The Spirit in the Mandolin

[OldSausage]

I think we need to unlearn alientation, among so many of the things we need to unlearn

But I feel so at home with the alienated.

[Ray Neuman]

I believe everything has a harmonic balance. A "tone" so to speak. Wood especially. So, I believe a craftsman injects their tone, the wood does, and so on until the instrument has songs to sing. We as musicians find the songs and pull them out of the instrument. Some instruments like this style, some like that, but they all have their personalities. Its what we speak of when we say..."That instrument speaks to me".....its harmonic tone fits ours well. Perhaps that is why acoustic instruments are so fickel, where as electrics are so toolish.

I need another beer.

[catmandu2]

But I feel so at home with the alienated.

It's but an illusion

[Marcus CA]

But I feel so at home with the alienated.

Better that than feeling so alienated at home!

I believe everything has a harmonic balance. A "tone" so to speak. Wood especially...Its what we speak of when we say..."That instrument speaks to me".....its harmonic tone fits ours well.

I can't explain it, but I think that used instruments come with music in them. When I play a new instrument in a store, it usually takes me a few minutes to lock in with it. With a used one, sometimes it's the same, but sometimes it's just a matter of seconds.

Maybe I don't need another beer.

[mandocrucian]

Did you buy an instrument from "Curious Goods" (formerly "Vendredi's Antiques") ?



Now a question I'll put forward is:

If you do subscribe to any of the numerous religious belief sytems that include intervention by supernatural entities/deities, sacred relics/places, etc. etc. etc., how is it possible to also dismiss the possibilty of haunted houses, voodoo, paranormal "talents" (telepathy.....) or "mojo" and "power objects"?

How can you buy into "King Arthur" without also buying into the concept of magic swords?

NH

[greg_tsam]

This is the whole reason I never wear second hand pants.

I draw the line at second hand undies.

[greg_tsam]

Please indulge my redundant laziness and allow me to quote myself from another thread.

I have a special aura that allows me to connect to the wood nymphs and faeries that once lived in the tree and now their residual energies reside in the mando at hand. It usually takes about 15-20 minutes of holding/stroking/caressing/talking and playing the mando to make the connection and become one with the wood and enhancing it's tone.

My ears, fingers and muscles all need to warm up too and my physiology settles down and gets into my mandolin groove as well.

YMMV.

[Bertram Henze]

I draw the line at second hand undies.

What ye take into your hand, ye take into your heart ... and touch not the unclean thing!

[Griff]

I wish the spirit in my well-used Eastman would push my fingers a little faster, and guide them to the right frets at the right time!

[Wilbur James]

[QUOTE=Ray Neuman;1071018]I believe everything has a harmonic balance. A "tone" so to speak. Wood especially. So, I believe a craftsman injects their tone, the wood does, and so on until the instrument has songs to sing.

I believe there are some fiddles that have a latin saying carved into the sides of the instrument, when translated to english it says quote " In life I was silent, in death I sing" referring to the tree the wood made to make the instrument came from>

[Bertram Henze]

So, I believe a craftsman injects their tone, the wood does, and so on until the instrument has songs to sing.

When I was a little child, learning my first instrument (a schmalzither, a 3-stringed instrument on a table, not unlike a dulcimer), our teacher told us that this is a dwarf with three hairs, and if we pull his hair he cries out.

I need another beer.

The best philosophical contribution so far on this thread.

[Gregory Tidwell]

I have never named an instrument before (seems kind of silly to me, for an bunch of instrumens that are all younger then the average Stradivarius and/or not played by Chuck Berry), but I am having one built right now that my daughter wants me to name after the horse in The Black Stallion. She's 6, but she is already in love with the photos (and video) the builder has sent me. That mandolin has allowed us to bond in a new way, so I'm already head-over-heels about it too, even though it's months away. We are both going to play it and I don't really believe in this kind of stuff, but if there is something to it, I hope that instrument gets a little bit of my daughter as a young girl into it. [/romanticism]

[catmandu2]

I have never named an instrument before (seems kind of silly to me,

As a dyed-in-the-wool metaphysicist, romanticist, and musical "symbioticist"... I admit that I find the notion silly, myself. I've never been one to name automobiles, guns, or other tools (my pet names are given off the cuff)

[Charley wild]

I'm not at all cosmic. I don't believe in "mojo", "aura" and other such terms. I don't name objects of any kind. As far as a used instrument coming with the music already in it; I traded Dobros with Norman Blake once and it certainly didn't work in that case. It still sounded just like me. If it had Norman's music in it I never found out how to get it out!
I've had good used and new instruments and bad used and new instruments. An instrument either works for me or it doesn't.

[Bill Baldridge]

If it doesn't hurt someone else and only applies to you, believe whatever makes your life most meaningful.

[JeffD]

Now a question I'll put forward is:

If you do subscribe to any of the numerous religious belief sytems that include intervention by supernatural entities/deities, sacred relics/places, etc. etc. etc., how is it possible to also dismiss the possibilty of haunted houses, voodoo, paranormal "talents" (telepathy.....) or "mojo" and "power objects"?

How can you buy into "King Arthur" without also buying into the concept of magic swords?

So its all or nothing, eh?

Chekhov said: "He was a rationalist, but he had to confess that he liked the sound of church bells."

[Beanzy]

Well if you buy a vintage instrument from a long dead player and have a look inside you'll see the bits they didn't get to bury.
Make sure you give it a good dust off beneath the willow tree or somewhere else you think they'd like to be.

[if6was9]

I have acess to a great mandolin that was originally owned by a famous player, and later by a really good semi famous player. Nearly everyone who plays it (or even hears it) is affected by this knowledge and seems to think it is superior to similar mandolins (i.e. same make and model) that do not share its particular history. I feel the same way about it. Perhaps it really is a superior instrument? I don't know. Playing any instrument is a subjective experience and its history is part of that experience.

[Bertram Henze]

I have acess to a great mandolin that was originally owned by a famous player, and later by a really good semi famous player. Nearly everyone who plays it (or even hears it) is affected by this knowledge and seems to think it is superior to similar mandolins (i.e. same make and model) that do not share its particular history.

Now we're getting someplace else, ending up with the imagination of players (and customers to be) harnessed by ads and special editions involving celebrities. Nobody will question the real existance of this phenomenon which works even when the celebrity in question never touched the actual instrument you've bought.
Under these circumstances, who's the one to question the magic of a dead man's undies ?

Seriously, I'd far rather play an instrument I grew up with than somebody else's. Sometimes, I like to just sit, do nothing and enjoy being me.

[greg_tsam]

If I may surmise...

If you believe it then it is real.

[OldSausage]

Fame, (fame) puts you there where things are hollow.

[greg_tsam]

Fame, (fame) puts you there where things are hollow.

I'd rather be in some dark hollow where the sun don't ever shine.

[Marty Henrickson]

I'd rather be in some dark hollow where the sun don't ever shine.

The sun's gonna shine, on my back door some daaaaaay!

[Wilbur James]

Now we are getting into "The Spirit" !