Harley Benton HBJ-24 Short Scale Tenor Banjo

The banjo is a well-built instrument. The resonator and pot are solid and tight, with good tension on the drum head. The neck and fretboard are comfortable; the frets are level, very clean along the neck, and well-polished. The tail piece and arm rest are solid, and performing their functions as expected. The bridge is securely affixed, stable, and keeping the strings in place.

It was somewhat more difficult to fully evaluate the tuning machines; they are basic, no-frills, economy tuners. The banjo shipped with fairly standard tenor banjo strings, but far too light for Irish tuning on a 17-fret banjo. I found it difficult to achieve a G2-D3-A3-E4 tuning, and almost impossible to keep it in tune. The strings and tuners did a better job of achieving and retaining a C3-D3-G4-A4 tuning. With a set of strings closer to .040, .030, .020w, .010 the supplied tuning machines should be satisfactory.

Overall, this a very nicely made musical instrument that would be perfect for the student or multi-instrumentalist who wants to be able to tote along a selection of instruments to fill in where needed at pub sessions. This banjo is easily the equal of any other economy banjo that is actually built to be used as a real musical instrument, but at much better cost to consumer; plus, the techs at Thomann did a great job of making sure the banjo was in good working order and setup well. The banjo could still be offered at great price if it were shipped with basic/economy Grover tenor banjo tuning machines, and that would improve it to a five-star offering.

I'm a regular customer with Thomann. If your looking at this banjo then you are most likely thinking of buying an Irish style banjo for traditional folk music. Curiously the banjo is supplied with the wrong strings for this venture. The supplied strings will tune correctly for a standard trad jazz banjo namely C,G,D&A. Its simple enough to just buy a set of Harley Benton electric guitar strings gauge 11-52 currently £1.29 (yes you read that price correct) and cannibalize the set for this banjo. This banjo will take either hoop or ball end strings.

Banjo, supplied with a quality Remo weatherking 11" head. Its good i won't be replacing the head but i did have to remove the resonator to tighten up the head (The tool is included with the banjo) takes all of 5-10 minutes. No fret buzz, the banjo pot is metal, i thought it was wood from the pictures but metal is better for volume.....to my surprise this is not a heavy banjo which is a plus for me. However i do regret not buying a banjo strap when i purchased this item. As others have stated the tuners do function but have some play so this is probably where HB has cut costs to keep the banjo at a nice budget price.

I've been noodlin' away at trad folk music today on this banjo and really enjoyed it, granted if you wanted to get in a session you will need to get the strings changed but for just playing around the house its grand.

I've owned 3 HB banjos and this is the one i've really wanted. It's just the right size for what i want to play namely traditional folk music.