Page 1 of 2 12 LastLast
Results 1 to 25 of 35

Thread: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

  1. #1
    Registered User
    Join Date
    Dec 2004
    Location
    Hinesville, GA
    Posts
    484

    Default Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    I was playing my Collings MT and just loved the sound of it. Not my playing, but the sound of this mandolin. I am using D'Addario EXPs that I still have and every note sounds so nice. The flat keys sound very "warm" and the sharp keys bright but still rich sounding.
    Now if I could only play better!
    Daniel Kaufman

  2. The Following 7 Users Say Thank You to FrDNicholas For This Useful Post:


  3. #2
    Timothy Tim Logan's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jun 2017
    Location
    Shutesbury, MA
    Posts
    664

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Absolutely! All four of them!

    “There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats.” ― Albert Schweitzer

    1925 Lyon & Healy Model A, #1674
    2015 Collings A (MT2-V)

  4. #3
    ************** Caleb's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2006
    Location
    DFW, Texas
    Posts
    3,676

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    This happens to me all the time while playing my MT. The D-course is particularly magical on mine.
    ...

  5. The following members say thank you to Caleb for this post:


  6. #4

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    yes

  7. #5
    Worlds ok-ist mando playr Zach Wilson's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2015
    Location
    Auburn, Washington
    Posts
    1,553

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Pre Covid I would routinely go to Dusty Strings, a Seattle music store that has a nice stock of nicer mandolins. Sure I would lust over different, newer, nicer instruments... but really, most often I would leave wanting to go home to play mine.

  8. The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Zach Wilson For This Useful Post:


  9. #6
    Resident Hack
    Join Date
    Jul 2020
    Location
    Chicago
    Posts
    295

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    We redid the wood floors in our living room and dining room, this summer. While the rooms were empty, I played my mandolin into them from the doorway and the sound was so mesmerizing I was stuck there for hours.
    What I play
    2021 Skip Kelley Two-Point
    Eastwood 'Ricky'
    Morgan Monroe RT-1E
    Epiphone Genesis guitars
    Various Basses

  10. The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Mitch Stein For This Useful Post:


  11. #7
    Registered User
    Join Date
    Jan 2009
    Location
    S.W. Wisconsin
    Posts
    7,507

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    The sound of my mandolin cures MAS every time. When I feel the urge, I play my mandolin and think how can it sound better than this.
    THE WORLD IS A BETTER PLACE JUST FOR YOUR SMILE!

  12. The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to pops1 For This Useful Post:


  13. #8
    Registered User J Mangio's Avatar
    Join Date
    Feb 2012
    Location
    Willow Spring, NC
    Posts
    563

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Yes!
    2021 The Loar LM700 VS

  14. #9
    Registered User Sue Rieter's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2020
    Location
    New Hampshire
    Posts
    1,985

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Sometimes I'm holding my mandolin just right, and the whole thing just wakes up and sings. The whole instrument is vibrating and I can feel it as well as hear it.

  15. The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Sue Rieter For This Useful Post:


  16. #10
    Gibson F5L Gibson A5L
    Join Date
    Apr 2008
    Posts
    2,526
    Blog Entries
    1

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Indeed anytime is good but ... Especially when I have put on a fresh set of strings. The crisp ringing the solid pop of a four tone chord. It encourages me to play more and more often. R/
    I love hanging out with mandolin nerds . . . . . Thanks peeps ...

  17. The following members say thank you to UsuallyPickin for this post:


  18. #11
    Registered User John Soper's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2004
    Location
    Durham, NC
    Posts
    1,356

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    There is a spot in my music room that really boosts the timbre of my mandolins. There are days when I forget what I was planning to practice and just listen to the tone of simple scales or complex chord cadences. Happens with all of my mandolins (I need to rotate them so that they don't get jealous).

  19. #12
    Eschews Obfuscation mugbucket's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2003
    Location
    Powhatan, VA
    Posts
    230

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Absolutely.

    Especially if the tune/song has a B minor in it. Ear candy.
    Despite the high cost of living, it still remains popular...

  20. #13
    ************** Caleb's Avatar
    Join Date
    Nov 2006
    Location
    DFW, Texas
    Posts
    3,676

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Quote Originally Posted by Mitch Stein View Post
    We redid the wood floors in our living room and dining room, this summer. While the rooms were empty, I played my mandolin into them from the doorway and the sound was so mesmerizing I was stuck there for hours.
    My favorite spot to play in my house is just behind the front door in entry hall. There is tile behind the door and then a wood floor. The natural reverb is awesome, though I think it freaks out the mailman sometimes when he comes to the door to drop my mail.
    ...

  21. #14
    Registered User Frankdolin's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    near Boston, MA
    Posts
    859

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Yes ! Yes ! Yes !

  22. #15
    Registered User
    Join Date
    Jul 2003
    Location
    Portland, OR
    Posts
    821

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    My favorite spot to play in my house is just behind the front door in entry hall. There is tile behind the door and then a wood floor. The natural reverb is awesome,
    Sometimes I play in the bathroom for that reason - a light touch and the mandolin rings for days.

    The family thinks I'm weird but that's nothing new.

    Kirk

  23. #16
    Registered User Bren's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2002
    Location
    Aberdeen, Scotland
    Posts
    1,036

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Yes.
    About once a week.
    Bren

  24. #17
    Registered User Bill Bradshaw's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2008
    Location
    Sheridan, Wyoming
    Posts
    283

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Yep.

  25. #18
    Professional Dreamer journeybear's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2007
    Location
    Northeastern South Carolina, west of North Carolina
    Posts
    15,346
    Blog Entries
    2

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Well, there was that one time ...

    A few years ago, my band had just finished playing an interesting show. We were sort of the background music for a cabaret setting, with ladies and gents dressed pretty snazzily and dancing swing-style to our music, which was varied but we kept it in that era for this event. This was during our band's peak time, which lasted well over a year, during which we were pretty much the toast of the town. All in all, after a long time, life was pretty good for me at the time.

    Since things were going so well, I thought it might be a good time to chance it, and succumb to the lead singer's incessant entreaties for me to join them in the indulgence of some smokables. (I hope it's OK to include this mention, as it is a crucial plot element.) I had always demurred, as the stuff doesn't agree with me anymore, although back in the day I couldn't get enough. But about a dozen or so years ago, the stuff started getting me too wigged out, so I stopped doing it. But here we were, I was in a good space and vibe, feeling pretty good about life. So I had a puff or two on our break. The gig went well, even with me getting a bit experimental musically here and there. Some of my band mates had some giggles when I got a bit loose on a lead, but I survived all right.

    After the show, we broke down and packed up. Before loading out, we sat down and hung out with the promoter and a few other people, chatting, having a beer or two. I was listening to the acoustics of the room - second floor of an old building, nice aged wood, with a peaked ceiling about 5-6 meters high at the peak. I thought I'd play my mandolin a bit, just to hear how it sounded in that acoustic space. Well, I'll tell you what. That little thing produced a sound that just filled the air, sounding bright but not shrill, bold but not harsh, light but not flimsy - in a word, perfect. I got to playing a melody I'd written, a sort of Calypso with a lively mixture of melody and rhythm. It's sort of self-contained, self-sustaining that way. It sounded so good, I couldn't stop playing. I dropped out of the conversation for the most part, happy to produce this background music, letting that be my contribution to the proceedings.

    After a few times around, the lead singer piped up with some mockery - look at you, you're so stoned, that sort of stuff. I thought that was pretty asinine of him, not just letting me be and enjoy myself, especially since he'd been instrumental in producing my state of mind. But he did suffer from professional jealousy, wishing he could play as well as I, even if he couldn't be honest enough to admit it. So I ignored him, because I was enjoying the way my mandolin sounded so much, and also the piece has a way of turning the end into a beginning and starting over. I must have played for ten minutes or more, and didn't stop until my band mates decided it was time to go. I didn't indulge in that stuff again, not for maybe a year, and that was the last time.

    I've no idea if it really sounded that good, or my buzz was directing my perceptions. I prefer to believe the former. One of these days, when I'm ready to do some serious recording, I want to go back to that room and check it out, see if I can lay down my lead tracks there.
    But that's just my opinion. I could be wrong. - Dennis Miller

    Furthering Mandolin Consciousness

    Finders Keepers, my duo with the astoundingly talented and versatile Patti Rothberg. Our EP is finally done, and available! PM me, while they last!

  26. The Following 4 Users Say Thank You to journeybear For This Useful Post:


  27. #19
    Registered User Aaron Bohnen's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2019
    Location
    Vancouver, BC
    Posts
    87

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    The Gavin Baird F4 in my avatar makes me feel like that every time. Such a joy these little things are!
    Gavin Baird F4 & F5, Weber Octar, Gibson K-1, Guild D50, Martin D35, Yairi DY-84, etc...

  28. #20
    not a donut Kevin Winn's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2016
    Location
    Portland, OR
    Posts
    735

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    That's how you know you got the right one(s)...
    "Keep your hat on, we may end up miles from here..." - Kurt Vonnegut

  29. #21
    Registered User
    Join Date
    Dec 2007
    Location
    California
    Posts
    402

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Yes, and I went through about 10 of them before I found one I loved. No more MAS! How many did you go through?
    Last edited by Bill Foss; Jan-08-2021 at 8:13pm.

  30. #22

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Pretty much every time I play it.
    2010 Heiden A5, 2020 Pomeroy oval A, 2013 Kentucky KM1000 F5, 2012 Girouard A Mandola w ff holes, 2001 Old Wave A oval octave
    http://HillbillyChamberMusic.bandcamp.com
    Videos: https://www.youtube.com/@hillbillychambermusic

  31. #23
    Registered User sblock's Avatar
    Join Date
    Mar 2009
    Location
    Redwood City, CA
    Posts
    2,335

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Quote Originally Posted by FrDNicholas View Post
    I was playing my Collings MT and just loved the sound of it. Not my playing, but the sound of this mandolin. I am using D'Addario EXPs that I still have and every note sounds so nice. The flat keys sound very "warm" and the sharp keys bright but still rich sounding.
    Now if I could only play better!
    It's a wonderful thing that you still love the sound of your Collings MT. It's great to "bond" with your instrument, that's for sure. Especially in these difficult times. I don't mean this in a provocative way, but I wonder how flat keys can sound warm to you, and sharp keys can sound bright, on an equal-tempered instrument, like a fretted mandolin. In other words, I fully understand how each of the keys can sound a bit different in just temperament, like on a violin, but that isn't supposed to happen in equal temperament, which is based on having exactly the same frequency relationships for scale notes in all the possible keys (using twelfth-root-of-2 frequency ratios)! I suppose you could be playing a few of the "sharp" keys (D, A, G, E, etc.) using more open-string notes than you do on the "flat" keys (F, Bb, Eb, Ab, etc.). Open strings have a subtly different sound from fretted ones. But other than that, I am baffled by your report.

  32. #24
    Registered User
    Join Date
    Sep 2015
    Location
    Ohio
    Posts
    1,322

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    I love the sound of my mandolins every time I play them. That's why i have them! They all sound wonderful in different ways, that's why I have more than one. Now if I could only play up to the ability of my mandolins....

  33. #25
    I really look like that soliver's Avatar
    Join Date
    Sep 2015
    Location
    Marietta, GA
    Posts
    1,745

    Default Re: Ever just love the sound of your mandolin?

    Every time I play my Silverangel I feel that way. Almost 95% of the time with the other 2 as well.
    aka: Spencer
    Silverangel Econo A #429
    Soliver #001 & #002: A double stack of Pancakes.

    Soliver Hand Crafted Mandolins and Mandolin Armrests
    Armrests Here -- Mandolins Here

    "You can never cross the ocean unless you have the courage
    to lose sight of the shore, ...and also a boat with no holes in it.” -anonymous

Bookmarks

Bookmarks

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •