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Posts: 2487
| Question?
Can anyone tell me why Mandolins follow the strick, ancient, rules of neck manufacture!
Why can't someone make a Mandolin that has a slighly wider neck?
Perhaps another 3/16ths or even 1/8th?? This would make such a difference in my playing.
Perhaps there is a brand I do not know of that does this? IF not here you go guy's! Good way to break into the instrument market! I'd bet youd pick up a good share of the market if one was made with good quality and a slightly wider neck.
Randy |
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Location: Texas | Gibson makes the "Sam Bush" model F-5 mandolin and it has a wider neck than their other F-5 models.
It is a reproduction of Sam's 1938 Gibson F-5 known as "Hoss".
Blind Lemon Parker :cool:
www.sergiolara.com |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | An interesting question. I can't say that I've ever seen one wider but it sure makes sense.
Maybe they want them thin to keep all the guitar players can't figure them out. |
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| Sam Bash! I'll look into it! Yeah Just don't get it Not to difficult to figure out how to play one but I have to crowd my fingers all the time. Seems foolish it is a good instrument otherwise. Love the sounds it adds.
Randy |
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Posts: 338
Location: Toronto | I heard once that the mandolin was just the bottom four strings of the guitar, backwards - so a person with dyslexia could learn how to play a mando...
Don't know if it's true tho
;) |
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Location: Waurika OK | I believe the one Blind Lemon Parker mentioned had a 1 1/4 nut width.
Mid Missouri is also now making one with a 1 1/4 inch nut width. W series
I found an ad for a used Harmony Monterrey ($425) that had a 1 3/8 nut.
Pegleg Dog Hopkins |
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Location: Fort Worth, Texas | Ya just gotta work up that different technique of fingering. At least that's my excuse for not being very good at the mandolin... :) |
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Location: Florida | While playing the mandolin, its not unheard of to press two courses of strings with the same finger - that is 4 strings, one fingertip.
Think.... in guitar terms, playing an Em chord on a 12 string with one finger... and having the other fingers do all sorts of knucklebusting #@$@#$#@ while you're trying to hold it there.
Also (and its a biggie).... Mandolin players tend to be an unusual sort. For the most part, if its not a Gibson F style, then it better be a Gibson A style. Sort of like saying all guitars must exactly follow the Martin pattern, or the Les Paul pattern.
Northcountry, try getting your hands on a mandola. You've got a lot more room. |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | northcountry
As a mandolin player for many years I feel that I have to comment.
I had a Washburn early century roundback that had a neck precisely like a violin, and was a little hard for me to play. the rest of my mandolins are Gibson related and have necks like the fabled Gibsons. The way a mandolin player deals with the small neck is by thinking horizontally, I place my fingers horizontally on the neck, which makes a big hand an advantage. Look at your hand and think that you have almost a foot of fretboard horizontally, much more than a guitars less than two inches vertically. Every chord is played from left to right, not up and down. Melody is the same, up to the seventh fret, and all four fingers are in play. DON'T think of a mandolin as a little guitar, think mandolin, and that fretboard will look like a 12 inch wide fingerboard laid on it's side and played that way for many years. Most mandolin players curse the possibilities presented by such a lot of possibilities and only one life to live to explore them all.
Bailey |
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Location: Florida | NOW THAT IS THE BEST MANDO ADVICE I'VE EVER GOTTEN!!!
Thank you! |
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Location: Nova Scotia, Canada | That's great, Bailey...thanks!
Wayne |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | The best mandolin advice I ever got was when someone told me to sell mine. |
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| Bailey ! Wow I do actually understand what your saying. Not that you are usually hard to understand but I am usually musically challenged! Thanks........... It is a great little instrument!
I am only learning a few songs so my knowledge of this little axe is very limited. But once you get a few chords and it starts sounding good it is addicting!
Charley B; Mandola? that's new to me too.
So many instruments, so little life!
Randy |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | Randy
I love the mandolin sound and I guess that is why I am a mandolin player. A mandolin is just like a violin, no mortal can ever conquer it.
Bailey (and I am mortal, but Jethro Burns is Immortal) |
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Mandolins ! Why !
