No kidding. Try joining a fiddle forum and start a discussion about whether that scroll at the end of the peg head is ridiculous and non-functional.
The only thing that matters is if an instrument sounds good and plays well. After that, it's just personal aesthetic choices. In most styles of music, no one else cares what your instrument looks like anyway. They care about whether you can play it or not. I have never been kicked out of an Irish/Scottish trad session because I play a mandolin with the swirly bits.
I have so little knowledge re violins that I can't tell if this is a serious question or a sarcastic one. A quick search shows that there is at least some discussion on the subject (not really a fiddle forum though):
http://blog.feinviolins.com/2013/04/why-scrolls.html
https://www.violinorum.com/us/scroll/
I just happened to be in a music store recently with a huge selection of violins and violas. Never noticed until then that the hooks they hang on are entirely dependent on the scroll. They are purty!
"I play BG so that's what I can talk intelligently about." A line I loved and pirated from Mandoplumb
They F style was was what attracted me to the mandolin. Was sort of the attraction of the1800s buxomy ladies you find in old paintings. I find the F style has tone that is a bit fuller than a similarly appointed A style. That is a controversial conclusion, but is what I hear. I find some head dive with the F that is annoying, but correctable using the left hand. The A is what I love to play when playing folk, Irish, and fiddle tunes in general. I prefer oval holes with the a non raised fret board. This creates a great contrast to the grassy F style. I want and have both.
Tony Huber
1930 Martin Style C #14783
2011 Mowry GOM
2013 Hester F4 #31
2014 Ellis F5 #322
2017 Nyberg Mandola #172
I'm willing to bet that if we presented people with 10 instruments built from the same woods by the same builder, same neck/body join, same soundholes with 5 being A shaped and 5 F shaped, no one would guess the shape on all 10. You don't HAVE to play an F style with F holes to play bluegrass (see Andy Statman's great works with an old A2Z), you don't have to play a Stradolin to play folk music. You'll get the best sound from a well set up instrument that inspires you to play.
Play happy!
Jamie
There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want; and, after that, to enjoy it. Only the wisest of mankind achieve the second. Logan Pearsall Smith, 1865 - 1946
+ Give Blood, Save a Life +
I’ve never liked 4-door cars no matter how far you go back..they’ve always looked odd to me unless they were wagons.
To my mind, that is the whole answer right there. Jamie has nailed it. Choose the instrument that inspires you, make sure it is well set-up, play it with great joy. If it ceases to inspire you, choose again. Full stop. Unless you are trying to make a living playing, nobody else's opinion really matters. That is it in a nutshell.
Purr more, hiss less. Barn Cat Mandolins Photo Album
Mine a Lebeda gets little playing even before Covid caused the places to shut town..
writing about music
is like dancing,
about architecture
Spot on Jamie Stanek. There is so much talk of wanting instruments with good tone on this forum. Having just got a Breedlove FF I support what you saying entirely. It might not have the colourful overtones of instruments costing 3-20 times more but I can do things on it I could not do on other mandolins. So I play the cr_p out of it as a result because of its setup. Same goes with the KO mandolin I have. Still looking for that OF.
Nic Gellie
Mandolin: Kentucky KM150
Other instruments: way too many, and yet, not nearly enough.
My blog: https://theoffgridmusician.music.blog/
My YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChF...yWuaTrtB4YORAg
My Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/africanbanjogunnar/
Free backing tracks:
https://backingtrackers.wordpress.com/
mtucker - I remember the days when a young dude-about-town wouldn't be caught dead in a 4-door anything. Way too "family"!
That Pontiac in the pic is a car from my youth...
¡papá gordo ain’t no madre flaca!
'20 A3, '30 L-1, '97 914, 2012 Cohen A5, 2012 Muth A5, '14 OM28A
Nice Volvo F-D! Bet you’d like to have that little Swedish army knife today... My favorite Volvo’s of all time are the early 70’s P1800 sports car (remember The Saint?) and the 1800ES wagon, two of the most bitchin’ bespoke rides to ever export from Sweden.
My ‘two-door’ 5 window! Long Beach harbor around the point to the left in the photo. Taken in June, better known around these here parts as, ‘June gloom’
Last edited by mtucker; Oct-16-2020 at 5:27pm.
"All generalizations are false, including this one". - Mark Twain
Jim
My Stream on Soundcloud
19th Century Tunes
Playing lately:
1924 Gibson A4 - 2018 Campanella A-5 - 2007 Brentrup A4C - 1915 Frank Merwin Ashley violin - Huss & Dalton DS - 1923 Gibson A2 black snakehead - '83 Flatiron A5-2 - 1939 Gibson L-00 - 1936 Epiphone Deluxe - 1928 Gibson L-5 - ca. 1890s Fairbanks Senator Banjo - ca. 1923 Vega Style M tenor banjo - ca. 1920 Weymann Style 25 Mandolin-Banjo - National RM-1
Three old Volvo guys on one thread! I started with a used 122S in 1965, my first car; drove it to the first "Story of Bluegrass" festival in Fincastle VA in 1966.
Owned about 6 or 7 over the years, most of them wagons. Lived in Boston area 1969 - 1974.In Braintree, near Boston, was Goldie's junkyard, which for a Volvo guy was heaven - they had a huge number of them and you could go in with tools and pull parts off them yourself. Then you'd go to the yard guy, he'd look at what you had, and say "ah, gimme 25 bucks"! You could replace everything that wore out in one or two trips there and be all set for a couple of years. Heaven...
My best friend there had a Volvo 210, arguably the coolest little wagon ever made.
My first years in bluegrass were spent driving around in Volvos. (Not exactly mandolin content, but the contents of my Volvos usually included a mandolin!)
I'll attempt to post a relevant photo, wish me luck.
Alas, it's sideways. But that's the back of my red '63 122S at the first bluegrass festival, Fincastle, VA, 1966
Not to worry, when you open it it, it rights itself. Great pic and total BG content!
Sorry for the double post.
Count me in; I had a white 1965 Volvo 122 wagon when I was an undergrad! There was a fellow in Eugene who had a specialty "you pick" old Volvo junkyard. I'd put a dead brake drum in my backpack, get on my bike, and ride 30 miles from Corvallis, spend and hour or two picking parts, and then ride back home for another 30 miles all so I could save $25... That made a big difference to a broke student when pints were $2!
Everything was simpler then. Not necessarily better!
When you opened the hood of your Volvo, you knew what everything was, could usually see what was wrong (damn SU carbs, flimsy generator bracket).
Bluegrass was surely simpler then as well - it hadn't turned into the hybrid that it is now. But that's a whole other thread...
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