Banjo NewsLetter Archives - Bluegrass Today

Banjo NewsLetter office moves to Wisconsin

Banjo NewsLetter, the print magazine dedicated to three finger and clawhammer banjo that was published from 1973 to 2021, has announced a move of their business office. They are not resuming publication, but the magazine and its rich archive of articles, reviews, instructional information, and tablature remains available online for $8.99 per year.

Founded in 1973 by Hub Nitchie and his wife, Nancy, in Maryland, Banjo NewsLetter was the first of its kind for bluegrass banjo players in the US. Hub was a banjo player himself, and wrote much of the copy initially, along with a small number of outside contributors. When he died in 1992, Nancy kept it going until their sons, Spencer and Donald, took over in 1994.

The two brothers managed the magazine successfully until 2021, when Spencer died from cancer at only 57 years of age. The prospect of assuming all aspects of the business alone proved too daunting for Donald, who was approaching retirement age, and faced with the rising costs of paper and mailing that had been upending the entire magazine industry. Publication was suspended in September of ’21, pending a search for a new owner. Failing that, BNL has remained an online resource of back issues and tablature ever since.

But now Spencer’s daughter Sofia has taken over the running of Banjo NewsLetter, and is moving the archive of print back issues to Wisconsin where she lives. She will also be working to ensure that print copies of all back issues will be available for purchase from the web site.

Banjo NewsLetter’s online resources include a searchable archive of all song and tune tabs available for sale, as well as a listing of all back issues with their contents, and the ability to order them. They also maintain a number of free tablatures and audio files, plus helpful information for anyone just starting to learn to play the banjo.

All this can be found online.

Banjo NewsLetter suspends publication

Following closely on the death of Spencer Nitchie, his brother and business partner, Donald, has announced that Banjo NewsLetter, the print periodical for banjo players, will suspend publication following the current September issue.

Donald and Spencer took over the magazine when their father, Banjo NewsLetter founder Hub Nitchie, died in 1992. Since 1971, Hub had passionately guided the newsletter from its infancy to a beloved and respected monthly contribution to the continued education and entertainment of 5 string banjo players of every style at every level. Regular columns were dedicated to new students, others to old time playing, or the music of Earl Scruggs. It always included reviews of newly released recordings, instructional materials, and products, instruments, and accessories of interest to the banjo world. Plus interviews with top figures in the community, players, teachers and instrument makers alike.

Donald and Spencer maintained the traditions their father started, and took the magazine into the future, going to a full color format and adding an online subscription function.

After taking over in ’92, they quickly established a workflow that had continued until Spencer’s illness required him to step aside in recent months. Donald served as editor, compiling the various columns and tablature selections, laying everything out in the software, and getting it to the printer each month. Meanwhile Spencer handled the business side of the journal, including advertising, subscriptions, accounts payable and receivable, and mailing services. It was an efficient partnership while it lasted, and kept Banjo NewsLetter a highly-anticipated publication into its 50th year.

But the combined emotional toll of losing his beloved brother, and facing a doubled work load going forward, has caused Donald to hit the pause button and consider the next chapter for the magazine. In his monthly editor’s column, Callous Thumb (started by Hub when he was editor), he explains things thusly.

With the loss of our publisher and the need for a major reorganization, it is with deep regret that we announce the suspension of Banjo NewsLetter publication after this issue. It is too logistically challenging to continue at this time. Many subscribers might not realize it was only the two of us at the helm, producing each magazine, each of us in different states. This issue will also only be online.

In recent years the Banjo NewsLetter has barely subsisted from issue to issue (it’s a challenging time for print publications). The magazine has always been partly a labor of love, and we are trying to think of ways that its content might continue. I have been talking with several people about BNL’s future. It’s too early to say for certain, but hopefully the newsletter will continue, perhaps under new management or in a different format. We ask for your patience. Check our website for further announcements. Spencer and I were proud of the magazine we produced together for so long, and again, I am so grateful to our many loyal subscribers, contributors and advertisers, for your generous support over the years.

In communication with Donald since Spencer’s passing, it is clear that he wants to see the magazine continue, but without him as the sole participant. Anything that lasts for decades will typically pass through several hands. As Hub created something and Spencer and Donald carried it forward to this point, it seems it is time for someone else to raise the banner of Banjo NewsLetter and carry it into the future.

Nitchie is eager to hear from anyone with ideas or a willingness to become involved. He would be open to staying an active part of publication, or turning things over to younger, more energetic managers. It could continue in print or go completely online. What is most important to Donald is seeing his father’s legacy, and he and his brothers’, remain a part of the wonderful world of banjo.

Donald has made the September issue, anchored by a lengthy interview with Béla Fleck by Noam Pikelny, completely free online.

Anyone with ideas about the continuation of the venerable Banjo NewsLetter is invited to contact Donald online.

Spencer Nitchie passes

Spencer Nitchie, co-owner/operator of Banjo NewsLetter, died on August 6 following a brief bout with liver and pancreatic cancer. He was 57 years of age.

Since 1992, Spencer and his brother, Donald, have run the publication launched by their father, Hub, who died that year. Hub launched it as a print periodical in 1971, taking it to the status of a ‘must have’ monthly magazine for lovers of all kinds of five string banjo music. Since taking over for their dad, the Nitchies have increased circulation and moved Banjo NewsLetter online, though the print edition is still shipped every month.

Before becoming a publisher, Spencer had attended Towson State College in Maryland. He then took the classic journey of discovery traveling in Europe with his guitar in 1984. Playing on the streets of London, Paris, Nice, Florence, Athens and other cities, he learned a number of different languages and returned to the States with a wife, Silvia Breida of Rivigliasco, Italy. After Silvia’s passing in 1990, Spencer took on the role of single parent to their daughter, Sofia.

Spencer was remarried in 2018 to his long-time partner, Tara Boyle, on Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts where he was born.

Donald remembered his brother and partner in his editor’s Callous Thumb column of the September issue thusly.

On August 6, 2021, my beloved brother Spencer passed away from pancreatic cancer. He had been diagnosed in early May. It happened very fast, and since he was in pain, blessedly so. At the time of his death, Spencer was 57: a musician, father, husband, brother, son and loving friend to many. He was especially appreciated in the traditional Irish music scene of Maryland, where his expertise on several instruments, including tenor banjo, flute, fiddle, concertina, guitar, and penny whistle, was an inspiration and encouragement to others. Spencer was also the one most BNL readers were in contact with, because he answered the phone, dealt with subscriptions, renewals, passwords for online and back issues, along with his other duties with printing and mailing.

R.I.P., Spencer Nitchie.

UPDATE 9/3/21 – Banjo NewsLetter has announced that they are suspending publication.

Medical fund established for Spencer Nitchie of Banjo NewsLetter

Sad news from the Nitchie family of Annapolis, MD, and fans of Banjo NewsLetter, The Five String Banjo Magazine.

Spencer Nitchie, who has published Banjo NewsLetter with his brother, Donald, since their dad, Hub, passed away in 1992, is dying from liver and pancreatic cancer. A medical fund has been established to help the family keep him comfortable for his final days/weeks/months, and to prevent them from having to shutter the magazine to devote all their time to his care.

Hub started Banjo NewsLetter in 1971, with assistance from his wife, Nancy, who had urged her two sons to take over the business when Hub passed away. Donald handled the editorial duties, while Spencer served as business manager. Despite banjo music being a decidedly niche market, they have maintained the magazine ever since, delivering it by mail to devoted banjo players and students all over the world. Each issue typically includes a mix of interviews, news, and banjo tabs, plus reviews of new products of interest to the banjo community, both three finger and clawhammer.

Interestingly, all three Nitchie men were fans of different types of banjo playing. Hub was a tried-and-true grasser, while Donald prefers old time banjo, and Spencer was fascinated by Celtic music on tenor banjo.

For the time being, publication is still ongoing, though they are not taking any new or renewal subscriptions at this time. As you might imagine, they have not become conspicuously wealthy publishing the NewsLetter.

A GoFundMe page has been set up by friends of Spencer and his wife, Tara, to provide some professional care for Spencer, and to help with various uncovered medical expenses and loss of income. Tara is not working in order to care for her husband, and Donald and other family members are trying to spell her as they are able.

Those of us who have enjoyed and benefited from Banjo NewsLetter over the past fifty years are urged to consider making a donation online in gratitude for the work the Nitchies have done all that time. If enough of us do so, they can easily reach their $50,000 goal on GoFundMe.

Contributions using major credit cards or PayPal can be securely processed online.

J.D. Crowe tribute in Banjo NewsLetter

The venerable Banjo NewsLetter has dedicated its December issue to the career and music of the great J.D. Crowe. Surely among the finest bluegrass banjo players ever to don picks, BNL uses the recent announcement of Crowe’s retirement to remember the many decades of artistry and technical brilliance he has given the banjo world since first joining up with Mac Wiseman in 1955 at the age of 18.

To even briefly sketch his musical career leads you to recognize what a crucial figure in the development of modern bluegrass he has been. From Mac’s group Crowe went to work for Jimmy Martin for several years before striking out on his own. He formed the Kentucky Mountain Boys with Doyle Lawson and Red Allen, before launching The New South, one of the most storied bands in the history of our music.

But it was the recordings he made as part of the Bluegrass Album Band with Lawson and Tony Rice that forever cemented his place in the banjo firmament.

For this special remembrance issue of BNL, the magazine has presented a recent interview with Crowe, plus an article containing tributes shared with the editors from many of the top banjo players of the day. Each expresses a mix of gratitude and appreciation for the man who has epitomized banjo excellence for most of their lives.

The December issue also includes a number of tab transcriptions taken from the AcuTab Crowe book. This is one that is certain to become a collector’s item.

Banjo NewsLetter offers individual issues for direct sale from their web site for $6, and online subscriptions are only $19.99/year. Print subscriptions are also available, with rates dependent on the mailing address.

Christmas time’s a’ comin’!

That Evening Sun from Thom Moore

That Evening Sun is a terrific album of delicate banjo music from Thom Moore, which escaped our attention when it was first released in December of last year. Thom had actually sent us a copy, but it never reached our editorial office owing to an address snafu.

We may be a bit late to the game, but wanted to be sure that our readers were aware of this recording, which includes 16 original banjo tunes of Moore’s, performed with sparse accompaniment in the three finger style.

Though he started out picking bluegrass, Thom’s music is more impressionistic, using our familiar 5-string to interpret his compositions in a style that melds influences of Celtic, old time and bluegrass. In fact, I bear some responsibility for his introduction to the banjo, as he took a few lessons from me in the late 1970s when he was just getting started.

But after a brief fling, he set the banjo down for the next 20 years. Coming back to it around the turn of the century, Thom dedicated himself to both learning to play, and creating his own music.

A number of the songs have a bluegrass/fiddle tune vibe, like Little Walker, Hames and Traces and Up to Dreaming Creek, which is a bit more space grassy. The bulk tend towards slower pieces, reminiscent of Celtic airs in many cases.

Thom thanks Tony Ellis ion the liner notes, and his influence is clear to anyone familiar with Tony’s music. I also hear a bit of Joel Mabus, another somewhat iconoclastic banjo player, who excels on guitar and mandolin as well.

Throughout the album Moore is supported by Zan McLeod on guitar, bouzouki and bass, and Matt Combs and Erynn Marshall on fiddle. Ben Sanders and Gary Tussing add cello on a couple of tunes, and Tim Moore supplies percussion on one.

Moore’s contribution is honored this month with a cover feature in Banjo NewsLetter, an interview conducted by Alan Munde.

That Evening Sun is available on CD from County Sales and CD Baby, and for download purchase from the major digital distributors.