Jim Mills, Ricky's banjo player, plays this out of C, with a capo at the 4th fret to put him, pitchwise, in the key of E.
I have taken a different path, tuning the banjo DOWN the equivalent of 3 frets, to an Open E tuning...
This way, if someone wants to play the song in G or A or C or another key in between any of those...all they have to do is capo from standard tunes open G and they will be right there.
The standard open tuning seems to afford more flexibility for players wanting to do this tune.
Having said all of this...my arrangement is fairly straight forward Scruggs style, but does contain some fairly challenging melodic work...not for a rank beginner.
I have the tune set up as a "Fakebook" style arrangement with the melody as sung and the lyrics on a mandolin staff at the top, a 'hidden' fiddle harmony staff under that (you won't see it unless you do the "File, Options" thing to expose the track...).
The banjo part is right underneath...starts out playing back-up while the lyrics go by and then bounces into a generic Scruggs style solo that contains, not all of, but a fair number of hints at the melody. The solo was intended to 'accompany' the melody without mirroring it completely. Scruggs did that a lot.
At any rate, this is a challenging piece to play...banjoitst have to do extra work to play in a key that comes very natural to guitar players...the key of E.
Tom
