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Select Cities. Heads up. There's

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Hey everyone, you're listening

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to Code Switch. I'm B.A. Parker.

0:30

That still sounds bad. Wait.

0:32

So, I'm learning how to

0:34

play the banjo. Be kind,

0:36

I'm not great, and I've

0:39

been getting some guff about

0:41

it. You'd be surprised at

0:43

the amount of attention

0:46

one gets as a black

0:48

woman commuting on the subway

0:50

with a banjo on her

0:53

back. It's mostly older

0:55

white guys, telling me

0:57

to keep up the

1:00

good work. Like they're

1:02

passing this baton that's

1:04

inherently theirs and to

1:06

be honest, that's what

1:08

learning it at home was

1:10

feeling like I mean

1:12

there's still real work

1:15

in progress people I

1:17

mean there's YouTube

1:19

tutorials galore, but

1:21

they're mainly white guys

1:23

teaching how to be

1:26

the next Ralph Stanley you

1:28

know slow but I'll get

1:31

it as slow as

1:33

I can. That's made

1:35

learning how to play

1:37

the banjo a bit lonely.

1:40

Come on down folks!

1:42

So when I finally

1:44

sought out community I

1:47

didn't know it would

1:49

lead me to a

1:51

banjo toss or rather

1:54

the banjo toss.

1:59

What? is 2024 Banjo Toss.

2:01

It's this absurdist event

2:03

at the Brooklyn Folk Festival

2:06

where competitors toss a

2:08

banjo on a long rope

2:10

into the Guantas canal. The

2:16

person who throws it farthest

2:18

wins free dinner and a

2:20

show. Now, I didn't do

2:22

the toss. I was there

2:24

to spectate and mingle. I

2:26

play a banjo yoke. A

2:28

banjo yokelale? And

2:31

I was kind of

2:33

overwhelmed by just the

2:35

sheer amount of people

2:37

with banjos that were

2:40

around on this cold

2:42

November afternoon, like dozens

2:44

and dozens in a

2:46

circle jamming together, all

2:48

knowing Americana songs and

2:51

Southern spirituals. Down by

2:53

the riverside, on they

2:55

come up burning. Down

2:58

by the riverside,

3:00

on they come

3:03

up burning. The

3:05

juxtaposition wasn't lost on

3:08

me. Like, I know the

3:10

history of the banjo,

3:12

how it comes from West

3:14

Africa, how enslaved people

3:16

in the Americas and Caribbean

3:18

adapted this gourd instrument

3:20

from their homelands into the

3:22

banjo that we know

3:24

today, how the banjo was

3:26

almost exclusively played by

3:29

black folk until minstrelsy. So

3:32

I can enjoy myself as

3:34

one of the few black

3:36

people on that cold afternoon,

3:38

but still feel a bit

3:40

of friction. And I needed

3:42

help reconciling that feeling. So

3:44

I went straight to the

3:46

top. I have some

3:48

notions. Yes, please. Because

3:51

it's kind of like

3:53

that whole idea of discovery

3:55

of the banjo. But

3:57

then that question of, like,

4:00

why don't I know

4:02

this? You know what I

4:04

mean? Why it? constantly discovery for

4:06

us. That's Ryan and Giddens. She's a Grammy winner,

4:08

Pulitzer Prize winner, MacArthur Genius Fellow. I am a

4:11

singer, banjo player, and

4:13

cultural historian, I guess.

4:15

Giddens is also the woman

4:17

who blessed us with the

4:20

opening riff of Biance's country

4:22

hit, Texas Hold On. Oh,

4:29

and all. Get into that girl. For the

4:31

people who were exposed to my

4:33

song already, yeah, that's really cool.

4:35

There's way more people who have

4:37

no idea who played that banjo.

4:39

And that's okay. That was by

4:41

design. Not my design, but, you know,

4:44

that wasn't the focus of that track.

4:46

And that's fine. Like, I didn't do

4:48

it for that reason. I did it

4:50

because I just want the sound of it

4:52

out there and I happened to play it.

4:55

When that song came out. What I

4:57

did on my Facebook feed is

4:59

every day I highlighted a different

5:02

black banjo player. I saw. You

5:04

know, because I'm like, this is,

5:06

okay, so if eyeballs are coming

5:09

my way because of that song,

5:11

they need to go to the

5:13

community. And I'm looking to

5:16

find my place in that

5:18

community. I've been searching for

5:20

black banjo, I'm learning how

5:22

to play the banjo. and

5:25

talking to black banjo players

5:27

about creating community and reclaiming

5:29

an instrument that's historically already

5:32

theirs. Support for this podcast and

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and trade on on Think Or Swim. Visit schwab.com

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to learn more. The

7:40

song was first recorded by

7:42

a white man 33 years

7:45

ago. Now Giddens is the

7:47

first black woman to record

7:49

it. Who's gonna dance with

7:52

Sally and who's gonna talk

7:54

to Trim Blan? I'm mostly

7:57

excited for Alice Randall because

7:59

it's her song. It's a

8:01

song about lynching that,

8:03

you know, finally

8:05

got a performance

8:07

by, you know, the black

8:10

woman that she wrote

8:12

it for. So I'm

8:15

excited for her that

8:17

this story, which is

8:20

a very difficult story,

8:22

has been, you know,

8:25

highlighted by the

8:27

nomination. I got into

8:29

playing the banjo through dance. I

8:32

heard the banjo as a sort of

8:34

dance instrument, like the claw hammer

8:36

style, really for the first time,

8:38

and was like, this is amazing,

8:40

what is this? This is not

8:42

bluegrass. I love this, you know,

8:44

and really just dance to it

8:46

for a while, and then was kind

8:48

of like, okay, I need to learn

8:50

how to. play this. And then, like,

8:53

as I started to play with the

8:55

white old-time musicians in the area, which

8:57

they were lovely folks, and like, they're

9:00

like, well, you know, the banjos, like,

9:02

African, I was like, what? What

9:04

are you talking about? And then

9:06

that kind of started me on

9:08

my, you know, my journey of

9:11

like, oh my God, what else

9:13

don't I know about my own

9:15

culture? So Giddens dug into that

9:17

history. The banjo is an The

9:19

Transatlantic Slave Trade, so to understand

9:21

the banjo, I was like, I really need

9:24

to understand the history that

9:26

surrounds it. In her research, she

9:28

found a banjo instruction manual from

9:30

1855, the first of its kind. How

9:32

to play the banjo, how to be

9:35

a minstrel, like all of these things.

9:37

And it had all the basics to

9:39

songs like Yankee Doodle and the Jim

9:41

Crow poker. The tunes in that 1855

9:43

book are... really proto-American tunes. Old minstrel

9:45

tunes, I had to throw the

9:48

words out because it was just

9:50

so depressing, you know. But really,

9:52

I'm interested in the music, you

9:54

know, because all the early minstrel songs that

9:56

we now call folk songs, that we

9:58

now teach our children, you know. Blue

10:00

Tale Fly and all that stuff.

10:02

Those tunes are legit American tunes,

10:04

you know? They're coming out of

10:06

that sort of folk soup of

10:08

music. And if you don't think

10:10

you know Blue Tale Fly, you

10:12

might actually know the lyrics, because

10:14

if you grew up in America,

10:16

you know the songs in that

10:18

folk soup. When I was young,

10:20

I used to wait on my

10:22

master and give him his plate.

10:24

and passed a bottle and he

10:26

got dry and brush away the

10:28

blue tail plot. Jimmy crack call

10:30

and I don't care. Jimmy crack

10:32

corn and I don't care. Jimmy

10:34

crack corn and I don't care.

10:36

The license is on the way.

10:38

Blackface minstrel songs like this one

10:40

are far cry from the songs

10:42

used to moat and amuse between

10:44

work on a plantation. Yes, culture

10:46

ebbs and flows, but it helps

10:48

to acknowledge how the banjo changed

10:50

hands. So in the time leading

10:52

up to the 1920s, you know,

10:54

black people were moving out of

10:56

the South. You know, we were

10:58

like moving in huge numbers as

11:00

part of the great migration for

11:02

a better life, right, to escape

11:04

racism, you know, lynching whatever. We

11:06

end up in the North, we

11:08

end up in the West, we

11:10

end up in the Midwest, and...

11:12

you know, we didn't put the

11:14

banjo down in as much as

11:16

that a lot of the folks

11:18

who left, you know, they discover,

11:21

oh, I'm in a different place.

11:23

Like, music is different here. Like,

11:25

oh, we don't have corn shuckens

11:27

anymore. I don't need this old

11:29

banjo. You know what I mean?

11:31

Like, oh, they're playing the hip

11:33

music or this, oh, this new

11:35

guitar thing is really cool, or,

11:37

you know, whatever. colored performers, you

11:39

know, come bring your blues on

11:41

a Thursday. And like, you know,

11:43

Hillbillies, come bring your fiddle tunes

11:45

on a Friday. And if you're

11:47

a black fiddler, you show up

11:49

on a Friday and they're like,

11:51

well, you know, blues days yesterday.

11:53

It's like, if you're a black

11:55

fiddler, you're like, well, I better

11:57

learn some blues if I want

11:59

to get. a job. Between the

12:01

Great Migration and World War II, a

12:03

lot of black musicians pivot and

12:05

adjust with the Times, and

12:07

it left an opening, particularly with

12:10

the American Folk Music Revival,

12:12

to re-appropriate things like the

12:14

banjo. So we start to

12:16

hear white artists like Pete

12:18

Seeger and Alan Lomax turn

12:20

slave songs into songs for

12:22

the white working class. And now

12:25

the way a lot of people view the

12:27

banjo is... Earl Scruggs, it's Steve Martin,

12:29

it's Kermit the Frog. But

12:31

for Giddens, her touchstone wasn't

12:33

any of these. Kind of all

12:36

roads lead back to Joe Thompson,

12:38

really, for me. Joe Thompson was

12:40

Gidden's teacher and led her to

12:43

what would become her famed former

12:45

string band, the Carolina Chocolate Drops.

12:47

Joe Thompson was an African-American fiddler

12:49

who lived in Mebin, North Carolina,

12:52

and he was part of a

12:54

long line of black string band

12:56

musicians in a family tradition that

12:58

kind of stretches back to the

13:01

time of slavery. But he, you

13:03

know, Joe was kind of one of the

13:05

last members of really once

13:07

an enormously thriving black stream

13:09

man tradition that stretched all

13:12

over the country, really. Here's the

13:14

Carolina Chocolate Drops playing the

13:16

traditional song, Georgie Buck, with

13:19

Joe Thompson. So for white string

13:21

band musicians, there were many children

13:24

in my brain. So for white

13:26

string band musicians, you know, there

13:28

were many elders that were still playing

13:30

that they could learn from and they

13:33

could be, you know, with, but for

13:35

the black community, there weren't very many.

13:37

And so to have somebody like Joe

13:40

Thompson. at the time that we had.

13:42

I mean, he was 86 when we

13:44

first started playing with him, but I

13:46

feel like it's one of the most

13:49

fortunate things that I've had

13:51

in my life. And I feel like I'm

13:53

kind of in a dilemma, you know,

13:55

because it's something I'm really thinking about

13:58

a lot with this music. You

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17:18

Parker. Just a Parker.

17:20

Code Switch. I've been talking

17:22

to banjo goat Ryan and

17:25

Giddens. So

17:27

I'm at the beginning of

17:29

my banjo journey and

17:31

I've started taking lessons

17:33

and like I'm in

17:35

a group course and

17:37

it is a majority white

17:40

people and like I'm in

17:42

this room I am very

17:44

aware that I'm a black person

17:46

and we're like playing like

17:48

down by the riverside and

17:51

so I'm like there's

17:53

like this I'm enjoying

17:55

myself. But there's also this

17:57

kind of cognitive dissonance.

18:00

that I'm experiencing

18:02

of like a group of white

18:04

people teaching me like black

18:06

southern songs. Yeah. Like tonight,

18:09

so tonight I have a

18:11

recital, which is coincidental to

18:14

this interview, and I'm very,

18:16

I'm stressed. It's not,

18:18

it's a group recital,

18:20

so we're not, it's an adult

18:23

showcase, but we're going to

18:25

perform with the group of

18:27

white people. in front of another

18:30

group of white people. And I'm trying

18:32

not to like get in too much

18:34

in my head about it, but I'm

18:36

also very aware of that history

18:38

while I'm learning. It's very, it's

18:40

very fraught. It's very layered. It's very

18:42

much, you have to kind of hold

18:44

things simultaneously, if you know what I

18:46

mean. You know, there is a shared

18:49

common southern heritage. of music and culture,

18:51

right, that everyone, you know, has pieces

18:53

of, and things have gone back and

18:55

forth between cultures and all this kind

18:57

of stuff, and that is the same

18:59

for the music. And you can go,

19:02

okay, this is something that, you know,

19:04

belongs to all of us, but also,

19:06

given the way that the history has

19:08

been taught, given the way that we

19:10

have been erased from this history, you

19:12

feel that, you know, otherness for a

19:15

music that supposedly... is from your

19:17

own, you know what I mean?

19:19

It's from your own ancestral history.

19:21

So I'm like, come to my house

19:23

and I'll teach you Georgia book.

19:25

We'll just sit and play Georgia

19:28

book. You know what I mean? Like,

19:30

that's what I'm interested in, is

19:32

this, if you really want to

19:35

learn in a context of being

19:37

a black string band

19:39

musician, then we have to figure

19:41

out ways of passing this on. within

19:43

our you know what I mean like

19:46

in addition to taking classes in addition

19:48

to you know being in you know

19:50

you know being in that recital or

19:53

whatever but like how do we do

19:55

it when there's so few of us

19:57

yeah I like I know I'm not going to

19:59

get me kind of like historical context

20:01

when I'm taking the course right now.

20:03

But I know that I'm going to

20:06

get some kind of technical skill, although,

20:08

I mean, thank goodness, the Georgie Buck,

20:10

I gotta learn. All I gotta do

20:12

is a G and an E minor

20:15

the whole way through, and that is

20:17

okay with me. Your journey is your

20:19

journey. Like, as long as you end

20:21

up playing the banjo, it doesn't really

20:24

matter how you got there. So

20:31

after I talked to Giddens,

20:33

I performed in my first

20:35

recital. It was nerve-wracking. But

20:37

it was a group of

20:39

us and the audience was

20:41

very kind. And finally, the

20:43

songs I had heard not

20:45

so long ago at the

20:47

banjo toss were at my

20:49

fingertips. All be it a

20:52

little clumsily. With

21:02

the recital being the end

21:04

of my classes, I started

21:06

looking for other avenues to

21:08

learn, and I found Hannah

21:10

Mayri. They're a musician and

21:12

a teacher. I started and

21:14

run an organization called the

21:17

Black Banjo Reclamation Project. Hannah's

21:19

creating spaces for Black Banjo

21:21

players to come together, which

21:23

is a change of pace

21:25

from how Hannah was introduced

21:27

to the banjo, hitchhacking around

21:29

the country. I got into

21:31

the banjo as... a person

21:34

that was traveling through American

21:36

society in the folk tradition.

21:38

So I came across it

21:40

like in the wild, if

21:42

you will. In my mind,

21:44

now I'm picturing you like

21:46

hopping on the railways just

21:48

playing, like the raconteur playing

21:50

in the banjo? Well, I

21:53

don't know what a rock

21:55

and tour is, but I

21:57

have rode some trains in

21:59

my day. Hannah, you'd like

22:01

a like an actual folk

22:03

hero. I asked Hannah about

22:05

their goals for the

22:08

Black Banjo Reclamation Project.

22:10

I think there's a

22:12

few. One of the outcomes in

22:15

theory would be for black people

22:17

to have the experience

22:20

of pursuing and stewarding

22:22

folk music while being

22:25

in black spaces. So maybe

22:27

we sit around a fire, maybe we're

22:29

learning songs that, you know, have been

22:31

saying for hundreds of years, you know.

22:34

I think people should have the option

22:36

of doing that because so much of

22:38

that comes from black people, they should

22:40

have the option of being in a

22:42

black space. And that's what I

22:44

feel like the advocacy work has

22:47

been of black banjo reclamation project

22:49

is making more spaces, more

22:51

comfortable spaces for black people

22:53

to just pursue cultural learning.

22:56

and have it not be out of

22:58

context. Hannah invited

23:00

me to an online banjo

23:03

study group that they run.

23:05

Just a Zoom call, once

23:07

a month, and each person on

23:09

the call gets to share what

23:12

they're working on, banjo-wise. Hi,

23:14

I'm Parker, she her, I'm

23:16

in Brooklyn, in New

23:18

York, and I've had a banjo

23:20

for a bit, a friend gave

23:23

me her banjo, but I'm still

23:25

very... novice at it. So yeah,

23:27

I'm just so excited to be

23:30

here. Yeah. I didn't expect to

23:32

be on a call with

23:34

over a dozen black

23:36

banjo players from all

23:38

over the country of

23:40

different ages and backgrounds

23:42

and skill levels all

23:44

seeking community. It's what I

23:47

desperately been looking for.

23:49

I wasn't alone. I want to

23:51

thank you for inviting me to

23:53

your class because now I have

23:55

something to look forward to the

23:57

first Saturday of every month.

23:59

Yes, I mean, I enjoyed,

24:02

I enjoyed the class that I

24:04

had before. I'll go to physical

24:06

space, we'd play, again, I was

24:08

like, I'm a black person, but

24:11

like, I was seeking out other

24:13

black banjo players, and I wasn't

24:15

getting anybody. And in one meeting,

24:18

being in your study group met

24:20

like three people in my city

24:22

and now we've got plans that

24:25

we're going to meet at the

24:27

end of the month and like

24:29

bring our banjos and talk and

24:32

like have community and it's really

24:34

wanted to thank you for that

24:36

because like that was like such

24:39

a joy and such like an

24:41

incredible opportunity. I'm so glad to

24:43

hear that. I mean that that

24:46

is definitely my intention and I

24:48

feel like if that is happening

24:50

is happening then like what is

24:53

happening with Black Banjo Reformation Project

24:55

is working and it's like fulfilling

24:57

its cause, you know. Is there

25:00

anything you think I should work

25:02

on before our next study session?

25:04

Like do you, what do you

25:07

think I should do? Well, I

25:09

would have to answer that a

25:11

little more specifically. Like I would

25:14

be asking you questions about what

25:16

you were working on in the

25:18

class and stuff and... I'm still

25:21

working on my, like, like, my,

25:23

my, my, uh, my chords in,

25:25

in the Kia G. That's what

25:28

I'm still, like, really working on.

25:30

I feel like you're at work

25:32

right now, but I would be

25:35

like, yeah, just flip out your

25:37

banjo real quick and just show

25:39

me, you know, or whatever. It's

25:42

right. So, like... I

25:47

keep wanting to use my thumb

25:49

and I know I'm not supposed

25:51

to use my thumb. And you

25:54

can leave the thumb. I mean

25:56

have you ever seen how like

25:58

Jimmy Hendrix plays guitar? Well he

26:00

was left-handed though. But like there's

26:02

different, there's blue. fingering for guitar,

26:04

for example, where you can like

26:06

grip your thumb around it. If

26:08

you can make it work, if

26:10

that's your anatomy, then like that's

26:13

what it is. You can slow

26:15

it way down because like you

26:17

want to be able to like

26:19

make all of the beats consistent.

26:21

So if you can, if you

26:23

have to go this slow... In

26:27

order to get the

26:29

core change on your

26:31

left hand, you want

26:33

to do it at

26:35

like the slowest pace

26:37

that will allow you

26:39

to have fluidity. The

26:41

fluidity has never even

26:43

occurred to me until

26:45

you just go. I

26:57

actually heard about the black banjo

27:00

reclamation project because a listener told

27:02

me that I needed to check

27:04

it out. Hannah said that they

27:07

got the urge to create the

27:09

project in 2018. I was coming

27:11

out of an artist residency where

27:14

I was learning a lot about

27:16

different types of harm that white

27:18

people cause to black people in

27:21

artist spaces. And it really just

27:23

dawned on me to be like...

27:25

I need to be asking people

27:28

for banjos. That was just the

27:30

first initiative of it, was receiving

27:32

banjos in the name of reparations

27:35

and distributing them to black people

27:37

who had expressed explicitly that they

27:39

wanted to be on a journey

27:42

with the banjo. Now, Hannah didn't

27:44

give me a banjo, but they've

27:46

welcomed me into this space and

27:49

encouraged me to respect this instrument

27:51

that I feel this connection to.

27:53

Respect, which Hannah feels like should

27:56

be the bare minimum. Like how

27:58

many times have? You've

28:00

been subjected to hearing a

28:02

joke about a banjo from a

28:04

white person. Little do people actually

28:07

stop and think. This is

28:09

actually like offensive. It turns

28:11

out there are endless jokes that

28:13

are all basically alluding to the

28:16

same thing. The banjo players aren't

28:18

very smart and that the banjo

28:20

sounds annoying. When you're talking

28:22

about an instrument that has

28:25

already gone through so much

28:27

insult. Like specifically through minstrel

28:29

C and then to have

28:31

somebody make jokes like, oh, how

28:34

does a banjo, whatever, I don't know

28:36

what the hell you're saying, but

28:38

it's not something that's supporting

28:40

my mother fucking banjo journey.

28:42

Part of Hannah's journey involved

28:45

learning how to make banjos. I

28:47

have learned to make a banjo, because

28:49

I wanted to create banjos,

28:51

but also because I wanted other

28:54

people to have that. that knowledge

28:56

and I didn't want that knowledge to

28:58

feel like it was being hell-a-gate

29:00

kept. They say they get requests

29:02

all the time from black folk

29:04

who want gored banjos, seeking a

29:07

more traditional kind of instrument.

29:09

These instruments are hard to come

29:11

by and expensive, so they run

29:13

workshops to help people build them,

29:16

but everyone's journey is different.

29:18

You know, I'm not making a banjo. I'm

29:20

gonna buy a banjo from somebody who

29:22

made a white dude made by banjo.

29:24

Full stop. Ryanne Giddens banjo

29:26

is also a very old school style,

29:29

a style directly from 1858 because

29:31

she feels a cultural and ancestral

29:33

connection to it. The instrument itself

29:35

is just a totally different kind

29:38

of banjo. Despite the fact that

29:40

it was used by blackface minstrels,

29:42

it was also played by African-American

29:45

banjo players. Like this

29:47

was just the big, it was the tool,

29:49

it was the banjo of the time. And

29:51

for me, it felt like a warmer way

29:53

into... dedicating my life

29:55

to the banjo than the modern

29:58

banjo which has so much modern

30:00

caricature around it, modern

30:02

ideas, medium manipulation around that

30:04

image of what a banjo

30:06

player is and who a

30:08

banjo player is. But those caricatures

30:11

aren't my idea of a

30:13

banjo player. I mean, in the

30:15

past, you've got Dink Roberts,

30:17

you've got Elizabeth Cotton, you've

30:19

got Edda Baker, and now, Rannon

30:22

Giddens is my gold standard.

30:24

But while searching for a

30:26

black banjo community, I've realized

30:29

that Whether you're starting out or

30:31

have become the premier banjo player

30:33

in the culture, that need for

30:35

connection persists. This music

30:37

didn't come from a star-making machine.

30:40

It came from community, it came

30:42

from working-class people making a life

30:44

together, and the more that we

30:47

try to make it fit into

30:49

that music industry model of one

30:51

person at the top, the music's gonna

30:53

die. The music needs community. It

30:56

needs sharing, it needs collaboration. or

30:58

it will turn into something that

31:00

we do not recognize. This coming

31:02

April, Rannon Giddens is hosting

31:05

her first festival called Biscuits

31:07

and Banjos. It's an entire

31:09

weekend of black folk artists coming

31:11

together and vibing in community.

31:13

She's even reuniting on stage with

31:15

the Carolina chocolate drops. I'm so

31:18

happy you're learning the banjo, keep up

31:20

with it, and if you come to

31:22

Biscots and Banjos, we'll sit down and

31:24

have a little, have a little

31:26

moment, banjo moment. And

31:28

Hannah Mae Reh with the

31:31

Black Banjo Reclamation Project

31:33

has created monthly spaces

31:35

for culture and connection.

31:37

And the community building

31:39

worked because I finally

31:41

found some people I was looking

31:43

for. Oh, hi. Hi, I'm Parker. Nice

31:45

to meet you. I met with four

31:48

other black banjo players from

31:50

the study group. We met in

31:52

person with our banjos and just

31:55

played. See?

32:06

See? No, okay.

32:08

Let me see

32:11

your C. and

32:13

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So please go

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32:59

at Plus. At

33:02

npr.org/Code Switch. This

33:04

episode was produced by Jess

33:06

Kung and myself. It was

33:08

edited by Courtney Stein. Our

33:10

engineer was Josephine Nionai. Special

33:12

thanks to Jeff Wiley, Kyle

33:15

Tiggs, Alina McGony, Skyless Winston,

33:17

Kay von Jones, and a

33:19

very special thanks to Diane

33:21

Wu for giving me her

33:23

banjo. The song you're hearing

33:25

right now is from Hannah

33:27

Mayri. And a big shout

33:29

to the rest of the

33:32

code switch massive. Christina Kala,

33:34

Xavier Lopez, Leah Danella, Dahlia

33:36

Mortata, Virilen Williams, and Jean

33:38

Denby. I'm B.A. Parker. Hydrate.

33:40

How do you take care

33:42

of your nails? Sorry. I just rip

33:44

them off on the left hand and

33:46

then I just, you know, try to,

33:48

I don't like... I don't unzip my

33:51

pants, like with my pointer finger, because

33:53

that's my banjo nail. That's commitment. Yeah,

33:55

there's no magic. It's just, you know,

33:57

you just try to take care. of

33:59

it, you know, but I can also

34:01

play without it. You have to eventually

34:03

play without the nail and it's a

34:05

dollar sound, but you know, whatever. This

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message comes from Warby This

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