Light strings and thin picks

[Caleb]

Well, I had been using medium/heavy strings for about a year now, so once this last set is ready to be changed, I look forward to trying the lighter strings. I think this last set is one that I bought that has lighter bottom strings (.40 not .41 on the G string, for example) and medium A and E strings. Already I think the lower strings sound a lot better, but that just might be because they're new. I don't change the strings very often. So it'll be interesting someday to try the lighter ones and see what it's like. I wish it was easier to change strings. At this rate it's a slow experiment.

I never did quite get over the buzzing of the heavier strings before. The buzzing is caused by me not being able to press hard enough. I don't think I am a weak person, but I guess I am. Been playing for 12-15 years, as an amateur and usually I just play and don't pay too much attention to this sort of stuff.

I do like the primetone picks. I have lots of them. I don't find them to have an appreciable positive affect on volume, but I do like the size and the points and how they are easy to hold.

I recommend some GHS Bobby Osborne med-lights, best of both worlds. These are my favorite strings. YMMV.

[Eric Platt]

My Gibson A Jr. seems to be quite happy with light strings. My Breedlove likes the heavy TI flatwounds on it right now. And the Big Muddy have the original medium-lights on it. Which I'll probably stick with.

As to picks, it varies. I admit to liking thinner picks. And by that I mean picks under 1.5. Right now I'm going between about 1.2 all the way down to Herco 75 Holy Grail. They all sound different on different instruments and not one seems to work on everything.

[Mark Gunter]

Isn't this a tautology. These are the folks who like heavier picks. This is the kind of music that is typically made with heavier picks. Noticing that says not a lot about mandolin in general.

Or perhaps I am missing that this is the type of musical tastes the OP is aiming for. I might have missed that part.

+1 to the sentiment.

It may be (and I'm sure it is so) that the majority of mandolins represented across the forum are carved top & back A and F models, but this by no means represents all mandolins. An observation, not a criticism: It seems to me that a lot of advice given in the threads here (not necessarily this one) gets heavily tilted toward the playing of Bluegrass music too, regardless of whether or not any genre gets mentioned. I don't really get why that's the case, but seems to be the case.

[Ivan Kelsall]

As Ray pointed out - Some mandolins will sound their best with a certain brand / gauge of strings coupled with a particular shape / thickness of pick made from a specific material. It took me ages to find the right combos.for my 3, & sometimes the results of trying new string brands wasn't too enjoyable. I have found that the Dunlop Primetone 'grippy', 1.5mm thick 'teardrop' shaped picks work perfectly on all 3 mandolins. We simply need to try as many combos of strings & picks as we feel we need to, until we find 'the' combo. that brings out the best in our mandolins,
Ivan

[Beanzy]

Another thing to look at is how flexible or hard the strings feel.
Even staying in the same gagues you can get good differences in feel.
I found going for hex core strings (DR Rare) made them feel easier under my fingers, even though everyone I asked thought they should have been stiffer. I’ve no idea why my experience is different. they also give a nicer chime than their round core equivalents.

Another one was when I tried Flat Topped strings, they fretted quite nicely without sounding too soft.

Savarez/ Argentine strings were a nice surprise on my bowlback, as were using Dogal heavies on my Arch-top.

With picks, I like to take a thick pick and make it pointy and tapered narrowly at the business end. Sculpting it further up too to prevent snagging and induce flexibility, and always shaping in 3dimensions to minimise pick click & maximise energy without waste going in click. In my 4 year development experiments I’ve found the important part for a brilliant tone is where the string leaves the tip, that’s where the brightness or softness can be changed dramatically. I start with buffalo horn for the bowl-back ones, and Primetone smooth 1.5 for the arch-top, softer Big dunlop picks as blanks for the mandoloncello. You have to get them super mirror-smooth polish after shaping if you want to minimise wear. I get about 1- 1.5 years between refinishing at the moment. It’s a very involved process getting the pick shape I like, I did think ‘ah I have the perfect pick, I should publicise this’ but you’d never be able to seell them for the price involved in the time taken. Also tooling up to mold a simple process in materials that could work to make quick blanks would cost a shed load. So I’ll just keep refining them until they’ve had a few more years of refining then do a “how to DIY” on here, like Alex did with the Roman plectrums.

[T.D.Nydn]

A thin pick does not always mean flexible and wobbly,,I use picks from .75 to .88 that are very stiff,,blue chip and carbon nylon,that can easily drive med. To hvy. strings,including double stop tremolo no problem,,and with clarity and excess volume on top of it...

[jimmy powells]

If it's 'twang' you like then maybe your a frustrated Duanne Eddy Fan. Just joking ! Light and thin does have a 'plectrum click' sound which can work well on certain folky/Irish music and lost of people seem to like that. May well make you heard in a session but I don't think they would carry to the back of the wall, as they say.

I use a 2.00 Wegen on my Northfield BigMon and whenever I pick up anything lighter I notice immediately. They give volume and tone and are unsurpassed in my view. Wegen used to offer 1.0 or 1.4 for mandolin but I use the 2.00 and love them and that's after 12 years. Never found anything (including Dawgs etc) to give the power, tone and cut.

[Johnny60]

Have tried lights on my Northfield F5S and took them off after a day or so. All the power, bass, timbre and "woof" got replaced with shrillness. Put EJ74s back on and the sound that I love was back.

Regarding the thin/thick pick side of things. Being a guitarist, I had loads of .96mm guitar picks, so when I bought my first mandolin that's what I used. Soon discovered that a heavier pick on an A style mandolin just produces a richer tone. I'm still using .96 on guitar, but my favourite mandolin picks are the Blue Chip TP60 and the brown Dunlop Primetone large triangle 1.5

[sblock]

Isn't this a tautology. These are the folks who like heavier picks. This is the kind of music that is typically made with heavier picks. Noticing that says not a lot about mandolin in general.

No JeffD, this isn't a "tautology"! Not at all -- perhaps you misconstrue the meaning of that word? I didn't select those names because they happened to use heavier picks. On the contrary: I selected them because they were some "mandolin heroes" with successful recording careers and significant audiences, whose names get frequently mentioned here on the MC. The fact is that a great many of these same great players happen to use heavier picks (1 to 2 mm) with medium-to-heavy gauge strings. And they all play carved top/back instruments (not bowlbacks, not flat-tops). This is therefore a genuine example of a correlation (that is, a cross-reference), which is the very opposite of a tautology (that is, a circular self-reference).

Or perhaps I am missing that this is the type of musical tastes the OP is aiming for. I might have missed that part.

Yes, I think so! As for the OP, unless I'm mistaken, she plays an F5-style mandolin -- NOT a bowlback or flat-top. At least, that's the type of instrument that she's shown playing in the video that she herself posted back on July 2, 2017 in this thread (see post #5). And she is playing oldtime music in that video. At the time, she'd mentioned that her pick was 1.14 mm (45 thou), and she was asking how she could learn to play louder.

Personally, I don't think the secret to playing an F5-style mandolin louder is to put thinner strings on it, or to move to a thinner pick. And I'm not sure many mandolinists here would recommend that, particularly some of the more experienced players and instructors who also play f-hole, carved instruments (A or F). I think the best advice, given the OP's mandolin, would be to go with medium strings and a fairly stiff pick (say, between 0.95 and 1.5 mm), and then work on her right-hand technique. And possibly work on her fretting technique, as well, since she claimed that she was "not weak" but nevertheless got "mighty hand cramps" with medium strings -- suggesting to me that something was wrong, possibly with her left-hand technique or with the instrument's action/setup. Or, perhaps she should consider switching to another style of mandolin, altogether?! Perhaps she might find a flat-top that's strung with light gauge strings easier to play? (But it will never be louder, which is something she also said she desired).

Anyway, absolutely none of this discussion is meant to slight -- or to invalidate -- all the wonderful bowlback/classical players on the MC in any way, shape, or form! Nor the flat-top players, either. Or anyone else with a lightly-built instrument designed for light-gauge strings.

Carved top/back mandolins are better suited to heavier strings/stiff picks than most other types of mandolins. And they will nearly always sound louder and cleaner with them. Hopefully, this is not such a controversial proposition.

[mandocaster]

Thanks for your opinion. I feel like I’ve been part of some similar discussions where science and certitude were applied in other areas where personal experience and a light touch might keep things pleasant.

[Beanzy]

I’ve been impressed by the tone from picks in the 1mm range & lower if they’re held with a tiny amount of pick exposed, way less than you normally see (maybe 2mm beyond the finger). I’ve experimented with them down to about .7mm & liked the sound and they catch less than with the tip more exposed. I’ve tried it in the real world as I like both bright and driven tone if I can get it, but I get a lot of knuckle rapping going on if I’m not cautious enough. It’s especially tough to get it ‘right’ if I’m trying to cross-pick where I seem to dive into the strings on a string crossing. I just can’t relax enough if I try that, but I can feel it would come with a lot more time refining. I suppose it probably would be very good for refining RH technique & control. I prefer to reshape the pick instead to get the power but behind a fine point.

So much will vary depending on how you actually hold the pick that talking about them without qualifying how they’re being used seems to be giving a very limited picture. People will probably tend to assume they’re using them the same way or that others will know what that is.

Anyway as to the OP: you don’t need anyone’s sanction to go for it, picks and strings are mostly cheap and you’ll be changing stuff on the mandolin for evermore. So no time like the present for experimenting & building up your store of experience. It’ll all feed into your future decisions for what to try. There’s nothing like first hand for embedding things.

[Cliff Seruntine]

I've always had a special fondness for the softer, somewhat rubbery picks made by Wolle and used by German mandolinists in that they minimize string noise. Even though I play Celtic music, I like a purity of tone and don't appreciate the clack of the pick interfering with the mandolin's voice. But they are terribly expensive because the Euro converts hard against the Canadian dollar, plus there is S&H to deal with. But I recently fell in love with Dava picks with delrin tips that I find give many of the same qualities and are much more affordable. They were running a special a couple months back, too, that if you ordered 2 or more packs of any of their picks, S&H was free. I stocked up. I also like them because they work well with my octave mandolin, so I can maintain consistency with how I handle the instruments.

I've come to prefer GHS Silk & Steel on my Kentucky 272. They are not quite lights but they have a lighter tension, closer to medium lights, I guess, and the tone is bright and sweet.

About all I play is Celtic but it works for me.

[mbruno]

I started playing with 12 gauge sets but over time I've moved to 10 gauge for strings on my f9. The heavy strings imo tend to slow me down due to the energy needed to move heavy strings. The light strings definitely lose some tone but not enough to really worry me.

Also I play with 1.2 picks (i got a move repurposed tortoise shell pick recently) primarily but may go to 1.0 - 1.4 picks sometimes. The heavy pick helps pull tone from the strings, provides more control on shaping the volume and tone, and again help with speed imo.

That said, try a few gauges and pick combos and see what you like. Remember though, changing string gauges means you seriously change the tension on the instrument which will cause intonation issues. If you change gauges, you need to check the setup and intonation of the instrument when you change them and a month later at least. I don't recommend changing gauges too frequently or drastically either.

[tiltman]

So, I used to have only J74's on all of my mandolins...all of the time. I'm a traditional bluegrass mandolin player.

A couple of years ago I was talking with Greg Boyd about purchasing a Givens mandolin. Greg got to talking a bit...and was saying that Bob Givens, a great builder, thought that light strings worked best on his instruments. That heavier strings actually inhibited the top from vibrating as well as it could thus decreasing volume and impacting tone. Greg gave a few examples where he found that to be true. I thought, "whatever", and said put some J74's on that mandolin and send it to me.

A few months later I had a wild hair and for some reason tried a different set of strings - Gibson Sam Bush Monels - on my Gibson F5. Wow. It's a good mandolin but is great with these strings. Amazing bluegrass tone and a lot of "cut".

So I got to thinking...as we all should...maybe I should try those light strings on the Givens and see what happens. Wow again! This mandolin absolutely livened up with light strings. No loss of volume as far as I can tell. And I play in a bluegrass band that often plays loud - and they would tell me if my mandolin wasn't keeping up. Couldn't be happier with this mandolin.

My point in telling you these stories, if you are still reading, is that it is now my belief that different mandolins will respond differently to different strings. Try something different - maybe J74's aren't the string for every mandolin. And light strings may not decrease your volume.

Kirk

[tiltman]

But I still use a 1.3 mm pick. I'm not crazy.



Kirk

[mandroid]

10-36 on my pre TR A.. would be considered lighter.. but the 9-34 on my banjo mandolin are even lighter..
Pick, a 346 'heavy' is thinner than the CT 55 BC..


Oddly the same 11-40 on the wooden A4 feel lighter than the same strings on the CF Mix A5...

[Mark Wilson]

I think med light strings and med thin picks are a bit easier to play early on. I've gone back to a thinner (than my usual) Wegen that I got here on Cafe and it feels really good. I'm able to pick a little faster (imo) and it is brighter/louder which cuts better, which lets me play with lighter touch at our weekly jam. It's not the best sounding pick I have, but it's the most effective atm. CT might be on to something

[pops1]

I don't feel the thickness of the pick or the gauge of the strings corresponds to volume, tone yes, volume no. I play an ff hole mandolin for old time and other types, with a rounded 1mm Wegen. I have plenty of volume, if I want a slight more I will go to a 1mm pointed Wegen. Strings 11-16-27-41. I have also played my Martin with 10-36 strings with the same pick with plenty of volume. I believe volume is more related to pick attack and technique. I can play with a .60 pick and be loud or a heavier pick and be loud. How many times have you watched two guitar players play the same guitar with the same pick and one be much louder than the other. Some folks play hard, but just don't seem to get as much volume as others who don't look like they are playing hard, but can certainly be heard.

[s11141827]

I got more volume out of lighter gauge strings in a session (really light ones) on the Mandolin by shaving down the top, back, & braces.

[Dave Hanson]

It's all about energy, you need to put a lot of energy into heavy weight strings to make them sound good, thin strings will always sound thin.

Dave H

[pops1]

Light strings on a lightly built mandolin will sound full. If a mandolin was built for heavier strings light strings may not drive the top as needed and sound thin, but on a lightly built mandolin they will sound great.

[Charlie Bernstein]

I use light strings, but I'm not a pro. The top of my mando has flattened some with age, so I don't want a lot of pressure on it. And light strings are easy to finger, which matters more to me than volume.

Pick choice makes a much bigger difference on mando than it does on guitar. What makes most sense is to have a different picks for different sounds.

Since I'm not a pro, I take the cheater's route and use finger picks — the same ones for every song. The sound probably isn't as pretty as with flat picks, but my playing is a lot better.

[tmsweeney]

String gauges and pick weight are certainly matters of personal preference, and there is no universal mandate for one or the other.
Obviously following examples by great players or friends is certainly popular, while experimenting on your own is less popular (not that there is anything wrong with that)
I do prefer light strings on some mandolins, and mediums on others, I generally use a heavy 1.4mm pick regardless of the box I am plying on.
I could never make the Dawg picks work, in a discussion with Don Julan, his impression was that Grisman holds the pick perpendicular to the string, which is not a very common practice.
Reading through this the one thing I didn't see much discussion of was right hand technique.
Regardless of what strings and or pick you use, your right hand placement and movement is going to have the most influence on tone.
I'm sure great tone can be pulled from any mandolin (within reason) using any combination, its the player that makes the difference.

[milli857]

I agree that different strings work better on different mandos. I have medium strings on my Morris F5 and light strings on my two flat tops, but the F5 is significantly heavier build than the flat tops. If I pick it hard though, it gives me a really full and loud sound. The flat tops require a bit more of a light touch, but also have a nice sound (just different).

[Eric Platt]

Am discovering the 1915 Gibson A is happier with medium strings on it. Wasn't sure as I had always used lights in the past on any old Gibson.

That said, am using a thinner pick on this one. So far am switching between a Tortex .72 and .88 depending on how I feel. And that is obviously subject to change without notice.