u/Translator_Fine

Bela Fleck played it wrong. It's not in C minor or E flat. It's in E flat minor or G flat. How do I know this? Well Gershwin most likely grew up listening to Classic banjo records. It's not like he was naive to the fact that banjos were transposed at the time. The evidence I have? Well one of the notes goes down to low A on the manuscript, a lot of the E flats are made natural which suits the fifth string on a five string banjo in A notation. Gershwin was more likely to use black key tonalities rather than keys like C minor because of their bluesy flavor. When he wrote this he was clearly thinking of people like Fred Van Epps. Bela Said he was thinking of a plectrum or tenor but that's not the case. The manuscript is clearly written for five string. Any questions?

Yes I know, AI image. Just ignore that for a second. It's cringe I know but I think these are getting better and more controlled as time goes on. I've gained such control that my fingers barely move to create differences in texture, even if it sounds like "random flailing" It's starting to become a language with its own logic.

My first ballad.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1o8-IneuPfQdOdTbPL4YWptHlfOJVbRI-/view?usp=drivesdk

https://on.soundcloud.com/nHEyGar5rgW0OZWW7g

It's not an exact manuscript because I improvise around my manuscripts but it's pretty damn close.

https://musescore.com/user/28785038/scores/33708515?share=copy\_link

I wrote this as a little warm up for a piano trio to practice to.