[Dixielandjazz] So what's wrong with banjos, huh!

[Bill Gunter]

Hi all (herewith arguments with which many of you will find fault),

Craig Johnson writes:

>When you have a good(!) banjo player they are a pleasure
>to hear, and I've been lucky enough to play with a few.

Isn't it true that the same thing could be said for any instrument?

But nobody ever says:

"When you have a good(!) violin player they are a pleasure to hear"

or

"When you have a good(!) piano player they are a pleasure to hear"

or

"When you have a good(!) cornet player they are a pleasure to hear"

Ok ok ok ok

But you get my point . . . there seems to be an automatic reaction that 
banjos are somehow inferior and/or unlistenable and/or annoying and/or not a 
standard musical instrument . . .  blah blah blah - yada yada yada.

So -

If any of you have some compelling argument as to why a banjo is only 
acceptable when played by a "good" player (as opposed to all other regular 
players?) please offer it here.

Or, lacking such an cogent proposition, please provide me with a list 
reasons why a banjo is less than acceptable than, say, a trumpet or a piano 
or a bagpipe (well, maybe not a bagpipe).

Craig's sentence  - "When you have a good(!) banjo player they are (sic) a 
pleasure to hear . . ." - while ostemsibly offered in support of the 
instrument, it is, in fact, a slap at the instrument because it implies 
rather strongly that unless the performer is unusually gifted the instrument 
has no merit.

Now I know that Craig really didn't mean that . . . but the nuances of our 
language are pretty subtle and Craig's sentence, in street language, really 
means "banjos normally suck."

Cheers,

Bill "I got your banjo right here" Gunter
jazzboard at hotmail.com

ps - actually I think a bagpipe should be included.