Click on the button below to get the PDF download for this tab delivered to you, and get 2 new tunes and tabs sent to you every week!
In the last installment with the song “Coming Round the Mountain,” I talked about 7 ways can transform a tune you know with some simple alterations.
Like viewing a statue from another angle, doing so can sometimes completely alter your perception of it.
Like Jeff Buckley’s sweeter re-imagining of Leonard Cohen’s dirge-like “Hallelulah,” or Hendrix’s cover of Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower,” a different take on a song can make it resonate with ears that previously hadn’t taken notice of it.
This has happened to me on numerous occasions over the years, where a new spin on a traditional tune I’d heard dozens of times a certain way caused it to suddenly strike my attention.
Interestingly, that new perspective usually changes, and enhances, your appreciation of the original. Yet more evidence that our perceptions say more about us than they do about the thing being perceived.
For years, “Johnson Boys” had been one of those tunes I’d play occasionally in a jam, but would rarely make it into my personal playing rotation.
That changed when I came across a version of it by Josh Ellis and Eddie Bond off their wonderful album “John Brown’s Dream.” Slowed and tuned down for that recorded, I heard a side of it I’d missed before, transforming it from forgettable to favorite.
Not surprisingly, I borrowed liberally for the version you hear today!
Johnson Boys
gDGBD tuning (tuned low on the gourd banjo), Brainjo level 3
Notes on the Tab
In this arrangement, I’ve tabbed out the part I play in the banjo “solo,” as well as the vocal backup I play on the banjo while singing.
Notes in parentheses are “skip” notes – to learn more about skips and syncopated skips, check out my video lesson on the subject.
For more on reading tabs in general, check out this complete guide to reading banjo tabs.
PRIOR SONG OF THE WEEK EPISODES
- Episode 1: “Ain’t Gonna Work Tomorrow”
- Episode 2: “Gumtree Canoe”
- Episode 3: “Crawdad Hole”
- Episode 4: “Oh Susanna”
- Episode 5: “Freight Train”
- Episode 6: “Grandfather’s Clock”
- Episode 7: “Hop High Lulu”
- Episode 8: “Been All Around This World”
- Episode 9: “I’ll Fly Away”
- Episode 10: “Leaving Home”
- Episode 11: “Poor Orphan Child”
- Episode 12: “Mr. Tambourine Man”
- Episode 13: “Swanee River”
- Episode 14: “Big Sciota”
- Episode 15: “Roll In My Sweet Baby’s Arms”
- Episode 16: “Darling Corey”
- Episode 17: “Battle Hymn of the Republic”
- Episode 18: “America the Beautiful”
- Episode 19: “Bury Me Beneath the Willow”
- Episode 20: “Way Out There”
- Episode 21: “New Slang”
- Episode 22: “I Saw the Light”
- Episode 23: “Amazing Grace”
- Episode 24: “Blowin’ in the Wind”
- Episode 25: “Yankee Doodle”
- Episode 26: “Budapest”
- Episode 27: “Wildwood Flower”
- Episode 28: “Paradise”
- Episode 29: “Mountain Dew”
- Episode 30: “Blue Tail Fly”
- Episode 31: “Otto Wood”
- Episode 32: “Down on the Corner”
- Episode 33: “City of New Orleans”
- Episode 34: “Big Rock Candy Mountains”
- Episode 35: “Come to the Bower”
- Episode 36: “Old Kentucky Home”
- Episode 37: “Long Journey Home”
- Episode 38: “Dixie”
- Episode 39: “Hard Times”
- Episode 40: “Corrina Corrina”
- Episode 41: “She’ll Be Coming Round the Mountain”
Level 2 arrangements and video demos for the Tune (and Song!) of the Week tunes are now available as part of the Breakthrough Banjo course.
Click here for a current list of all the clawhammer songs and tunes currently available inside of The Vault
View the Brainjo Course Catalog
