Gad Robinson Fairbanks

[John Cohen]

I've narrowed my choice of new banjos down to two- the Orpheum No. 3 Special I mentioned in a previous thread, and a Fairbanks Gad Robinson Grade 2 (the one currently at Bernunzio).  Does anybody have experience with the Robinson banjos?  The tonering looks similar to the Electric tone ring, but it has many more scallops and sits directly in the all-metal rim (the Electric tone ring is housed in a sheath).  It is an 11'' rim version with a 27'' scale length and 22 frets.  Both banjos are in excellent condition with straight necks; the Robinson appears to have never been played and is in mint, NOS condition.

[Jody Stecher]

A metal rim is likely to sound….how shall I put this?…..metallic. It's unlikely to sound like a spun over wood rim. I'd go for the #3. (or more likely, I'd stick with the banjo I already have,  for a good long time, at least until such time as I have until I've learned some of its secrets). 

[John Cohen]

I hear you Jody.  I really loved the sound of my Electric, but the neck was in poor shape and needed to be completely taken apart and redone.  The pearwood underlays were decaying and had to be replace, but they had already caused a nasty hump to form at the 5th fret, screwing up the action.  The Van Eps banjo I had sounded excellent as well and played well, but like I said previously I'd rather wait and see if I can pick up a flush fret one day.  A strong part of my interest in historical banjo styles is the history behind the instruments themselves (and the eras in which they were made).  This might sound kind of crazy, but the fact that the Van Eps was made in the 20s was a big turnoff to me as I have no interest in the history of fashions of this decade.  When it comes to U.S. history I'm primarily interested in the 1840s-1918 with a strong emphasis on Antebellum minstrelsy, the turn of the 20th century, and the Great War.  A 1920s Van Eps in no way satisfies my interest in this time periods like the previous two banjos I've owned ( a 1910 Tubaphone and an 1898 Electric).  To me, a 1915/1916 Orpheum or a late 1890s Robinson is more interesting and exciting than anything from the 1920s.

[Jody Stecher]

Maybe not crazy, but perhaps over-simplified. I'd say that the banjo designers of the 20s were often the same people who were designing in the 90s, aughts, and teens. By the early 20s they had solved some of the problems. From my point of view, for example,  1920s Whyte Laydies, especially the ones made while David Day was still at the helm, though visually simpler, tend to be sonically superior to the earlier ones. (On the other hand the Bacon banjos from the aughts might be the best ones). Anyway, the people who were making five string banjos were from an earlier era and the music they had in mind for their new banjos to play was the music of days gone by. the music of the 20s was played on tenor and plectrum banjos.  So perhaps it's not inaccurate to say that in the world of five -string banjo, the early 1920s took place in the aughts (1900 -1909).  an analogy is "the sixties". Much of what people remember about the 60s actually happened in the 70s, but it felt like the 60s so they remember it that way. Consider zither-banjos in the UK. The idea started in the nineteenth century  and the instrument was intended for nineteenth century music, and then for early 20th century music. But the zither-banjo designs that were the most successful happened several decades later. I mean that they were successful at being suitable (and perhaps *more* suitable) for the music of what was now an earlier era than the zither-banjos being built in that earlier era.

John Cohen said:

I hear you Jody.  I really loved the sound of my Electric, but the neck was in poor shape and needed to be completely taken apart and redone.  The pearwood underlays were decaying and had to be replace, but they had already caused a nasty hump to form at the 5th fret, screwing up the action.  The Van Eps banjo I had sounded excellent as well and played well, but like I said previously I'd rather wait and see if I can pick up a flush fret one day.  A strong part of my interest in historical banjo styles is the history behind the instruments themselves (and the eras in which they were made).  This might sound kind of crazy, but the fact that the Van Eps was made in the 20s was a big turnoff to me as I have no interest in the history of fashions of this decade.  When it comes to U.S. history I'm primarily interested in the 1840s-1918 with a strong emphasis on Antebellum minstrelsy, the turn of the 20th century, and the Great War.  A 1920s Van Eps in no way satisfies my interest in this time periods like the previous two banjos I've owned ( a 1910 Tubaphone and an 1898 Electric).  To me, a 1915/1916 Orpheum or a late 1890s Robinson is more interesting and exciting than anything from the 1920s.