I had been playing the mandolin for about a year when I realized that some of the old-timey songs I was playing might sound better on a banjo. I was barely able to play the mandolin and certainly not very well. I was in no position to be learning yet another instrument. When I learned of the mandolin banjo I thought that might be the answer. I found one on eBay which was for sale within about 20 miles of my house. I went and listened to it, loved it, and bought it. So begins M/BAS, I guess. I was able to play the mandolin banjo just as well as my mandolin right from the beginning. That is to say, I could get through a few songs that sounded better on the banjo. She'll be comin' round the mountain, Oh Suzanna, etc. And they really sounded great. I found that I used tremolo a lot and that it was pretty easy to do. I presume this is because the banjo head is more springy or something. My instrument is a Vega Professional model. It is pictured on the main page of this group for lack of a better image to post. I am told that it is called the Professional model because of the resonator. There was no amplification when this banjo was made, so if you wanted to play loud you used a banjo with a resonator. The thing is loud. In the house, anyway. The guy who sold it to me had played it off and on from 1985 to 2012 in a band. It shows both the wear and the maintenance of a seriously played instrument. He said it was made circa 1925 or earlier. I believe that for the following reason. The tuners were seriously worn and hard to turn and the knobs were extremely shrunken celluloid. One finally broke and I decided to replace the tuners. It uses 4-on-a-plate mandolin style tuners, but of a non-standard spacing. StewMac sells tuners with modern spacing and tuners with some supposedly vintage spacing. Maybe that vintage spacing matches Gibson mandolins, but it didn't match mine, nor did the modern spacing. I had an oddball. I found out that before 1925 everyone who made tuners used their own spacing. My spacing was just slightly greater than the modern spacing, so I bought some modern tuners and a tapered reamer. The StewMac tapered reamer has teeth on about 2/3 of its circumference which enabled me to creep the holes slightly up and down on the head. I was going to add the metal bushings that come with the tuners, so this was not a problem. An excellent and very helpful luthier named Paul Hostetter advised me and approved of this method. When I was done, the tuners dropped right in and were a lot easier to turn than the old ones! I had a LOT of trouble finding strings for it that matched what was already on it. The instrument had been setup and maintained by a very well respected luthier and I was a novice, so I figured I'd better keep the same string sizes. At least until I had a reason to change. I ended up buying individual strings from Bob Passante (http://bpstrings.com/). While I was figuring out the string thing, I learned about a guy who makes banjo bridges. The one thing about my mandolin banjo is that the head is plastic and the sound seems a bit too "pure" or crisp or something. People said that his bridges "warmed up" the sound so I thought I would try one. I made the mistake of also ordering one for my mandolin, too, just out of curiosity. I sent him measurements and money and he send the bridges. Neither fit my measurements. We went around a couple more times and I finally gave up. I was out $80, but I figure it is partly my fault for confusing him by ordering two mandolin (8 string) bridges at the same time when he is used to just 5 strings. For that reason, I am not going to list his name. So I'm back to the original flat, ebony mandolin bridge which I suspect is not original. The instrument still sounds good, but I think I can make it better when I get the time. Next thing I will try is a warmer sounding head and maybe I'll make my own bridge. The banjo people seem to scoff at the mandolin banjo. Maybe it's because it seems odd and doesn't fit into a standard bluegrass or Dixieland jazz ensemble. And I don't actually know what mandolin players think of it. Thankfully I don't care a lot about what others think. It suits me just fine.
