Grateful Dead Music Forum

i just bought a mandolin about an hour ago, i have never played one, but ive played guitar for about 4 years, im just wondering if anyone had advice, or good sites, or any insight on this beautiful instrument

The obvious:

http://4stringchords.com/

I am sooo siked for you .... I have played guitar for 25 years and I bought a Mandolin four months ago and can't keep my hands off of it, I will send you the only links I used and I am already playing out with it ... sat in with Rootstand last friday ... my best advice, listen to alot of it, get the percussive aspect of it inside of you, it can be like drums .

http://www.mandolincafe.com/cgi-bin/chords/ch.pl

http://www.mandolincafe.com/two.html

http://www.projectsandhobbies.com/bluegrassmandolin.htm

welcome to wonderful world of the mandolin..you have gotten some good sites to look at..there are of course a number of good lessons on CD available ..I still keep the Mel Bays Back up trax for mando in my case..has old time fiddle tunes , the stuff most beginner BG players should know..plus you learn the basic chords and and how to pick some leads...try learn how to use a much heavier pick than you might use for guitar...the Dawg or wegen picks available are great..these have rounded edges which seem to sound better than the more pointed ones for guitar..try to keep the pick loose in your hand and don't choke down to hard on the strings with your left hand..most importantly have fun playing ..find someone to jam with ..and remember Mandolin players are always the smartest pickers in the band

I've played bass for 30 years but love being able to grab the mandolin and go to a park or beach and jam away...never made much sense doing that on a bass



david

And the Mandolin is a nice light carry in for a gig !!!!!

i bought a mando like a year ago, but i bought like a $40 one and it was damn near impossible to fret and has a terrible sound. ya get what you pay for. i was thinkin about gettin an electric one, but i also want a banjo, which would you recommend?

How much does it costs a good mandolin, not the best, but somethin good and cheap.

i appreciate the advice, mandolincafe.com seems to be the best site out their, i played the thing for about 5 hrs after work yesterday just workin on the g chord and scale, its unbelievable

nicolesalk: i got a dean nashville A series for 300, it seems to have good tone well worth the price, my friend told me you dont want to get a cheap mandolin because their worthless, like the above post said, i would go with something in the 250-400 range

thanks again
candyman

i bought a slightly used michael kelly left-handed f-style last year for 500. it was 600 new and he threw in a 100 dollar case for free. i don't play it as much as i would like to, but it is fun. just find the melody to a song and pick yer heart out. it can be quite easy. i recorded a bunch of songs and soloed with the mandolin over my guitar. i found that the best cuts were my first try of just improvising. if i went back it never got any better or just got worse. i'm thinking of taking lessons from mike westfall in madison,wi who's played with just about every big bluegrass name you can think of. he's a world renowned jazz mandolin player

i would agree with the 300-400 dollar price range. i think i went a little overboard, but it was such a good deal.

also try musicmoose.org. they have video lessons on every bluegrass instrument

hey man how you doing?

i man i am pretty psyched about the new mandolin, i have been playin it a ridiculous amount the past 2 days, i cant put it down, its funny ive been playin it so much, when i picked up my guitar it seemed like it was fuckin huge and the strings were a mile a part. but i was just wondering if you just transcribe those yonder tabs to mandolin chords, (thats basicaly what ive been doin) but it seems to be missing something, i guess with practice it will get better, but im really strugglin with the chop method on the off beats its really confusing, anyways thanks for the post.

oh yeah just bought my tix for the milwaukee yondder show, we'll for sure meet up their, but im not positive i can go to the madtown show cuz of previous obligations, but well exchange numbers, sometime soon

peace
matt

^hey man. i'll be hitting up madison, chicago, milwaukee and urbana(and possibly the badger-illinois game the next day) my tour buddy is having a big grill out/kegger before the milwaukee show, which should be a good time.

Hey Candyman we should all meet up and do some pickin in the parking lot. I plan on going to both sows, just trying to find decent ticket prices. Let me know if your interested.

Thats great that you got a mandolin I hope your having a blast with it. I played for about 2 years then switched to banjo.

Not to be the Devil's advocate or anything, but if you buy the correct gauges of strings (guitar strings) you can tune the mandolin like guitar (ie: DGBE). I learned that from a Tommy Tedescdo lesson in GP years ago.
I since decided that I wanted to learn the proper tuning and hence have completely ignored the thing. While I had it in guitar tuning I played it with people and in the car at break etc.
It may just be because I hardly have time to practice my guitar let alone mandolin.
I'll try to find the article with the gauges if you guys don't think I'm vibe killer.

if your buying a mando spend as much as you posibly can afford to so you dont just have to buy a new one in 2 years because the tiny neck will get warped so easily from all the tension.