I've been playing clawhammer for a few years mostly focusing on old time tunes but lately I've been getting more and more into singing with the banjo, to the extent that I find 90% of my practice these days involves singing while playing clawhammer. This had led to a renewed interested in the music of Pete Seeger.
A few songs which I particularly like his versions of are Kisses Sweeter than Wine (starts after 1 minute 30 seconds) , Summertime and Which Side are you On.
There are other folky songs which I'd like to be able to play too.
Is up picking generally considered the way to go for playing folk songs solo or is it possible to play all of these clawhammer style too? Kisses Sweeter than Wine and Summertime sound to me like they wouldn't really work with clawhammer but I must be honest, I haven't actually tried to work them out on my banjo.
I have read a lot about clawhammer and up picking being generally interchangable in terms of tab etc. I don't have any experience of up picking but from listening the feel seems completely different to clawhammer.
Has anyone who learned up picking after clawhammer noticed a negative effect on their clawhammer playing due to the similarity of the styles? I have the seeger book and I must admit from my extremely brief attempt at it (as in a few minutes) I found the up picking concept to be counter intuitive and kept just wanting to use a downstroke.
Anyone here play both styles?