Bingo Arms
(Jody Stecher/ Vegetiboy Music BMI)
Many years ago my wife Kate’s youngest sister Lisa made an emotional declaration of her aversion to growing old. She didn’t want to have “bingo arms”. What a good title for a tune. It had to be a polka. B flat seemed a natural fit. Descending arpeggios is a borrowed feature of Brazilian choro music on the bandolim (mandolin). The crazy phrase at the end of each part applies one of Bill Monroe’s mandolin techniques to a key where he never used it as far as I know. He would alternate a down stroke on a closed (fingered) string with an upward stroke on the same string open (unfingered). This was with little regard as to whether it made conventional musical sense. The result is startling and, for me at least, musically pleasing.
Jody Stecher: mandolin
Kate Brislin: guitar
Chad Manning: fiddle
Tony Trischka: banjo
Ethan Jodziewicz : bass