“If you’re a beginner or a musician my teaching method gives you all the banjo skills you’ll need to learn any song you want. It’s literally the keys to the banjo and I’ll teach it you, one song at a time.”
Joff Lowson
Click below to see what you’ll get inside my Banjo Academy.
Joff Lowson Trio
NEW SINGLE ‘All the Bananas’ OUT NOW!
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Come and see us play live!
Click below to see our upcoming live dates
To find out about upcoming gigs and see live videos from some of our recent concerts, Click here
Penny - solo banjo performance
Recorded in the mountains of Andalucia, Spain, this original composition by Joff Lowson was featured in Bluegrass Today.
"Recognised as one of the UK's finest banjo players for over 30 years."
As seen on:
Recommended by:
"Bristol’s answer to Clarence White…in all the years I’ve known Joff, he’s never played a wrong note."
"Joff Lowson has the most mellifluous voice…"
"Interesting, Jazzy stuff..."
"Joff Lowson, excellent!"
"I really like what he does, especially the rockier numbers..."
"Absolutely brilliant"
"One of the UK’s foremost banjo players"
"I really like what Joff is trying to do"
It’s never too late to learn banjo!
Yvonne received her first banjo lesson on her 90th birthday
Most banjo material tries to make you run before you can walk.
I’ve spent around 50 years playing the banjo. During the last 30, I’ve also taught others. From a total beginner who’s only just picked up the banjo to musicians who want to bring that unique folky sound into their band—I’ve helped thousands of people learn to play the banjo.
Many banjo books seem to want to teach you the most complicated stuff straight away. You can learn that way, only it takes longer. Some give up before they get that satisfying sound.
A hero of mine, Earl Scruggs, played a particular style in his early years before bluegrass. When I discovered this much simpler technique—it changed the way I played banjo forever.
I’ve played on stages with thousands of people watching. With bands like ‘Hayseed Dixie’ and featured in media like BBC Radio 1 and MTV.
Throughout my journey, I’ve always come back to this simple method of playing the banjo. While teaching others, it became clear that if you use the simple hand positions I teach you in the academy—you can quickly pick-up-and-play the songs you love.
It doesn’t matter if you’ve never touched a banjo before or already know how to play another instrument. This technique makes learning faster, fun, and friendly.
Click below to see what you’ll get inside the Banjo Academy.
Some Words From Our Members
"I love your site only got my banjo for a month never played before already learned Cripple creek, old plank road , Dan tucker, dueling banjo,amazing grace, Katy hill, Cumberland gap, and started on I’ll fly away"
"thanks again for the amazing content on your site, and for finally getting me off the ground with the banjo!"
My free videos on YouTube hit one million views.
As well as the Academy and my Fast-Track learning program—I’ve also created loads of free content. The first to hit success was my cripple creek series on YouTube which rose to one million views.
That response was excellent. The popularity of my YouTube videos proved that the technique I was teaching worked well. Inspired by this result I then built and filled this website with content to help those who want to master the banjo for free.
The Banjo Academy has a full program that’ll take you through learning many songs. Each song is broken down bit by bit and teaches you the three banjo’s foundations.
You can still enjoy a lot of free content on this site that’ll give you the basics to get started. Click below to try some of my free videos before purchasing the fast track program.
What people are saying:
Bluegrass Ireland Blog
Thanks to Joff Lowson of Bristol, England, for news of additional resources for his banjo instruction website which was already impressive when the BIB first mentioned it in August 2015 Joff now reports:
I’ve recently updated several of the free pages to make a great resource for complete beginners. In particular the beginners page has a lot of new material on it, as does the easy song page.
As the BIB made clear in 2015, Joff’s website is packed with material and good advice, well organised and well presented, especially with a view to making learning easier for the beginner, whether they're familiar with bluegrass and old-time or not. With thirty years' teaching experience, he is an accredited Wernick method teacher, and one of the organisers of the Old-Time music workshop weeks in Andalucia, Spain. He has also recently made some new recordings: a fine example is his composition ‘Penny’, in old-time style. The video was shot in the Andalusian mountains.
Bluegrass Today Blog
Bill Evans is a fine player, teacher, and historian of the banjo. I was very proud to be featured alongside him in BluegrassToday.com
We have a couple of videos of banjo music to share, contributed by two prominent instructors of the five string from opposite sides of the planet.
First up is Bill Evans, who created this lovely arrangement of My Favorite Things played by he and his wife, Babi...
Now we hear from Joff Lowson, who runs his own online Banjo Academy from his home in Bristol, England. His video is a solo arrangement of his original tune, Penny, dramatically captured in the mountains near Andalusia in Spain.
Well done all!
Celeb Mix
One of the musicians attempting to repeat the seismic change that Scruggs made in his genre of music is Joff Lowson. Lowson has been described as one of the UK’s foremost banjo players and has had a successful career in music, including performing main stage at Glastonbury and appearing in live sessions on MTV, CMTV and BBC Radio 1.
Lowson achieved recognition in the national press for his banjo adaptation of Reading Rock Festival Headliners the Blue Aeroplanes’ song ‘And Stones’ which was normally played at the climax of their gigs due to the riveting solo which achieved some notoriety in rock music circles. The solo was so iconic because Lowson played the original guitar part by Angelo Bruschini on banjo at twice the speed, getting lively audiences moshing on a sold out tour of the UK.
This same tour included an iconic gig at London’s Academy where U2 had also recently performed, and which was attended by a representative of The Telegraph who reviewed the concert. A renowned outtake from that review, was that “it took a banjo to really kick things off.”
BBC Radio 5 Live
Joff appeared live recently on BBC Radio 5 with presenter Patrick Kielty
This was part of the promotion for Joff's new album, which is due out later this year. Two of Joff's songs were played on national radio, "Fire on the Hillside" and "All the Bananas."
Check out advanced student Andoni
Singing in Euskera, a ten-thousand year old language which is native to the mountains of Northern Spain.
Andoni was our first advanced student, he’s been with us since 2014.
Here he is playing a version of the Leadbelly song ‘Pick a Bale of Cotton’ with his group Lepogorriak. They have translated the lyrics into their native language Euskera, which we know as Basque in English. This language is one of the oldest languages in the world!
You can learn this song in the Banjo Academy.