, which were sometimes sweaty or corrosive. 

[Trapdoor2]

I have suspicions regarding the talk about the 1st string being first.

My favorite excuse: they may have simply not mentioned the 5th as "everybody knows, you use the same string on both". This sort of exclusion is very common in historical texts. Lots of info/things are "lost" as the unidentified thing may have been so common that nobody gave it a second thought.

Wire tech has changed a lot in just the last 120 yrs. We have an astounding number of choices. Our ability to control alloys at the molecular level is unprecedented. We can wrap wire in nanotech plastic/carbon/unobtanium, plate it with rare earths, have it infused with the sweat of your favorite player, etc. You can buy wound strings with round cores or hexagonal. Windings can be of anything under the Sun.

I prefer Nickel Silver over Italian Smurf entrails. Great for the Blues...

[Jody Stecher]

It seems to have been a fairly common "deviation" to use a slightly bigger gauge for the 5th than the 1st. 

Trapdoor2 said:

I have suspicions regarding the talk about the 1st string being first.

My favorite excuse: they may have simply not mentioned the 5th as "everybody knows, you use the same string on both". This sort of exclusion is very common in historical texts. Lots of info/things are "lost" as the unidentified thing may have been so common that nobody gave it a second thought.

Wire tech has changed a lot in just the last 120 yrs. We have an astounding number of choices. Our ability to control alloys at the molecular level is unprecedented. We can wrap wire in nanotech plastic/carbon/unobtanium, plate it with rare earths, have it infused with the sweat of your favorite player, etc. You can buy wound strings with round cores or hexagonal. Windings can be of anything under the Sun.

I prefer Nickel Silver over Italian Smurf entrails. Great for the Blues...

[Joel Hooks]

One is much harder on the 1st string than the 5th.

For some British arguments for and against, I recommend the BMG's from during the Great war.  Start with the 1917 year and then work backwards.  Lots and lots of articles.  Pretty much every issue has something. 

[Jody Stecher]

And that might be an argument for a heavier first rather than fifth. But I never heard of that. Anyway the problem I have with consulting random BMGs is that unlike the tutor books there is no apparent way of perusing them here on this website. One must download them onto one's device where eventually they take up space and must be deleted. It's not that hard but also not convenient.  So far I haven't found any 5th string arguments in 1917 or 1916 but I am guessing instead of being methodical.

Joel Hooks said:

One is much harder on the 1st string than the 5th.

For some British arguments for and against, I recommend the BMG's from during the Great war.  Start with the 1917 year and then work backwards.  Lots and lots of articles.  Pretty much every issue has something. 

[Jody Stecher]

However I have found discussions about gut, metal, and "tropical" strings.  (Rayon?) in a 1917 BMG

Jody Stecher said:

And that might be an argument for a heavier first rather than fifth. But I never heard of that. Anyway the problem I have with consulting random BMGs is that unlike the tutor books there is no apparent way of perusing them here on this website. One must download them onto one's device where eventually they take up space and must be deleted. It's not that hard but also not convenient.  So far I haven't found any 5th string arguments in 1917 or 1916 but I am guessing instead of being methodical.

Joel Hooks said:

One is much harder on the 1st string than the 5th.

For some British arguments for and against, I recommend the BMG's from during the Great war.  Start with the 1917 year and then work backwards.  Lots and lots of articles.  Pretty much every issue has something.