May 5, 2025 - JOHN’S BUSY WEEK
My daughter, Kara, and her co-teacher, Sara organized a fundraiser for their school. Apparently, the funding had run out for an extensive field trip to the Cummings Nature Center. Not wanting to disappoint their students these two dedicated educators were willing to pay $900 out of their own pocket so that the planned trip would still happen. They came up with the idea of a soup fund raising event serving a variety of homemade soups and bread (generously donated by Leo’s Bakery) at our store in exchange for a small donation. Not only was it an overwhelming success, but they raised enough money to fund the trip in the fall. A total of $2000 was raised! Thank you community of Rochester for your support.
Julie amidst the flowers at Highland Park
Ward Hayden and the Outliers stopped by the store on Saturday and gave Julie one of their CDs. Now to find a CD player!
Fred Van Eps, the father of the great guitarist George Van Eps was a banjo builder and remarkable player. We are in possession of one only twenty-four flush-fret, scalloped fingerboard banjos that he made in his lifetime.
Ray Montana was the original "singing cowboy". Here he is on the front cover of the 1925 Frets magazine in all his cowboy regalia sporting his original Bacon and Day "Montana" banjo, which is now in our possession
JOHN’S BUSY WEEK
May 5th, 2025
Greetings folks,
Despite taking the entire week off from working at the store, my life was busier than ever. On Tuesday Julie and I went into Rochester to help out with the event that my daughter Kara and Ryan Yarmel had organized. The purpose was to raise money for her school’s outdoor trip. Julie’s birthday was on Wednesday and that usually takes up a good portion a week, but we also had the American Banjo Fraternity spring rally which I attended and displayed some fine instruments. All three of these events were great successes.
The fundraiser was such a success that I would like to give a shout out to all of those who showed up and donated. The students who my daughter teaches seldom get a chance to interact with the outdoors. As a result of your generosity, they will not only have this experience in he Spring but there is enough left over to fund the experience this Fall.
For Julie‘s birthday, on Wednesday, we went out to dinner at a fine Japanese restaurant with my brother Pat, his wife, Kathy and our friends John and Sheila….it was a splendid time to say the least.
On Thursday I set up a little booth at the American Banjo Fraternity rally and sold a couple of things but mainly just visited with old friends. I was so happy to spend a bit of time with Madeleine Kaufman, whose husband Elias passed away recently. There were several young fellows who were really keen instrumentalists. Drew Frech, the musical director, kept them all organized and they played some great tunes as an orchestra and also individual performances. One of the tunes was written by our own Gavin Rice. (I’ll have more about that later) There were several evening concerts but it was too far for me to drive home in the dark so I missed seeing Aaron Jonah Lewis‘s concert and Gavin‘s performance on Saturday night.
On Sunday, we spent some time with our newest addition to the family…Talia Rose and her parents. They spent the day with us in Penn Yan. At seven weeks old, she got her first listen to live music at both Abandoned Brewery and later Laurentide Brewery… we think she’s developing a taste for Rock and Roll and suds!
With peace,
John Bernunzio
The American Banjo Fraternity is a small, but dedicated group. They meet twice yearly and share the banjo music from the period of 1880-1920. It is referred to as “classic banjo". The instruments are all set up traditionally with light gut or nylon strings and are played finger style with music that is written specifically for the banjo. Among the great players that were there were Drew Frech, Aaron Jonah Lewis, and our own Gavin Rice.
In our front living room with the first Bacon and Day Montana banjo made AND, what us perhaps the last of the 24 flush fret Van Eps banjos…. this one from 1951 and in mint condition. We will be listing both of these for sale on our website sometime in the next week or so.