Stringbean

To millions of younger country music fans, David Akeman, better known as Stringbean, was one of the comedy powerhouses of the Grand Ole Opry and television's Hee Haw, of which he was one of the original cast members. As a banjo player, however, his work goes back to the 1940s and a three-year stint with Bill Monroe.



Akeman was born to a farm family in Annville, in Jackson County, KY, and he became interested in music at an early age -- no surprise there, since not only did his father play the banjo at local dances, but he was surrounded by players of considerable skill in his local community, from all of whom he learned the banjo. He built his first homemade instrument at age seven out of a shoebox and thread borrowed from his mother, and by the time he was 12 he traded a pair of prize bantams he had raised for a real banjo. He was already making the rounds of local dances and developing a reputation on the instrument, but not earning a living. Akeman spent time working for the Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps, building roads and planting trees.

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