So what would a 27" scale mandocello sound like?

[Jacob]

Why play the mandocello horizontally when it might be better played vertically like a cello?

Or, why play cello vertically? Bach wrote for the Cello da Spalla.

[NotMelloCello]

Bach didn't write chords, which are tough to play vertically.

[Harley Marty]

Why play the mandocello horizontally when it might be better played vertically like a cello?
Put it on a short step stool or something and give it a try.

I took cello lessons for two years. My instructor emphasized that the bow would be a challenge no matter how long or well I played the cello. Comparisons of the ease of playing the cello vs the mandocello should include that. After two years of cello lessons I learned that cello lessons should start at the age of six, not sixty.

After 2 years of cello lessons the six year old is now only eight and probably no better than you at sixty two. Keep going, you can't wind the clock back, when you're seventy two you'll be happier to have started at sixty than seventy. I firmly believe a sixty year old has better learning skills than a six year old! By a country mile.

[Sue Rieter]

The low tones are pretty visceral. I had a conversation with Jake Wildwood last week when I went to pick up my new mandola, about how instruments affect our senses, of course auditory, but also visually, and even olfactory and viscerally. It's so awesome.

[Fivecourse Mac]

I made and play a 27" scale small bodied guitar tuned in all 4ths starting with a bass D and going to GCFBb for the higher courses. That tuning was arrived at by many trials of strings and different tunings. Its 5 courses are doubled with only the low D octaved, with the high octave on the upper side of the pair so that the lower octave is hit with an downpick. The combination I settled on sounds best and happens to be good for my voice. An apparent D chord, for example, is actually 2 semitones lower at C which better fits my voice.
The instrument has very nice tone throughout its range and is fairly easy to play.