Playing longer scale mandos gets progressively more impossible?

[Digital Larry]

Way back when, I think I had a Flatiron Octave Mandolin, but it had been sold to me with a set of Mandola strings, and being stupid I didn't know any better. Wound up with way too much tension and warped the neck. But putting that aside, I found it really difficult to play, being used to the mandolin and ability to reach the 7th fret with my pinky. Scale is just too long.

I wound up selling that to a friend who fixed it up and hopefully sold it with the right kind of strings on it.

I look at mandolas and octave mandos and mandocellos and they have a nice sound but I'm telling myself that they are fundamentally different beasts to play. The YouTube demos of OMs and MCs tend to show someone generally fretting the top two strings and using the bottom ones as drones, but laying your fingers down and playing scales up and down all strings which is easy on a regular mandolin is not so much in evidence. You can't play a bluegrass "chop" type G or D form chord on those things.

Anyone go for a longer scale mando-thing and find it was too difficult? Or were you able to adapt to it somehow? Give up and use a capo?

[Mark Gunter]

Hey Larry! Good question, I think you'll find all manner of experiences here. There is a whole sub-forum section below titled "CBOM" - which stands for Cittern, Bouzoukis, Octave Mandolins, I believe. There's a sort of sub-community of users here who use those longer scale instruments often. I've read of plenty of folk using capos on them as well, and seen many videos of pros doing so. So I believe you'll find a wide range of stories from different people here.

I'm currently building a mandocello to try, and I've ordered a custom mandola which I should have later in 2019. I'm looking forward to using those.

[Digital Larry]

Thanks, I did check out a few of those threads and I think I reached the proper conclusion. They sound so great strumming some first position chords though! Having just bought an electric mandolin after a few years of diversion into electric guitar and ukuleles I think I'm just gonna stick with my mandolins. Trouble is, you buy one, and that's so much fun, then it should be twice as much fun to buy another one right? But then I remind myself that I just sold 5 guitars that I hadn't been playing in spite of them being reasonably nice instruments and fun for awhile at the time.

[foldedpath]

We will all have different approaches to this question, and some of it comes down to the size of your hands and fingers, and how much you can stretch (including the usual age factors that slow us down).

I play a mandolin and a 22" scale Weber octave mandolin. Almost everything I play is Irish, Scottish, or Cape Breton traditional instrumental music. Tunes, not backup, and much of it very fast at typical dance tempos. For the fast tunes like jigs and reels, I choose the mandolin. It "speaks" faster, the ornaments are crisp, and I can fly on that instrument.

I use the OM for slower tunes like marches, "slow reels," and metered airs, where I can milk the sustain of that instrument. If I have to, I can play the OM as fast as my mandolin, using a quick hand shift to reach the high B note in a fiddle tune. But it's tiring, and I can't keep that up for long. I'd much rather use it where it seems to fit better for the slow stuff, and grab the mandolin for the fast tunes.

That's just me, and your mileage or anyone else's may vary.

[allenhopkins]

...You can't play a bluegrass "chop" type G or D form chord on those things. Anyone go for a longer scale mando-thing and find it was too difficult? Or were you able to adapt to it somehow? Give up and use a capo?

Octave mandolins and mandocelli aren't designed to be played like "regular" mandolins, or even mandolas. Four-finger "closed" chords are much more difficult, finger stretches are longer so the fretting hand has to "un-anchor" from the end of the neck, and slide up to grab those fifth and sixth fret notes.

Using a capo on one of these is not "giving up," any more than putting one on your guitar or banjo (a generally accepted technique in the folk-based-acoustic-music community). It's just a way adjust the instrument's scale so that playing in certain keys, or playing certain melodies, is made easier and more fluid.

There are shorter-scale octave mandolins, a bit over 20 inches, that aren't that much longer scale than mandolas. Your Flatiron Model 3 was four or so inches longer than that, and Flatiron labeled it a "bouzouki" (I know because I've been playing a Flatiron 3-K for 30 years now). Look at a brand like Trinity College, and you may find something more "finger friendly." Or get an old Regal Octofone, if you can find one, and string it like an OM.

Don't try to make 'em what they ain't. Accept the idiosyncrasies in order to get the benefits. I've gotten a lot of music over the years out of a long-scale octave mandolin.

I concur in Mark G's advice to look at the CBOM forum, which is devoted to the larger mandolin-family instruments. Lots of discussion of scale lengths, stringing, and playing techniques. All these instruments allow you to adapt your mandolin fingering knowledge, to making music in a lower range. Which is great fun.

[Roger Moss]

Ummm..."impossible" is an absolute, isn't it? I mean, once you get to impossible, you're there. More "difficult", yes, but impossible is pretty much an end point.

[Digital Larry]

OK you guys, I realize you're trying to help me out by assuaging my fear of excessively large mando things, but I think we will all be better off if I just stick with what I have and try to do that the best I can. Too bad I can't just check one out from the library.

[trabb]

I tend to use the longer scale instruments for different purposes. Almost always, I'm playing in a setting where there are other instruments to carry rhythm - usually an acoustic guitar. On the mandocello, I'll play lots of double stops to add some texture; on fuller sounding sections, I'll use two finger chords relying on open strings. I also find that combining my guitar playing knowledge with mandolin family fretboard knowledge lets me do 3-finger closed chords (often with a barre) pretty easily. Four-finger closed chords are sometimes impossible. (Roger Moss's point is well taken, but there are some chord shapes that my hands just can't make due to physical limitations.)

Octave mandolin takes the place of guitar for me when I'm after a certain sound. I find I use it less than the other instruments just because while I love the sound I get from it, it's not something I want on most songs - but when it IS what I want it's amazing. I also tend not to use it if there's someone else playing acoustic guitar because they overlap so much in tone.

Mandola is my least used, mostly just because I never quite connected with the one I have. (New one arriving tomorrow though! Can't wait to try the new Eastman.) I find that I use it most often on songs that are keyboard/piano driven. It adds a nice accompaniment that isn't quite as high as the mandolin, which I find often gets lost when the keys start playing in a higher register. On mandola, I don't have the same reach issues, of course, as with the others.

On none of them will I likely be playing lots of scales, though I do sometimes on mandola. And on all of them, a capo ranges from necessary (mandocello, OM) to really helpful (mandola). I can play any key using barre chords on guitar, even if I don't usually want to play without a capo in, say Eb. I actually can't do that on mandocello/OM, both due to the longer scale and less experience/comfort. I do have to remind myself pretty frequently that they're not just big mandolins - each is its own instrument with its own benefits and limitations.

[Digital Larry]

First mandocello I ever heard was David Grisman playing "Opus 38" and you wouldn't have guessed that it was any more difficult to play than the regular one. What a sound!

Years later I realized that this is mostly due to Grisman being amazing. Maybe once out of the 15 or 20 times I saw him play live did he bring that beast, and then he made Mike Marshall play it!

[RichardF]

I think the stretches can be done on 53cm and even 58cm Octave Mandolas. When I was younger, maybe had fitter fingers and no fear it was much easier. Now I have to warm up for longer, raise the head of the mandola more and liberate my thumb from gripping the neck to move it more; that takes confidence and practice.

[CarlM]

This illustrates why longer scale instruments like guitar and bass are more often tuned in fourths.

[Digital Larry]

I did play a Greek Bouzouki at NAMM in January. It was tuned like the top (highest) 4 strings of a guitar and actually played and sounded great! Just not sure I could deal with holding that watermelon sized body on my lap. And of course, maybe a little goes a long way with some of those things as my interest is not specifically playing ethnic music. I've even considered an electric 12 string but I doubt I'd use it enough to keep myself from getting rid of it a few months later.

[Chuck Leyda]

I put mine in GDAD immediately so I wouldn't try to play it exactly like a standard mandolin. The tuning is often used in Celtic music but it works well for old time, Gospel and American folk music too.

It's a franken-instrument...a bit DADGAD guitar, mandolin, mandola, clawhammer banjo-ish, bouzouki-ish thing. I love it. And while a lot of it transfers from mandolin (particularly moveable triad chords) it's really its own thing.

[SincereCorgi]

I look at mandolas and octave mandos and mandocellos and they have a nice sound but I'm telling myself that they are fundamentally different beasts to play.

Yeah, I would agree they are. For a while I was playing a lot of swing on a tenor guitar and the scale length and tuning definitely forced me into certain patterns. I ended up playing out of closed positions halfway up the neck just because the scales were much easier to navigate where the frets were closer together. I just play that stuff on regular guitar now and it's hilarious how much easier it is.

I think when I go back to tenor guitar I might try going through a couple cello methods. I figure that's got to be just as hard and cellists seem to zip their scales around just fine.

[Beanzy]

Yep it’s really just a case of getting into the dancy-shifty mindset you use when playing ‘cello.
You basically treat nothing as fixed and as much as possible move the hand rather than try reaches which would slow you down.
When extending for a simgle note it’s often much better to move to a 1/2 or whole position higher and reach back, as the index and 2nd finger have greater scope for extending. Once you are into continually shuffling about the fingerboard the apparent difficulty goes away for most scales.

[Bob Visentin]

. You can't play a bluegrass "chop" type G or D form chord on those things.

I can play chop chords on a mandola but mostly play 2 and 3 note chords.

[Digital Larry]

This is the first tune I ever tried to play on the mandolin. That was many years ago. I'll get it one of these days! Looks like Grisman is playing a mandola and Mike Marshall gets the honors on the 'cello. Even bends a few notes in his solo.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVJrjuqFKr8

[Hypoxia]

I've deeply played guitar a long time, mandolin not so long or intensively, and larger 5th-tuned axes more recently. My 21-inch fretted 12-string Turkish banjo is strung in 5ths (I call it a Turk cittern) and is monstrous to play. I have 13-inch mandos, some in standard GDAE, some in Celtic GDAD, and a couple in a blended Yank Rachell (down a minor 3rd) and Celtic to EBF#B which works well for blues. My mandolas are a cheap 19-inch teardrop and a cheap 17-inch taropatch (8-string) tenor 'uke restrung with two Aquila 31U sets, also down a minor 3rd.

Are longer scales harder to play? They can't be played as a standard mandolin, no. But I'm primarily a guitarist and I may approach mandos with guitar-like moves. I started on mountain dulcimer and played Dobro so I'm used to modes, drones, open chording, etc. I setup that 17-inch mando-'uke specifically so I could chord comfortably all over the neck.

The 19- and 21-inch axes demand different thinking, more linear than harmonic. Open chords are where you find them. Closed chords are much further up the neck than on a wee little mandolin. It;s sort of like moving between 15-inch concert 'uke and 25-inch standard guitar. A piccolo is not a bass flute.