Damien O’Kane, left, and Ron Block, with their contrasting banjos
THE humble banjo is often maligned…until placed in the whirling hands of Northern Irishman Damien O’Kane and Californian Ron Block, whose banjo bromance blooms anew on third album Banjovial and its accompanying tour.
The 14-date itinerary opened in Barnsley last Friday and arrives at the National Centre for Early Music, York, on Wednesday (15/10/2025).
Seven years on from their Banjophany debut album, followed by 2022’s Banjophonics, Coleraine-born, Barnsley-based O’Kane picks up his Irish tenor banjo once more to recharge his telepathic transatlantic connectivity with Gardena-born Block’s five-string bluegrass banjo on Banjovial’s ten new tunes and two original songs, supplemented by guest contributions from Irish button accordionist Sharon Shannon and American bluegrass fiddlers Aubrey Haynie and Tim Crouch.
Percussive and punchy, ebullient and life-affirming, their banjo union revels in light and shade and tempo shifts from fast, cracking fireworks to more reflective flowing timbres and tunes.
“It would have been in 2012 when we first performed together,” says Damien, as he looks forward to returning to the NCEM – “a gorgeous little place” – for the first time in more than a decade.
“I first met Ron in 2011 as he’s involved in a bluegrass summer school called Sore Fingers at Kingham High School [in the Cotswolds], where Kate’s brother Joe works every year on the sound for the concerts.” Kate being Barnsley folk singer Kate Rusby, Damien’s wife since 2010.
“Ron invited us to see him playing with Alison Krauss & Union Station [his regular beat] and invited us backstage, and that was our first meeting.”
Block duly played on two songs on Rusby’s album 20, joining Eddi Reader and Dick Gaughan on Wandering Soul and Reader, Jerry Douglas and Philip Selway on Sho Heen. “Kate then asked Ron to play on the 20 tour , so it all went uphill from there!” says Damien.
The cover artwork for Damien O’Kane and Ron Block’s third album, Banjovial, released on Cooking Vinyl on October 3
Their partnership brings out the best in each other’s banjos. “The most notable difference is that the five-string banjo is bigger with more frets and those five strings, and Ron plays with two picks on his fingers and one on his thumb, so his style is very much fingerstyle, very ‘arpeggioed’, whereas the Irish tenor banjo is plectrum style,” says Damien.
“Over the years we’ve both tried in our playing to give a nod to the other style, so I’ll do a lot of cross-picking on the Irish tenor banjo.
“It makes for really interesting tunes with two completely different banjo sounds. The five-string strings are lighter, so there’s a brighter sound, whereas I like the mellow sound of the Irish tenor banjo that doesn’t ‘punch you in the face’!”
Damien has always been a fan of duel banjo playing. “I grew up listening to and playing Irish traditional music, watching music sessions from The Corner House on Irish TV [on Geantrai on TG4], when Cathal Hayden and Brian McGrath would play tunes together, just two banjos,” he says.
“I was about nine years old, and I remember it being one of the most amazing things I’d ever heard. It was like a banjo epiphany.”
O’Kane and Block first toured together on their own, but now perform with a band featuring Steven Byrnes on guitar and Duncan Lyall on double bass and Moog, both from Rusby’s band.
“It’s fascinating to do because I don’t really get to play much banjo on Kate’s tours, which is my main focus through the year, primarily playing guitar, and yet the banjo was my main instrument long before guitar, so to be able to record and play tunes with Ron is a real chance to push each other’s musicianship,” says Damien.
The Damien O’Kane and Ron Black Band, featuring Steven Byrnes and Duncan Lyall
“I remember thinking with the first album, ‘oh my god, I’m playing with Ron Block, I have to bring my A-game’.”
He still does, this time in tandem with Block on tunes “triggered by comedic events, family and friends, CS Lewis’s The Chronicles Of Narnia’, heart-stopping moments, beloved animals, the craziness of Covid and even cartoon themes, swinging from the humorous to the heartfelt”.
“We record everything live for the albums, as playing live give it an extra spark,” says Damien. “I think the new album is definitely our best, probably in a few senses, one of them being that we really learned how to lock on to each other’s playing.
“There’s a running joke we have that I’m always ahead and Ron is always behind, which adds to the excitement, as we’re not about making perfect music.
“This album is more mature. I’m not taking anything away from the other two but we’ve learned so much from each other and from the band. We’re tight-knit now, knowing each other’s strengths – and weaknesses too!”
It was Ron Block, by the way, who came up with the Banjovial album title. “We wanted to keep that title theme going, and I thought, ‘that’s the one’, as it sums up what we do, when people tend to be scared of one banjo, let alone two, but not us!”
Damien and Kate had first met Banjovial guest contributor Sharon Shannon when they were gigging at Monroe’s Live in Galway, where Sharon lives. “We were playing upstairs and she was playing a session downstairs; she came up to listen to the last half of Kate’s set and we went out for a couple of drinks afterwards,” he recalls.
Galway button accordionist Sharon Shannon: Played on Damien’s tune St Patrick’s Day on Banjovial
“That’s when I asked if she’d like to play on the album, and she said, ‘oh, absolutely’, which was a pinch-me moment, as I’d listened to her albums since childhood. She’s a sweetheart too.
“We sent her the track [Damien’s St Patrick’s Day], she recorded it in Galway, and that was that!”
Likewise, Damien and Ron sent the track Mario Kart Rides Again to bluegrass fiddler and mandolin player Aubrey Haynie. “I’d never come across him before but Ron said, ‘we’ve got to get him on an album some time because he’s amazing’,” says Damien.
“All the car sound effects on there, the car screeching, the police car, Aubrey did them all on his fiddle. He’s incredible.”
On the road from October 10 to 26, Damien will be on driving duty. “Ron stays in the passenger seat. He did drive us once over here, and I told him he’d never do that again!” he says.
Damien O’Kane and Ron Block Band’s Banjovial Tour plays National Centre for Early Music, York, tomorrow (15/10/2025), 7.30pm, and Otley Courthouse, October 24, 8pm. Box office: York, 01904 658338 or ncem.co.uk; Otley, 01943 467466 or otleycourthouse.org.uk.
Damien O’Kane’s guitars and banjo will be in the band for Kate Rusby’s Christmas Is Merry concert at York Barbican on December 11, 7pm. Box office: yorkbarbican.co.uk.
