Just got this oval hole Nobility on EBay and the FedEx truck will drop it off any moment! http://www.ebay.com/itm/380443335555...84.m1439.l2649 Can't wait to figure out what strings it wants, but I am leaning towards trying Jazzmando JM11's. BB
WOW!!! Astonishing condition. Looks like it never left its case.
It arrived and it is a beauty! Took off the rusty strings and threw a set of GHS Lights on it and it came to life! Nice tubby oval hole sound but clear. I have a beautiful, old Harmony birch/spruce top archtop that I got from Jake Wildwood that has Thomastik flatwounds and now I am spoiled. Just ordered a couple of sets of Jazzmando JM11's for this one. So why do I keep looking at F-Styles? Scroll envy...
I stopped looking at scrolled mandos early on when I found out that the scroll itself had littie or nothing to do with the sound but everything to do with the price.... On the other hand the absurdity of the scroll still fascinates me, and in truth if I had the spare cash I would probably buy one for that reason. Yours has activated my case of "oval hole envy". I can relate to your description of the sound, I felt the same way when I repaired and strung up my first (f hole) Stradolin. It growled at me on the first pluck on the g string and I knew I had something really special.
Are there any f-style mandos that even approach the low end produced by an oval hole?
Not having an oval hole Stradolin i have no idea.... But my two f hole Stradolins are quite different in sound, one being spruce top and the other being maple top. My spruce topped Stradolin, has a wonderful bass. Louder znd more resonant than the one with the maple top.
Thanks for the discussion - you've answered my question about likely using light strings. Remember the one on e-bey held by a wood figure? It just arrived today. Going by the wear on the top near where the right hand wrist would go, it was likely played by a man - that wear pattern makes me think of the buttons on a shirtsleeve rubbing. Even with the strings loosened for shipping, I'm excited about the sound. I'll give it a bit to acclimate (do some gardening while I wait) then put the light strings on, and fire it up.
I use light strings on most of my mandolins because all except one are 70+ years old and most have been repaired/rebuilt by me. I have had one mandolin deconstruct from a bad batch of glue shortly after stringing it up. It was that horrible liquid hyde glue which I have so faith in at all now, though some claim to have had success with it.
