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Originally Posted by Jack Roberts

All the tunes you could want are on:

http://www.ibiblio.org/fiddlers/FCfiles.html

After you copy them to your clipboard (They are in ABC format), paste them to

http://www.concertina.net/tunes_convert.html

and you can print out a pdf in standard notation. No charge.

(You may have to remove extra lines from your paste depending on your software.)

I started playing mandolin in high school. I found out it was truely in my blood. My mother and father was taking me to bluegrass festivals almost every weekend so it was really seeping in at a very young age. My first festival was Raccoon Creek at age 7. I got my first mandolin at age 13 and that is where the madness began. My first group I was in was called "I'll have to come back to it, I honestly can't remember". Second group was the most longest running show. It was "Misery River" ...

Hi Folks,
I've just posted a new video to YouTube. The content is apropos of nothing on the Mandolin Café, unless you count the fact that I wrote and can play it on mandolin too.

I left space for you to jam with me...
Key of G. Four bars at the top over the G chord (I'm hammering onto the B note from the open A) and a full verse after the bridge. G, C, Am7, D, G, Am7, G.

If you enjoy it please consider subscribing to my channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/Nestlerode), ...

This quote from the recent Mike Marshall interview got my attention:

I just borrowed a nylon string mandolin from Caterina Lichtenberg that with a little work, I think is going to be very very hip. I have always wanted one of these. I think I may tune it to a E, B, F#, C# (low to high) to make it a little looser. This will put it right in between a mandolin and a mandola. I know we all really don't like the Key of E, so imagine playing a G chord and sounding an E! You can do this if you put a mandolin

...

Originally Posted by fred d

In the last couple years my wife and I have attended at least a 14-15 different jams bluegrass? Most say that they welcome beginers and new people???? YA well I play at least a dozen songs and sing them, by memory and a couple single string. My wife playes tenor banjo we have been told that the tenor does't go with blue grass OK so I tuned A 5 string like a tenor and lowered the 5th so she didn't hit it ! and she is asked to play and encourged to try a break! But I"m trying to

...

Did anyone see the movie, Crazy Heart? Jeff Bridges' character, Bad Blake, plays a really cool looking, older, accoustic guitar...I was trying to figure out if it was a Gibson. They never showed the peghead up close. Any guesses? Thanks!
By the way, the film was really good!

6 years. Its been 6 years...and only now am I comfortable picking up, holding, and picking on the mandolin in the most basic way. Competence really is a stumble...one of these days I'll figure out how to fret clean every time.

Still, got my first tune picked at 230 BPM the other day. I feel some sort of limit has been raised.

Who says an overdriven 8 string sounds bad?

The attached file is a QDAF (Computer nerds may get the allusion) Quick & Dirty Audio File I did for a class in Audacity I'm teaching on Wednesday.

Tune: Ashokan Farewell
Key: D

I'm actually working on a version of Ashokan that changes keys. I'm going for a Steve Vai/Joe Satriani vibe. Ashokan is such a great melody that I think it can handle a lot of different interpretations. This recording ...

Attached Files

• Ashokan1a.mp3 (1.09 MB, 773 views)

I have recently finished building a mandola.However, the plans I worked from do not specify string gauges. Does anyone have any recomendations. The scale length is 522millimeters. Most mandolas I have noticed are somewhat shorter scale length. On the other hand, octave mandolins seem to have longer scale lengths. Where does my instrument sit?I am planning to tune the pairs in unison. Also, is it possible to tune GDAE, since I already play mandolin, rather than CGDA.

I've always thought it a good thing to avoid talking browsers and software systems on this site. And quite frankly, I don't really care what people use as long as they're comfortable. Macs rule! PCs drool! Less filling, tastes great! Kentuckys are better than Eastman! No, Eastman is better than a Kentucky! Pegasus over Calton, no, other way around! If it ain't Gibson, it ain't ####! That ain't bluegrass...

But once in awhile, in musician terms, it's good to try out a new pick, a new ...