Taking up instrument building again
Kategori: Instrumentbygge, tenor mandola
Old new project.
About ten years ago I started a project of making a family of instruments in the mandolin family. I planned three instruments - an octave mandola, a mandolin and a long necked tenor mandola. I started all three but only completed the octave mandola, which has been my work horse since then.
Now that I'm taking up instrument building again, it felt like a good idea to complete the unfinished instruments.
So I'm starting off with the tenor mandola. It shares body size with the mandolin (slightly larger than a standard mandolin) and it shares string length with the octave mandola(525 mm). The idea is that - when capoed at 7th fret - it will have the tuning and string length of a common mandolin, but when "uncapoed" it'll be tuned as a tenor mandola albeit with much thinner strings than normal. My aim is to have session instrument that will allow me to change between melody playing in mandolin tuning and chording with the capo off or at second fret.
Anyway - here is what I left ten years ago: a top made of Swedish spruce (from a plank I found in a barn), sides (rather badly bent), back and neck in African mahogany (not shure which specie.
