Oval vs. f-hole in A style?

[JeffD]

This is a personal observation, but one that is guiding me away from f holed instruments towards an oval. In reality I spend vastly more time practicing and playing alone than in performance and I find the oval sound is easier to hear. I like the sound of my Weber Yellowstone, but only really appreciate it when someone else is playing it and I can be in front of it. For what it's worth, if you are mostly going to be playing alone, I would steer to the oval hole mandolin.

There is something to this. I would always advocate playing out in public as much as possible, but... if you are not happy with the sound of your instrument when playing alone at home (and we all play alone for a significant amount of time), then you won't enjoy playing at all.

I prefer an oval hole, for a host of reasons. I would not want anyone to think that the oval hole is inadequate for playing in public. The only thing an oval hole can't do as well as the ff hole mandolin is the blugrass chop, and there the difference can be mitigated by the player (and the selection of pick) to a large extent.

Its a different sound, and may or may not be one's preference. Or perhaps justification to get one of each.

But I would not say the difference is so great between an oval hole and an ff hole that one is public playing and the other for private playing.

I play my oval hole at home with one pick, that gives a nice warm tone, and another pick when I play it out in a large group, to give me more punch. I have never had a problem being heard. (I have had problems being listened to, but thats different. )

[mandobassman]

Awesome Breedlove but in today's classifieds.

http://www.mandolincafe.com/cgi-bin/...uery=retrieval

[ColdBeerGoCubs]

Awesome Breedlove but in today's classifieds.

http://www.mandolincafe.com/cgi-bin/...uery=retrieval

Damn it, I might have to jump.

[mandobassman]

Oops! That was supposed to be "Awesome Breedlove BUY" I guess spell check doesn't doesn't check usage.

[Clement Barrera-Ng]

I thought the flame on the back of that one was the best I'd ever seen. NFI.