Choosing the mandolin over other instruments?
Well... I played viola since 4th grade so I was quite familiar with all that goes along with that. But all the fidgety little things about it started hurting in adulthood: keeping the thumb bent to hold the bow, applying the right pressure in the right position to hold the instrument in place, etc... The body just doesn't work the way it used to. So I stopped playing. I had a few sputtering revivals through the years and switched to a violin for a short bit, but didn't care for those high notes on the e-string and it didn't really help bridge the mismatch between what the instrument requires and my body is willing to do.
The only other string instrument with which I had any familiarity was the guitar. So I tried that for a few years. My undoing with that instrument was two-fold: bar chords and it wasn't arranged in 5ths. Worse yet, there's one string that doesn't hold the pattern of 4ths. I think I'm programmed to think in 5ths; I think I could have adapted to 4ths...maybe. But those chords... no good. I gave it a good shot. A few years.
So, on to the ukulele. Should be easier, right? Four strings, like I'm used to -- definite improvement there. But, still, the strings were the "wrong" tuning. It's just like the top strings of a guitar which was a touch problematic for me and then the "my" string (using "my dog has fleas" tuning) is an octave above where it "should" be. Gave that about a year.
I thought about taking the ukulele and re-stringing it to CGDA, but then I was told that something called a "mandola" existed. Four courses of CGDA tuned strings. Hallelujah!! Borrowed one from someone for a month of two and it was fantastic. Well, the instrument itself was so-so, but what I could do with it felt right. So I got one of my own and played melody. Again, not the best instrument - fretboard was straight and wide. Wider than I would like. And chords... eh... that was no good. Then I upgraded to a better instrument - nice radiused fretboard - felt more like a viola... the instrument with which I'd grown up. Better feel, better tone... Melody sounded better; chords were also better, but still... eh... not my forte. And I'm a bit of a perfectionist, so if a given chord wasn't happening despite practice and hands-on instruction (and I'm looking at you D-chord: major and minor. D-chord has not been my friend), after awhile, my inclination is to stop trying. Some of those chords felt like that stupid guitar problem all over again. But now on an instrument I loved. The horror!
Enter mandolin. Do you have any idea how much easier chords are on a mandolin than a mandola? For me, it's felt like reducing the near-impossible into child's play. So now I practice chords on a mandolin and then move them over to the mandola. I don't really play melody on the mandolin -- as was with the violin, I don't care much for the high notes. So, for me at present, the mandolin is my instrument of choice for learning and practicing. But my heart is with the mandola
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