Joel had spent weeks perfecting his routine. Little did he know that the final performance would go viral.
It began with Joel, a high school kid, walking on stage in full hillbilly attire.
With a banjo in his hand, nothing on his feet and a stick of straw in his mouth, he got into place.
He sat in a chair, plugged his banjo in and announced that he’d like to say a couple of words.
Those words were mostly an inaudible mumble. At the end of the short speech, he said, “And I’m proud of it.” Well, it’s good to be proud, unless you’re proud of a bad thing.
Then he began playing his banjo. At first, it was just a little warm-up, and then he dove into the performance.
The kids, who had laughed at his outfit, were suddenly enthralled. For the next few minutes, he played his song flawlessly.
When he finished, he thanked the crowd and played something else.
This song was just as good as the first. No one could believe that their schoolmate had such an amazing talent.
At the end of this second song, he stood up and threw his hat to the cheering crowd.
Unsurprisingly, this performance was enough for Joel to win first place in the school talent show. But he wasn’t expecting for people all over the world to see this performance.
Footage of Joel playing the banjo appeared on YouTube, where it soon went viral.
To date, it has gained over 17.2 million views. It also has more than 68,000 likes and 3,800 comments. People have been saying things like this:
Since this video, Joel has done a lot of growing up. He’s now an adult who can legally drink alcohol and everything.
He’s also stuck with music and banjo playing in particular.
In 2020, he uploaded a banjo instrumental that he wrote himself.
His banjo playing had gotten even better. He could certainly go far!
Banjos are often used in country music, but have you ever wondered how that came to be?
Well, the first banjo was invented in the Caribbean in the colonial era. They were first used by enslaved people. In fact, the oldest known banjo dates to the 1770s, the same decade that saw America gain its independence from the British Empire.
By the middle of the 1800s, banjos had become popular in the USA, particularly in the south.
Then banjo musicians from the south began traveling all over the country and later to Europe, making the instrument become popular across continents. In fact, historians estimate that between the years 1844 to 1866, the number of banjos in New York City increased from a handful to 10,000.
Banjos remained popular until The Great Depression, when tough economic times led to their sales tapering off.
In fact, the market for banjos was practically nonexistent by the outbreak of World War 2.
Luckily, after the war ended, banjos became popular again. Of course, their associations with the American South are still strong, as Joel’s performance outfit proved.
Who knows, perhaps Joel could make the banjo more popular than ever? Stranger things have happened.
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