Comment by Jody Stecher on December 7, 2015 at 23:26

And you know, Chris, whenever I play St Louis Tickle I want to slow down the second part because to my sensibilities Morton is playing it at optimum speed. Maybe some time I'll try the Tickle all the way through slow like this. Next time I make a banjo video I'm gonna have to get me a red flannel undershirt and open all my shirt buttons. 

Comment by F. Chris Ware on December 7, 2015 at 23:39

Ha! "They sure liked those red flannel undershirts." I always wondered what the secret to love was in 1890s New Orleans.

Plus, at 78rpm, isn't the Ossman-Dudley recording in "D"? Sort of weird for fingerstyle banjo. I've sometimes wondered if Victor sped up the recording transfer to get it to fit on the disc, or something (if that was even possible.) Then again, maybe Ossman and Farmer (wasn't it William Farmer?) just tuned up to suit the harp guitar, which is full of sympathetic drone strings, if my understanding of them is correct. If one slows down the record a bit to get the key to C it's at least not so sob-inducing to try to keep up with if one is playing along. Plus it sounds a little less, well, sharp.

Then again, Ossman's solo recordings of it also appear to be in D, so maybe he just played it in that key and I will always be a terrible fingerstyle banjoist.

Comment by F. Chris Ware on December 7, 2015 at 23:42

Or Ossman just tuned up a step for "brilliance's sake," as we sometimes read about banjoists doing.

Comment by Jody Stecher on December 8, 2015 at 1:12

On the two recordings I've heard of Ossman playing SLT the pitch on the average playback machine is just south of D on the one where he's backed up by an orchestra. On the trio recording the pitch is squarely between E flat and E natural. The speed of the recording with the *lower* pitch is faster that the trio recording, and the latter is the one which has the higher pitch. Both sound  natural in tone quality. The sound of the harp guitar is unearthly.  The other instrument is a mandolin or mandolin banjo. Do you think it was played by Farmer instead of Audley Dudley? Stranger things have happened. The harp guitar has extra bass strings that had no fingerboard below them. The idea was to extend the bass range lower than an ordinary guitar goes. But as strings get lower the harmonics/upper partials that it gives off are easier to hear. So anytime a pitch is played on the main playing strings it is reinforced by the overtones of the open low strings. Sympathetic strings and drone strings are two different things, both of which are found on some string instruments in India, such as sitar. But they operate differently. They are tuned high. When their exact pitch is played on the melody strings they will resonate sympathetically. But… and this is the interesting part…. when a low pitch is played on the fingerboard of the instrument (sitar or whatever) sometimes its own upper partials are reinforced by the high tuned sympathetic strings which start to sing and ring and ping. So for instance if you played a C, the same pitch as the low string of a 5-string banjo, you might hear a response from a sympathetic string tuned  at E natural three octaves higher (the note you'd get at fret 14 of the first string). this is kind of the opposite of what happens on a harp guitar.  Drone strings, on the other hand, are like the 5th string on a banjo. They are actually plucked with the right hand.

Comment by F. Chris Ware on December 8, 2015 at 1:50

Well, that constitutes by far the best and most interesting explanation of a harp guitar and the difference between drone and sympathetic strings I know I’ve read. And you’re right — I was lazily pairing the Ossman Banjo Trio (which included Bill Farmer) with the much better known Ossman Dudley-Trio (which did not.) Sorry — very sloppy thinking and typing before dinner.

Comment by Jody Stecher on December 8, 2015 at 2:28

I find I am able to think sloppily even after dinner. And during as well. 

Comment by Shawn McSweeny on December 18, 2015 at 21:44

The mystery man's face is narrower, eyebrows are heavier, his nose is longer, his lips broader, ears large but less protrusive and his eyes larger, darker and angled downward.

Sorry, but there's no credible resemblance.

Comment by RitonMousquetaire on December 19, 2015 at 16:40

This film of Ossman is fascinating. I've read several books about the history of early sound films, but I don't remember reading anything about the company that is mentioned at the beginning of that one, "R&E singing pictures". I'll look into them again, in case I missed some important informations. The only thing I could come up with on google are some patents : http://www.google.com/patents/US1777418

Apparently a certain Harrison W. Rogers (the R in the company's name maybe?) was the one that developed the devices that were probably selled by the "R&E singing pictures". From the patents and the fact that the film is presented here without sound (and was clearly not shot at  24fps), we can be almost certain that it was a sound-on-disc process, unlike the other films in the compilation (that were all DeForest sound films I think). The sound on the Ossman film was probably recorded directly, it would have been too complex to present an instrumental number in such a manner, especially if we look at the fact that he stops, move in front of the camera (closer to the microphone maybe?) and starts playing again. The patents date from 1918; the first sucessful attempts to make films with directly recorded sound date from 1910 (Gaumont in France and Edison in the United States); so we can assume that this Ossman film was made between 1910 and 1923 (if we assume that it's Ossman playing here, but if we look at the photographs that were posted here I think it is the case).

Alas, as too often with early sound-on-disc films, the sound part is probably lost... Unless the sound we hear on the youtube video corresponds to that film (but would then be very poorly synchronised). I don't know which archive preserves the film part, they may have more informations. The compilation is of quite bad quality, it looks like it comes from a tape... It would be great to find the original sound. At least there is a 1921 film of Van Eps that survives entirely, with both film and disc.

Comment by Chris Cioffi on December 23, 2015 at 3:39

Hi Benjamin-I think I speak for all here in welcoming you and also saying that we would help you with any insight you may find interesting from our banjo mindedness (there are a few collectors of this sort of banjo info and artifacts here), as well as welcome any information you are willing to share about your descendants and their involvement with the banjo....both professionally or personally....memories, stories, etc....

I will say that possibly this is where Chris W's pictures came from, but a few years ago, on the famous (infamous) auction site, I think around 2001 if memory serves....several auction lots of Ossman family heirlooms, pictures, artifacts, documents, etc....were found in an abandoned storage facility in St. Louis (where I believe Vess Sr. is buried at Valhala Cemetery), and auctioned off in several lots.

I was financially embarrassed at the time, but I know of 2 collectors who paid.....pretty well...for some of these things.....pictures of Vess Sr. and Jr., paper documents, and other things. 

I could be mistaken, but I don't remember any actual banjos or banjo accessories being in these auctions.

Of course, we are all curious about what happened to their instruments, and would love to know how they set them up, etc....

Shawn-I think you will find, if you look at that video as much as I have, that that is a 13" Orpheum either No. 3 or Brass Band.

No banjo on your list would have a fretboard extension, or be a raised head.  Look at the peghead shape and inlay.

There is no doubt that is Vess Sr.  Pictures of him later in his life look a lot different in the face than his younger pictures and he does look "skinnier" later in life....just like in the video.

Merry Christmas

Comment by Chris Cioffi on December 23, 2015 at 4:06

I think it's safe to say this film is later than 1906, which would be after Vess Sr. endorsed/commented on the Bacon banjos.

Shirley Spaulding endorsed Orpheum Banjos, and the story I heard, is that Vega offered her 2 Whyte Laydie No. 7's  if she'd leave Orpheum, and return to playing Vega WL's, which she was not willing to do for whatever reason.  I have seen an earlier picture of her earlier a Whyte Laydie No 2 before she played the Orpheums.

My point is that the film being later than the known Bacon/Ossman connection, and Orpheum/Lange (Bill Bowen and Paramount) courting 5 string players as endorsees, AND Vess obviously "taking" endorsements over the years with other brands, it seem logical besides what I see in the video to think that this is an Orpheum banjo as I proposed in the previous post.

I borrowed a friend's 13" Orpheum No. 3 for a while, and even with a poor set up, years of neglect, and fishing line for strings, it sounded.....pretty incredible.....and pretty much looked exactly like the one Vess is playing in the video.

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