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Location: Yucaipa, California | I have a Fender Mandolin (please forgive me!) and was wondering:
Can I tune it to the same pitch as the top 4 strings of a guitar (DGBE) without ripping the face off?
What about using the "octive" strings from two 12-string sets? Would that lesson the tension?
I really like the Mandolin sound, and want to include it into my Elder Care Ministry, but I don't have the time to re-learn fretboard note maps nor new chord shapes.
If it was tuned to DGBE I could use guitar fretboard note maps and chord shapes (without the bottom end of course).
Comments?
I realize I'm crazy, but that's another issue....
tim |
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Location: Fort Worth, Texas | Tim, haven't tried the tuning, but one thing that helped progress my mandolin skills was reading somewhere that the tuning is the standard guitar tuning upside down.... |
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Location: Yucaipa, California | one thing that helped progress my mandolin skills was reading somewhere that the tuning is the standard guitar tuning upside down....
....so not only do I have to use mandolin chord structures, but I have to play them standing on my head! :rolleyes: That might add some much needed excitement to my programs! :D
tim |
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Location: Shelton, Washington, USA | might i suggest that you not wear a kilt during those particular performances??????
neat idea to tune it like the top four of a guitar... i wonder if that would work... i'll have to give it a run on my mando.... wouldn't it be awesome to be able to get the mando sound without having to learn all the other crap? like standing on your head, thinking backwards, reciting string names backwards, etc..... |
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Location: NJ | Want an easy way out?
Take a shallowbowl 12-string and capo it at the 7th (or 8th) fret.
My partner and I do a kick-ass version of Rod Stewart's "Maggie May" in which I do exactly that with the 12. It sounds like the Humvee of mandolins. |
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Location: SoCal | The late Tommy Tedesco, studio musician parexcellance used to tune everything like a guitar when he could. Made things a lot easier. |
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Location: Yucaipa, California | Cliff... I do have my Balladeer 12 that I use that technique...capo 7th and it sings...
Jim: That's the point! I already have the Mandolin but my poor brain short circuits and I automatically finger guitar chords on it!
What about the Octive string idea? :confused:
BTW I also have a 6-string Banjo ... banjo sound but a guitar neck! :cool:
Ok, If you hear a "phwannngggglglcrkkk" this weekend, you'll know the face of my mandolin came off! :(
tim |
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Location: Fort Worth, Texas | Then you'll have to get an O mando |
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Location: Yucaipa, California | Paul,
Could you please call my wife and explain that to her???? pleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease
tim |
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Location: Scotland | You could tune a mandolin like a guitar but you'd need to use lighter string guages or it'll be way too tight. Gibson have introduced an A-style mandolin designed for guitar intervals. As Moody pointed out Tedesco tuned everything like guitar, but this was so he could sight-read quickly & easily on any instrument, he tuned bouzuoki like top 4 of guitar also. He would have MD's re-write bass guitar parts in the treble-clef so he could read them & get paid double-rate. He kept producers happy but pissed-off a lot of session musicians. Most of the character of the mandolin sound comes from the fact it is tuned in intervals of 5ths, while a guitar is in 4ths with a major 3rd between the G & B. Frankly, learning basic mandolin chords & scales is no challenge if you already play guitar. |
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Location: Canton (Detroit), MI | I (try to) play mando also....I think the suggestion about capoing the 12-string is a great idea. I would NOT try to tune your mando to guitar tuning, you'll either pop the top or the strings. Fortunately, I think it would be the strings, unless you use a heavy set.
Not sure how you could use guitar strings on a mando, unless your Fender uses ball-end strings, or you make loop ends by hand. I wouldn't anyway. There are already plenty of good choices for mandolins.
Cliff, I love that mental picture....a 12-string....the "humvee of mandolins"!!!! :D
Roger
1976 Applause AA14-4 6-String
1981 Ovation 1118-1 Glen Campbell 12-string
2001 Adamas 1598-MERB Melissa Etheridge 12-String
2003 Celebrity CC01 Spruce Top 6-String |
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Location: Upper Left USA | Tell me to shut up and go to sleep if you must but here's 16 bits;
The mando is set up to play the intervals of 5ths as stated. You can change the rules but there will be some compromise and loss in tone since the instrument has already been tweeked, if you will, to sound as it does at a prescribed tension.
There are other options for a similar sound. One example is the Tacoma Papoose series. A guitar, in short, that plays as though you were capoed at the 5th fret. It comes in 6 and 12 string. It is a wonderful, bright, exciting instrument! It is the only instrument I heard that projects like a roundback. They even put the soundhole in the right place. If ovation set up an instrument like this I would buy two (I hope you are listening).
The Ovation/Applause AA12 has similar characteristics but doesn't go as far. With xtra lights I can only go two frets higher. If there was a 12 string option it would be soooo keeewl!
I believe that your 6 string banjo was designed for that.
Oh yeah, my point. Play the instrument as designed for the best effect. There are plenty of options out there.
LBNL - Tim, for your wardrobe:Manly Wear |
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Location: Central Oregon | A buddy of mine that plays at the mall has a Tacoma Papoose. He's the only guy I'd met before I went over there. I haven't played it yet but he rocks out with it. It has an electric pickup too. His name is Glenn Miller. Really. We also have John Hancock.
/\/\/ |
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Location: Upper Left USA | Forgive me of skewing post topics again but here's one.
For the last 3 weeks there has been a new Apprentice coming to my bus stop for our commute. His name is Josh, and he's a pretty nice guy. I was talking to him today and I happened to look down at his security badge. It reads;
Joshua White
I asked him if he'd consider signing the label on my Ovation! He didn't understand :confused:
Wouldn't that be worth at least two gen-u-wine GC truss rod covers? |
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Location: NJ | The janitor in my high school was named Frank Sinatra . . . oddly enough, they were about the same age, too. |
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Location: Yucaipa, California | Mwoody,
Thanks for the Kilt Link!
Interesting that, because I am a member of the Clan Campbell (my wife is also 1/2 Scottish)and when I was in Scotland 3-years ago, I came ever-so-close to having a Clan Tartan Kilt made for me... didn't quite have the cash though! :( In Edinburgh there were kilts everywhere... it was great! I'd move there in a heartbeat! :D
As for the Mando tunings... sometimes I just want the easy way out.... thanks for all of the replies! Good information/advice as usual!
tim |
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Location: Upper Left USA | Tim,
I haven't bought a kilt yet. It's just another way to air your differences. It may also add to the Rollback Roll.
And... Jesus loves Banjo Players too! |
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Location: NJ | . . . not according to Mel Gibson. |
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Location: SoCal | Jesus loves all the sinners, including banjo players (the bigger the sin, the more the love! And that's one helluva big sin). |
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Location: Yucaipa, California | Hmmmmm.....
As long as I'm considered a "banjo sinner", I may as well make it the Ultimate Insult: If Ovation can make Mandolins, why not make an Ovation Banjo!??? :D
ok, I'm ready for the stoning! :eek:
tim |
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Location: NJ | Oh, jeez! . . will you Californians just slide into the Pacific already so Witko can have "oceanfront property"?? :D |
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Location: SoCal | If they keep building houses out here, we might just sink under our own weight. |
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Location: Las Cruces, NM | Been playin' them there mandolins for almost 40 yars, I'd say tune it any way you want to, they is made vurry tough, acstually tuning like a gitter is lower than the way the fiddle players tune there mandolins, but what in hell does a fiddle player know about reel music. I ain't never seen one who could reeely play an accordeeein like Larry Welk could.
Also, I saw a TV show last night about this family that was a wunderful bunch of musicans, and there on top of there grand peano was a roundback antique Washburn mandolin (I had wun just like it, and saw the Sons Of the Pioneers p;aying one in an old movie), you culd tell they was real musicians as they had this antique mandolin spicing up the way there peano looked even tho it din't even have strings on it (That would have been SO hillbilly if it had strings). |
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Location: Athens, GA & Gnashville | Youz guyz just keep the banjo jokes, already! See you ALL in hell!! ;) |
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Location: Seattle Tacoma Washington | Hello Tim, I kind of like the mando chords. They seem easier than guitar chords. If there are some you can't find look here http://chordfind.com/4-string/ Another option would be for the GHS Ultra light set so you can tune them up to guitar tuning, or roll it back either 1/2 or 1 step. Just thoughts.
Glenn Anderson
MM68-4 |
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A Dumb question about Mandolins from Tim-
