Mandola (Viola) and Guitar accompaniment

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I had an interesting jam with a fiddler friend this afternoon, that may interest some of the CBOM folks here.

He's a very good player, classically trained but also teaches OldTime and Irish in addition to Classical. We were in a band together a few years ago. When he played in orchestra in his younger days, he was a violist, and he still considers that his main instrument, with fiddle as a necessary second for teaching (not a lot of call for viola instructors in my neck of the woods).

We hadn't been together for a casual jam in a while, so he invited me over and warned me that he wanted to play some of our old band material on his viola. This was mixed OldTime and "Celtic" stuff... Kitchen Girl, Red Haired Boy, New Rigged Ship, Cooley's Reel, etc. We played some tunes in standard mandolin/fiddle mode to warm up, then he pulled out his viola.

I don't own a mandola, so I switched to guitar in the usual Drop-D tuning I use for OldTime/Irish accompaniment. We tried it first just transposing chords, but the two timbres of viola and guitar were just too muddy together. So I did the obvious thing and capo'd at the 5th fret. That turned out to be a very interesting and usable backing sound along with the viola.

The viola growled (we actually played the "Growling Old Man and Woman" tune), and the guitar had a nice high sound that mixed well. A bit like a tenor guitar I guess, but with more strings so the chords are more full, and you have more options for emphasizing the lower or higher parts of a strummed chord shape.

I'm posting this here for the mandola fans in the Cafe. If you want to play with a guitar player just for fun, or in a band, then try asking your guitar player to capo 5 and play whatever they'd normally play for a mandolin/fiddle tune. It's a cool sound. Especially if they play in Drop-D so you get a slightly deeper bottom note when capo'd.

[NotMelloCello]

Video or it didn't happen.

[DougC]

Not an obvious choice. But I guess the capo really does sharpen things up. And both instruments are still lower in pitch than a mandolin so it must be a nice mellow sound. I'm a big fan of mandola and this idea is gonna be used over here in Minnesota. Thanks!

Also we are trying some beautiful klezmer nigun and dobriden on viola and mandola. It is like two alto singers doing a duet. Dance tunes? Not so good but the slow stuff - golden.

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Video or it didn't happen.

Nah, we were just fooling around and I didn't think to bring a camera. My phone is an antique flip model with no video. Next time we have a jam I'll try to shoot some sample clips.

BTW, it occurred to me just now that a High Strung or "Nashville" tuned guitar might also be interesting for this. That's a normal six string acoustic with the bottom three strings replaced with smaller, unwound gauges and those strings tuned up an octave. You'd get the higher pitch to contrast with a mandola or OM and provide a bit of separation, and you wouldn't need a capo.

I used to own enough acoustic guitars that I always kept one around the house in Nashville tuning, but I'm down to my last two guitars now so I can't experiment with it.

[Charlieshafer]

Viola tuning is where it's at right now in the fiddle world, with 5-strings taking over. Not surprised it sounded so great! I especially think the idea of Nashville tuning with a viola is worth playing around with. That jangly sound is great.. now i gotta talk the guitarist into tuning one that way.

[NotMelloCello]

BTW, it occurred to me just now that a High Strung or "Nashville" tuned guitar might also be interesting for this. That's a normal six string acoustic with the bottom three strings replaced with smaller, unwound gauges and those strings tuned up an octave.

Good call on that one. That tuning was first devised to keep the multiple guitar tracks from getting so muddy. Worked, too.