Track Listing

1. Dueling Banjos - Steve Mandell, Eric Weissberg
2. Little Maggie
3. Shuckin' the Corn
4. Pony Express
5. Old Joe Clark
6. Eight More Miles to Louisville
7. Farewell Blues
8. Earl's Breakdown
9. End of a Dream
10. Buffalo Gals
11. Reuben's Train
12. Riding the Waves
13. Fire on the Mountain
14. Eighth of January
15. Bugle Call Rag
16. Hard, Ain't It Hard
17. Mountain Dew
18. Rawhide

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7296 in Music
• Brand: Warner Brothers
• Released on: 1990-10-25
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Soundtrack
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .20 pounds

Customer Reviews

A Must-Have for Bluegrass Fans
Wonderful, exhilarating, breathtaking music, both in speed and execution. Banjoist Eric Weissberg has spent most of his career in relative obscurity as a studio musician, which is a shame as he is one of the finest banjo players to ever pick up the instrument. City born and musically educated at the University of Wisconsin and Juilliard, Weissberg was a seminal banjo picker who combined the power and taste of Earl Scruggs along with the progressive melodic banjo stylings of the 1960s.

Obviously, the album features the definitive version of "Dueling Banjos" that Weissberg recorded with Steve Mandel. The rest of the tracks come from an incredible album called "New Dimensions in Banjo and Bluegrass," released by Elektra in 1963. Most of the tracks feature brilliant dual arrangments between Weissberg and Marshall Brickman, a banjoist who left the music world behind to write movies for Hollywood (The Bad News Bears, co-writer for Annie Hall). They are backed by guitar legend, Clarence White, who creates beautiful backup runs on songs like "Pony Express" and fine solos throughout. I think the fiddler was Gordon Terry, whose atmospheric style on "Reuben's Train" will make your hair stand on end.

The album is loaded with famous and oft-copied banjo licks, including the descending single-string work on Little Maggie, the "bumblebee break" on an insane version of "Shucking the Corn," the C-F-E-C chord sequence on "Riding the Waves," and some of the fastest (and cleanest) banjo work you'll ever hear anywhere on songs like Rawhide and Hard, 'Aint it Hard.

If you do not already own this CD, BUY IT. And if anyone in the music business is listening, you need to scrape up some money and produce a dozen more acoustic albums by Weissberg and Brickman. These guys deserve more of a legacy than a single album!

Speed Metal Wishes it Was This Energetic
Anybody who likes Flatt and Scruggs, will love this CD. It is filled with rippin' banjo bluegrass instrumentals that simply defy you to not get up and dance.
Eric Weissberg and Steve Mandel might not be original good old boys, but they are obviously well versed in the ways of Flatt and Scruggs and do a very admirable job creating exciting arrangements. A major plus is that this CD is about twice as long as most of Flatt and Scruggs offerings making the the CD to pop in when you want more bang for you buck.
Also as a fan of Metallica, I have to rank some of the tracks on this CD right up there with 'Master of Puppets' as one of the most intense pieces of music in my collection.

A Rediscovered Masterpiece
What can I say about this album that does its quality justice? I first heard it growing up in the early 1970's, and recently rediscovered it. That it's an outstanding exhibition of bluegrass banjo is self-evident. Within a collection that is ripe with great performances, "Pony Express" and "Reuben's Train" are particularly outstanding - at once both energizing and melodically compelling. Beyond the banjo, though, the guitar and fiddle accompaniment are also adept and entertaining. In short, this CD belongs in the collections of not only those with experienced tastes for bluegrass and the banjo, but also those who are new to the genre and interested in hearing this musical style at its best. Both the beginner and the seasoned enthusiast alike will delight in Weissberg and Brickman's infectious, churning performances.