Wedding Musicians and Party Band for Boston, New England and Cape Cod | Bluegrass, Swing & Old Time Music | The Goodtime Stringband

The banjo gods have smiled upon me! I recently had the good fortune to obtain a Recording King RK-85 banjo at a fantastic price.

In case you haven’t heard of the Recording King line, it is Greg Rich’s (formerly of Gibson and Rich and Taylor)  latest project involving the manufacture of high-quality instruments in the Pacific rim.

The model I purchased has the flamed maple resonator, 20-hole tone ring and funky retro vibe.   It’s a heavy duty instrument with a pre-war look and sound.  After reading some threads about mods on the banjohangout website, I swapped out the tailpiece for a Kershner-style and a Huber bridge. Woo hoo!!! The instrument now sounds incredible.  I haven’t owned too many banjos, but this one is the best by far.  In fact, after taking it to a recent BG jam, my buddy Randy went out and bought the last remaining RK from a local retailer.  It sounds that good.

Everyone has different tastes and opinions about what a bluegrass banjo should sound like. I would heartily recommend this instrument if you are in the market for a pro-quality banjo at a reasonable price!

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 1st, 2009 at 11:45 pm and is filed under boston, fun bluegrass swing music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.