Goldman tunes the drone string on his banjo as he warms up for a three-hour-long set of classic old-time music with the Water Tower String Band

Old-time gets a new voice

Cory Goldman, a University student and banjo devotee, preserves an American music tradition with the Water Tower String Band.

By Nick Cummings

Two years ago, Cory Goldman had never so much as picked up a banjo.

As an avid musician throughout his childhood, Goldman is no stranger to a plethora of instruments and musical styles. He learned to play a variety of woodwind instruments, including the clarinet and baritone saxophone, in grade school band classes. But it was outside the classroom where Goldman got his first taste of the guitar.

Goldman played in a slew of bands and musical projects throughout his teenage years. The styles of music varied – he tackled everything from popular music to punk and industrial rock – but as with most bands, things fell apart when people began to move away.

After graduating from high school in 2004, Goldman enrolled in the School of Music at the University of Oregon with an emphasis on guitar performance. And when several of his former high school friends got together to form an old-time band – American folk music that is as traditional as it is eclectic – he leapt at the opportunity.

Punk Music for the Great Depression

From left: Cory Goldman, Kenny Feinstein and Peter Dagett open as a trio before the full band joins them at the Axe and Fiddle

The band’s two founding members, Kenny Feinstein and Josh Rabie, had been friends throughout their teenage years with Goldman. While they had spent many days jamming on their various instruments, it wasn’t until Rabie introduced the group to the old-time sound and style that they found something that stuck. Goldman saw an opportunity to flex his guitar-playing muscle and began playing with the group. Many countless hours of practicing and learning the various instruments later, the band began to congeal into a promising union for its members. And thus, the Water Tower String Band was born.

Though the distinct instrumentation drew him in, he hadn’t anticipated becoming a banjo player. But when Rabie injured his hand and had to switch to playing fiddle, Goldman jumped at the chance to learn to play the banjo. Hundreds of hours of arduous practice and patient practicing later, Goldman was strumming, plucking, popping and clawing away at the banjo with finesse.

As with most fledgling bands, the lineup changed at a dizzying rate. Even though he joined the group within its first year, Goldman recalls that he was the third guitar player the band had gone through. “Our instrumentation kind of dictated our shift from more bluegrass tunes to old-time,” Goldman explains.

That instrumentation lays down the roots for a highly danceable and engaging genre of American folk music. Or rather, as the band’s MySpace site describes it: “We makes you feel like you’re at a 1930s punk show!”

That description isn’t really off the mark, either. The frenzied pace of the music and the energy of the crowd gets the toes of even the dourest patron tapping away. It’s no surprise, then, that dances are Goldman’s favorite type of show to play.

Old-time disregards formal structure, and in its place offers a variety of interesting tunes that are highly danceable, if not formal in the musical sense. Improvisations on melodies and rhythms are commonplace. “They’re songs with strange twists and turns – what we call ‘crooked tunes,’” explains Goldman.

Gigs rolled in slowly at first. Booking venues was especially difficult in Eugene, the band discovered, but getting fair recognition for their efforts was near impossible. “A lot of places in Eugene don’t seem to want to pay people,” Goldman says with a laugh.

One of his most memorable gigs was a dance at the Portland Old Time Gathering in January 2008, where the Water Tower String Band rubbed elbows with some of the most prominent old-time musicians in the country: Sammy Lind and Caleb Clauder from Foghorn Stringband. “People from all over the country came and danced,” he says. “That was pretty amazing.”

Now, the band is playing more events than ever, ranging from Portland and Eugene and even up to Seattle. Yet the average person – or even an avid concert-goer – may not know what old-time music consists of.

That High, Lonesome Sound

The full Water Tower String Band, from left: Ben Wheeler (bass), Cory Goldman (banjo), Josh Rabie (fiddle), Kenny Feinstein (mandolin), Peter Daggett (guitar)

Like the instruments that are central to the style, old-time is itself steeped in American folk tradition. Many of the songs are many decades old, some extending as far back as the 19th century. Since old-time is such a rarity in most concert venues, it has created a rare opportunity for Goldman and his band to gain exposure and a youthful audience.

Traditional folk music isn’t often considered part of a young music lover’s repertoire, but The Water Tower String Band has been relatively successful in building an audience – and its success is growing faster with time.

Old-time is “a uniquely American form of music” that is “endangered,” says Goldman. The band describes it as “that high, lonesome sound,” a statement that recalls the Appalachian Mountains where the genre is often believed to have originated.

As with most traditional folk arts, old time music isn’t particularly structured or scientific. It was born from musicians who didn’t formally study music technique or literacy. As a result, it carries a tradition of learning through demonstration, not from textbooks or college education.

Playing such an old and endangered form of music is a reward unto itself, Goldman says: “There’s something to be said for preserving folk tradition.” It gives him the feeling of being a “cultural ambassador,” as he describes it: “It’s a really incredible aspect of American culture."

African Roots

Goldman demonstrates a technique of opposites with the clawhammer style

Learning to play the banjo is complicated, like with many musical instruments. But for Goldman, the allure is easy to explain. “It’s rhythmic,” he says, plucking out a simple melody. “That’s what attracted me to it.”

The banjo is an instrument with African roots, where the earliest iterations of the instrument consisted of two or three strings attached to a gourd. Today, many musicians play with an American style that is more common in country and bluegrass music where the thumb picks the string with a downward motion and the fingers pick upward. Goldman incorporates an African style of play in his performance, called clawhammer. Clawhammer involves downpicking of notes with the fingers and “popping” the drone, or far left string, with the thumb. This rhythmic approach stands out amid the vocals, fiddle, bass and guitar that complete the band’s sound.

With such a distinctive sound, the banjo is an instrument definitively associated with certain types of music – namely, country and bluegrass. But old-time predates them both with its heavy reliance on the banjo as a complement to the melody, rather than acting the driving melody-maker of the band.

Bluegrass is more rigidly structured than old-time, and is largely credited to Bill Monroe and The Bluegrass Boys. Developed as an offshoot of old-time traditions, bluegrass operates as a more unwavering and formal style of music.

Goldman says the distinction is like the difference between swing and bebop: One is more predisposed to a concert setting, and the other – in this case, old-time – is more danceable.

Though the band’s initial reception was lacking for the first few years, in recent months it has been picking up speed. The Water Tower String Band’s first album is set to be mastered later this month for release in late March, and Goldman has been developing a clientele of aspiring banjo players whom he teaches on a regular basis to help pay the rent and pass on his skills.

The Water Tower String Band has been gathering momentum as the band’s members have adopted a more serious commitment, as Goldman sees it. With major concerts and folk festivals approaching in the coming months, Goldman and his banjo are set for a long summer of hard playing.