Solo banjo and voice recorded on the 31st of November 2022 in Vertou, France. All songs written and performed by Elwood Stroud. Recorded at LKZ. Engineered and mixed by Pierre-Antoine Parois.

The songs here were conceived in an old stone house built in 1909 in the countryside a 10 minute walk from the Cotes Armor sea, in Brittany France.

I spent a

Solo banjo and voice recorded on the 31st of November 2022 in Vertou, France. All songs written and performed by Elwood Stroud. Recorded at LKZ. Engineered and mixed by Pierre-Antoine Parois.

The songs here were conceived in an old stone house built in 1909 in the countryside a 10 minute walk from the Cotes Armor sea, in Brittany France.

I spent a month there in between October and November. Mornings typically were spent, after getting the wood stove lit, with meanderings on the banjo as I watched through the window morning light begin to streak the sky and reflect on the trees in the field beyond.

I miss the low wooden stool that was probably once used for milking cows, but then, that’s probably taking the romanticism to a stretch. As the banjo is round, without the shapely waist of a guitar to nestle one’s knee under, it can skid around on one’s thigh, especially if you move and shake it in the ecstatic throws of a performance. So a nice low stool gives the advantage of both wedging the banjo’s head into your waist while bringing you closer to mother earth for inspiration and courage.

After coffee I’d write, and then work on the songs I had uncovered the days before. Then I’d pack a small lunch and head to the sea for a swim. Those cold water dips would have me waking in the middle of night sweating like nobody’s business, which some say is a healthy sign, I don’t know, but I started to crave that cold plunge into the clear greenish blue (no, not turquoise, that’s for warm water). It made me feel cleansed, and somehow whole with an added plus of knowing it was effort so I wasn’t slacking off. Later, in the afternoon I would put take earbuds and explore the country lanes listening to my audio notebook of what I had done that day. Work on lyrics, melodies, and feeling good. The evenings, which come early there in the Fall, were spent cooking, eating, drinking wine, reading and watching a movie. It was one of my favorite four weeks ever. I no longer have the wooden stool as it belonged to the house, which belonged to a dear dear friend of mine.

Thanks Paulline. I’ll call you in the Spring, I’ve got more material to work on.

So, how would I describe the result of that time? I was rediscovering the banjo. After having spent years with traditional Appalacian music and making it into something else while keeping its flavor, I felt I had done everything I could with that… and indeed the banjo itself. What happened I’m not quite sure, a long period away from the instrument perhaps… and coming back with completely different ideas from other explorations I had done… and tuned it differently, and it seemed to just keep on giving. I just had to show up, a lot, but that was the fun part. The goal was to take it out of the typical banjo repertoires, and use it as the stringed instrument with a snare drum for its head as it is. Much more interesting than the repertoire itself is the sound that actually comes out of the banjo.

For me, it’s a lot of droning, rhythms, phantom notes, other surprises, repetition, and other. People have asked me what do I write first, the music or the lyrics… I always think they’re joking, but then I answer that the banjo parts come first. They come out of picking it up, sitting down, and playing until something comes a long that interests me, that pulls me, and I work on that. It’s a very kinesthetic process. And the banjo It can take a long time before that original riff or piece becomes something that can stand on its own, something that I’d like to listen to. It can happen fast too. But they all change as time goes on, hopefully for the better. I keep checking which involves listening to a lot of daily recordings. Either bits of a melody comes as I play, or I have to actually write one for a piece. That takes time too. Then, the lyrics. I’ve always struggled with lyrics which is odd as I write other things nearly every day. IBut lyrics seem to important, too open for pretention, too much based on the self, or love. ’d carry my notebook with me everywhere and jot some down, even write long flurries… and even if content in the moment, a new day would shine an unforgiving sunlight on them. As the date for the recording approached, I got a bit nervous that I hadn’t all the lyrics yet, and you can’t really know a song, feel it and sing it like you should, even give it structure, until you have the lyrics, or at least I can’t. I spent days just working on structure and the lyrics started to come, and once they do, if you’re there, more come with them. I’m quite proud of these. That’s was the process for this work. I truly hope you enjoy what you hear and that it brings you something. Please reach out to tell me. I’ve got new songs coming, so I hope you’ll hear from me soon.