c.1930s? Portuguese Guitar/Mandola Conversion

**Jake Wildwood** · Dec-14-2011, 11:18am

I converted this old Portuguese guitar (17.5" scale) to a mandola as it was missing a few of its tuners and had a relatively narrow nut (1 5/8"). It turned out GREAT! I was very surprised with the warm, full sound even with the fairly light strings I have on it. The plain D course gives it much more of a bouzouki/mandolin-y feel to it -- springier and more balanced to my ear. This makes it a great chording/backing instrument as it can fill the roll of a zouk pretty well.

Anyhow, click here for a link to the blog post.

I've also attached a sound clip to the post: mandola.mp3

**Tavy** · Dec-14-2011, 1:01pm

Jake that makes one sweet sounding 'dola - very nice indeed.

Interesting that not only is the top slab-sawn, but even has knots in it! Seems to have lasted OK though...

**Jake Wildwood** · Dec-14-2011, 2:13pm

A lot of these old Portuguese instruments are really funky like that -- maybe making use of whatever materials they had on hand? They sound amazing, though, and that's what counts.