Neil in New Cross
Sep-14-2004, 2:50pm
Anyone living in London (UK) might be interested to know that Planxty are playing some rare reunion gigs in Januay 2005, featuring mandolinist Andy Irvine (see: http://andyirvine.com/)
Andy's website describes his own unique mandolin: "My instruments have been made for some years, by Stefan Sobell in Northumberland in the North of England. I wanted a rounder, warmer sound and we came to the conclusion that a bigger body was the answer. Rather than have a very large tear drop shaped body, I opted for the guitar shape which is easier to hold. A pity in a way because people who do not know me think I'm playing a guitar. Stefan also made me a mandolin/mandola. Never quite know what to call it. Its two frets longer than a mandolin. I used to play a Gibson mandola which had the same string length as Stefans. Classicly, a mandola should be tuned way down to CGDA but I always thought this stupid with a Gibson because it didn't have a big enough body, nor a long enough string length to cope with the hawser-like strings required. So I thought it logical--as it was two frets longer than a mandolin-- to tune it a tone lower, using mandolin strings. So I tune it FCGC (I nearly always have the top string tuned down a tone)"
Does anyone know if anybody else was using the mandolin in Irish music prior to Andy Irvine in Planxty?
Andy Irvine (http://andyirvine.com/)
Andy's website describes his own unique mandolin: "My instruments have been made for some years, by Stefan Sobell in Northumberland in the North of England. I wanted a rounder, warmer sound and we came to the conclusion that a bigger body was the answer. Rather than have a very large tear drop shaped body, I opted for the guitar shape which is easier to hold. A pity in a way because people who do not know me think I'm playing a guitar. Stefan also made me a mandolin/mandola. Never quite know what to call it. Its two frets longer than a mandolin. I used to play a Gibson mandola which had the same string length as Stefans. Classicly, a mandola should be tuned way down to CGDA but I always thought this stupid with a Gibson because it didn't have a big enough body, nor a long enough string length to cope with the hawser-like strings required. So I thought it logical--as it was two frets longer than a mandolin-- to tune it a tone lower, using mandolin strings. So I tune it FCGC (I nearly always have the top string tuned down a tone)"
Does anyone know if anybody else was using the mandolin in Irish music prior to Andy Irvine in Planxty?
Andy Irvine (http://andyirvine.com/)