Each year, as part of the Brooklyn Folk Festival , contestants gather on the banks of the fetid Gowanus Canal to see who can throw a banjo the farthest in the - BANJO TOSS: BANJO THROWING COMPETITION! The special "throwing banjo", attached to a rope is tossed into the canal, a federally designate Super Fund site. The marked rope pays out, showing how far the banjo has been tossed. It is then hauled back in for the next throw.