From the first time I picked up a mandolin around a year ago, I kind of realized the instrument is pretty dependent on precision in both the build and the playing of it. Pretty unforgiving of both aspects.
As far as the playing, there is pretty much the one perfect place to fret, one perfect place to pick, one perfect pick grip tension, pretty much everything. The learning of this thing is a process of working toward these perfect techniques, and the closer you get toward this, the more your lack of perfection stands out, oh, but when you do something right, it's so very rewarding.
As for the instrument, I've been taking my MK from an unplayable monster, to a satisfying experience, a painful 2% at a time, but those 2 percents do add up. After my last bridge fitting, things looked and sounded pretty good, but there was a tiny bit of daylight on the bass end. As much as not quite getting a tremolo even, it was bugging me, so off it came for another go. Looks perfect now, and the G string lack of richness for wont of a better description, that is my primary tonal gripe on sub $1000 mandolins is 90% gone. It seems like every little improvement has had an effect, each subtle, but each contributing to the whole. I can very well see now the merit of something like the mandovoodoo process.
Time to ditch the plastic nut, and work on my D flat scale.
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