Banjolele too loud for uke Clubs?

Alleyoop

Member
Joined
Mar 25, 2016
Messages
9
Reaction score
0
Location
Courtenay, BC, Canada
I run a successful uke club on Vancouver Island. I have discouraged the use of banjoleles because of their 'loudness'. This has upset some folk. The hall we play in is quite large ... there are about 50 of us and the room does fill up. Should I relent and permit banjoleles or stay firm in avoiding them?
 
My wife's banjo uke is open backed and she sticks some material in there to calm it down. Maybe better to encourage people to listen to each other and complement the overall sound than to ban some instruments.
 
If you are running a club for ukulele players then it should be for ukuleles only. Banjos are not ukuleles, even if they do have the same scale length and the same tuning. The sound of a banjo is not compatible with ukuleles. Even when damped down to reduce the excessive volume, banjos have a penetrating, "clacky" quality which is quite out of character in company with ukuleles.

I can't understand why anyone would object to being asked to use a ukulele at a ukulele club. Even if their intention is mainly to play the banjo, outside of the club, it is not a big imposition to be expected to buy a cheap soprano ukulele to use on ukulele club nights. If I were organising a ukulele club, I would keep a couple of cheapies handy for loaning to any itinerant banjo players who might turn up.

John Colter.
 
Sometimes I wish our club could require people to pass an examination before they get to play banjo ukes:

  • Do you know how to play this thing softly?
  • Do you understand the stylistic difference between Hello Ma Baby, Hello Ma Honey, Hello Ma Ragtime Gal and Michelle, Ma Belle?
  • Can you stay on beat? Seriously.
Of course I don't really want to play in a group that requires banjo licensing. Heck, an hour from now I'm headed off to uke club with my Firefly. I hasten to add that a Firefly is a nicely-behaved open-back banjo uke that is not hard to tame and blends very nicely with other ukes if you play it with any sense whatsoever.

What you might try is pick a meeting and call it "Banjo Uke Night" and encourage everyone who has one to bring it. If that night is a disaster, it might convince the people whose noses are out of joint. If it turns out mostly ok, then you might as well let the banjos in.

If it's only a few players who are too loud, maybe your club has respected leaders with good social skills who can take someone aside and gently suggest how to stuff a sock in it (literally or figuratively).

Now if we could just deal with the resonator ukes and the guitars. :cool:
 
The Uke Club that I attend does allow Banjo Ukes but I have mixed feelings about them. When there’s a limited number and they are played well by experts then they do add to the evening. However they can drown out other players (rather than support them) and if played badly then they put others off or confuse. To further confuse the issue Banjo Ukes come in different sizes and loudness, but perhaps what’s most important is how much sound (limit of) should any one player be allowed to generate. Maybe a halfway house here is to allow, on individual request and agreement between the leaders and member, Soprano Banjo Ukes (only). Personal amplification of a standard Uke isn’t allowed and that principle of broad equity of sound output works for us, YMMV.
 
Last edited:
Mine is a closed back resonator one and it is LOUD. When I was running a ukulele group myself I never took it along. In fact it's languishing in the loft just now because I find it too loud to sing over. I know someone who brought one to an open mic because it was loud enough without plugging it in as the previous time she'd had problems with the mics for voice and uke being too close together leading to problems with feedback.

I think you are probably right to at least discourage people from bringing them though you might consider saying OK if they show they can moderate them and reserve the right to ask them not bring them again if they don't act sensibly.
 
So many things can go wrong, I would just avoid it. It's an ukulele club; if they want to play banjoleles let them form their own banjolele club.
 
My group has several people that own banjo-Ike’s. They don’t bring them often and generally control them. Only on rare occasions has one been overbearing. I say let them play but tell them to respect the songs and the other players. We are a pretty loose group. One guy even brought a.......Mandolin!!!
 
If you are running a club for ukulele players then it should be for ukuleles only. Banjos are not ukuleles, even if they do have the same scale length and the same tuning. The sound of a banjo is not compatible with ukuleles. Even when damped down to reduce the excessive volume, banjos have a penetrating, "clacky" quality which is quite out of character in company with ukuleles.

I can't understand why anyone would object to being asked to use a ukulele at a ukulele club. Even if their intention is mainly to play the banjo, outside of the club, it is not a big imposition to be expected to buy a cheap soprano ukulele to use on ukulele club nights. If I were organising a ukulele club, I would keep a couple of cheapies handy for loaning to any itinerant banjo players who might turn up.

John Colter.

They are not banjos, they are banjo ukes, or to give them their correct name, ukulele banjos.
Perhaps allowing them 15 or 20 minutes on club night might be the way to go. Just banning them sounds a bit draconian.
 
I play bass uke and a mandolele, should I be banned because they're not a ukulele, should concert, tenor or baritone ukes be banned because they're not a soprano ukulele? Our group has two banjolele players, one is good, the other not so much. Both are definitely heard over the other ukes, but no one complains, especially since our leader is always amped playing and singing, plus another member and I both play amped bass ukes.

I say just ask the banjolele players to control their volume, I mean the general consensus is ukulele groups are an ohana, so be inclusive rather than exclusive. I just joined a Meetup group that meets in a park and encourages any acoustic instrument; guitar, ukulele, mandolin, harmonica, cajon.
 
It depends entirely on the type of ukulele group you attend. I've been to groups where the purpose seems to be for everyone to strum chords and the melody is entirely carried by the vocal. In some of these groups, folks don't really want to learn an awful lot, but are quite happy learning a few chords and singing along. Banjoleles usually work fine in these groups.

In other groups, people want to learn instrumental tunes and like working out duets and trios, learning the uke as a serious instrument. In this case, it's often important for the volume to be balanced and often for the tone and timbre to be matched as well.

I have enjoyed attending both of these types of clubs, but would not take a banjolele unless I had a particular reason for using it. In any case, if I can take only one instrument it will be wooden ukulele.
 
Last edited:
"They are not banjos, they are banjo ukes, or to give them their correct name, ukulele banjos.
Perhaps allowing them 15 or 20 minutes on club night might be the way to go. Just banning them sounds a bit draconian."

We all know what is a banjo. Tuning a banjo the same as a ukulele does not make it a ukulele. If I were to tune a ukulele the same way as a banjo - would that make it a banjo?
 
It never ceases to surprise me, people join a club/group dedicated to a particular interest, then attempt to change/subvert the groups activities to suit their own interest/requirements.

I've seen clubs fold because of members causing disharmony in an attempt to get their own way.

Sadly it comes down to having an all encompassing constitution with I's dotted and t's crossed, without one your fighting an uphill battle, human nature.:mad:
 
"They are not banjos, they are banjo ukes, or to give them their correct name, ukulele banjos.
Perhaps allowing them 15 or 20 minutes on club night might be the way to go. Just banning them sounds a bit draconian."

We all know what is a banjo. Tuning a banjo the same as a ukulele does not make it a ukulele. If I were to tune a ukulele the same way as a banjo - would that make it a banjo?
A banjo and a ukulele banjo are totally different instruments, but no doubt classing them the same suits your narrative.
 
Agree with DPO. It's a banjo ukulele, not a banjo. Try telling a banjo player that your soprano is a banjo, see how that goes over. Or for that matter try taking a banjolele to a bluegrass jam and see how that goes.
 
I am having trouble seeing how banjo ukes can cause a problem when surrounded by 50 uke players. Perhaps you could allow ukes, but limit the number of them that play at any one time...kind of like basses. Perhaps you could require mutes as some have suggested. My personal experience as one who also plays banjo uke in a group is there has never been a problem, but then I do not find it difficult to strum it softly enough so as to not be overbearing. (hope my English teacher isn't looking down on that last sentence, LOL) I also don't think it's cool to just ban them outright. I could strum my Martin or Kamaka hard and loud enough to cause the same problem you are trying to avoid. One last idea.....identify certain songs on your list as "banjo appropriate" and let them take the lead. Sorry, no more thoughts on the matter.
 
We all know what is a banjo. Tuning a banjo the same as a ukulele does not make it a ukulele. If I were to tune a ukulele the same way as a banjo - would that make it a banjo?

If you really want to be like that call it a soprano banjo if it makes you happy.

in truth, the banjo ukulele is something of a hybrid but it's generally accepted as a variant of a ukulele.

Call it what you like but accept that the overwhelming majority treat it as a form of ukulele.
 
Well, it's your club & you decide the rules. :)

If they want to play banjo, fine, but it's not a uke, it has a skin resonator, as against wooden, I know, you're going to say that plastic isn't wood either, but it looks the same & has an approximation of the same sound qualities, whereas a banjo uke has a totally different, usually quite raucous, sound.

Take a secret vote of your members if you can't decide.

(I'd keep them for playing at home, if I ever got one, but that isn't very likely. ;) )
 
A banjo uses a skin (or similar diaphragm) stretched over a hoop. It is, in essence, a drum on a stick. The ukulele is very different. If there were no problem in accepting small banjos at ukulele gatherings then the OP would not have needed to ask the question. Quite clearly there is a problem, and my suggestion that a club should keep a couple of "loaners", for anybody who turns up with a banjo, is reasonable and not unfriendly.

Any banjo player who objects to playing a ukulele at a ukulele club is not being reasonable. Whether or not small banjos are accepted where other banjos are played is not relevant.
 
I run a successful uke club on Vancouver Island. I have discouraged the use of banjoleles because of their 'loudness'. This has upset some folk. The hall we play in is quite large ... there are about 50 of us and the room does fill up. Should I relent and permit banjoleles or stay firm in avoiding them?

The original post doesn’t mention banjos only banjoleles (whilst similar they are also different instruments) so, to me, talking about banjos too doesn’t really help the OP. I hope that that is fair comment.

As I read comments so far the consensus seems to be that moderate use is tolerable and in the spirit of Ohana or family (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohana). For what it’s worth I stick with the view that banjoleles should be by invitation only, to me it should be a priveldge awarded to appropriate players rather than a right - in short quite controlled use might be OK.

As for the upset of people perhaps it’s simply best to explain the logic behind the descision to restrict the use of instruments other than Ukes (overly loud banjoleles spoil the meeting for other people), it’s not wilfully being mean to anyone but rather being fair to everyone. That there isn’t a right to play a banjolele in a Uke group and that to do so is a priveldege awarded by those that run the group and then only awarded with reservations. If you don’t feel strong or supported enough to control and moderate the use of banjoleles then I think that it would be best, simplest and fairest if you stayed firm in avoiding them and sticking to Ukes only in a Uke group.
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom