This means that you can play an open-back, five string banjo right there in your browser. It’s a fully detailed 3D model of a banjo and you can rotate and zoom it while you play. For each note, you hear the actual recording of someone playing a banjo. It sounds real. You can play using your computer keyboard, your fingers on a phone or tablet, or even just your mouse. Nothing to install, nothing to download.
There is no separate sound button. Tap a note to play says the status line on the bottom. After you tap your first note, it prepares the recordings and the text change to Sound ready. At the top is a question mark which displays a short guide and sound credits. The full screen button makes the banjo take up your entire screen. Pressing Escape or clicking Exit full screen will return you to the page. Bottom bar has a Volume slider.
How to Play the Banjo
In open G tuning, the banjo’s strings is tuned to g4, D3, G3, B3, and D4. Its short fifth string start from the fifth fret. On the 3D model you can click on each string to play it open. Or drag across them to strum. As the notes sound the strings light up and shake. They ring out and fade away naturaly.
Directly below the model is a line of 32 note pads. These provide you with all the fretted notes from D3 through to A5. They are labelled by their names and the notes is spaced a semitone apart. You can tap the individual ones as required. You can also use your mouse or finger to swipe over them quickly for a run.
The pads correspond to certain numbers and letters on a computer keyboard. Key number 5 sound the highest note (A5) and key ‘A’ sounds the lowest note (D3). Each subsequent key sound one semitone higher. All keys has their corresponding letter displayed. The Space bar sounds the note you previously selected. Before playing from the keyboard, click inside the banjo frame.
Full Chord: G, C, D7, Em strummed quickly from lowest note to highest.
Gliss: ↑ runs all 32 notes up to the highest note. The down arrow runs all 32 notes down to the lowest note.
Damp stops all strings from ringing immediately. It ends the current Auto pick, song, or game. On narrow phone screens, we hide Gliss buttons to save space. Keep chords and Damp in place.
Tap Auto pick for a rolling pattern that picks through the notes of whichever chord you’ve selected. Two notes per beat. It switches when you tap on another chord. Making it simple to roll between G,C,D7,G. Tap individual notes over the top too. Tap Auto pick again to turn off. Use the Tempo slider to adjust the speed.
The Touch slider below the pads controls how hard you pick. Higher settings produce brighter, louder notes. Lower it for rounder, more mellow sounds. Short tips appear next to this as you play.
Tap the song menu to get to the songs. Tap Morning steps, Twinkle, Twinkle, or Ode to Joy. Tap ▶ Play song to make the banjo play that song. It will change to Ⅱ Pause and then back to ▶ Resume. Tap the ↻ button to repeat the song (loop). Tap the ■ button to stop all sound. The Tempo slider goes from 50 to 150. When you select a song, it starts at that song’s tempo.
Above the pads is a preview of the upcoming notes. It also indicates how long they last in beats. Tap a note on the strip to hear it.
When you know how it goes, click on the ◇ Game. Now the pad you need is glowing green. Next one is amber. They show up on the strip as NEXT and NOW. The game waits for you. As soon as you play the right note, it moves on. Play on the keyboard, on the pads, or on the 3D strings. Each time you need a repeated note, you must press the pad, keyboard, or 3D string again. How far into the song have you got? That’s shown by the counter. A hint tells you if you play a different note and reminds you to try the green one. When you get to the end, you’ll see Complete! Play this one again or choose another song.
Click 3D to look around and rotate. Scroll to zoom in/out and drag the background to turn it. On a touchscreen use two fingers. Touching the strings while looking around will still pluck them. ↺ button takes you back to the start. Switching Rotate off also returns you to the starting view.
Try the model out by plucking all five open strings (this gives you the sound of the open G tuning). Turn Auto pick on then tap G, C, D7 in sequence. End with Twinkle, Twinkle in Game mode slowly.
