Another guitar player buys a mando

[Tim Farney]

It ships today. I’ll be playing rock and Americana, not Bluegrass. Recommendations for good online resources to get me started?

[Randi Gormley]

I'd start with mike marshall's youtube on how to hold the instrument. The link is around here somewhere ... but it does help overcome the guitarist's misinformation that a mandolin is a "little guitar" and that technique simply transfers over. It'll put you on strong feet so you CAN transfer over stuff like strum technique, rhythm, love of music etc. but it should short-circuit the idea that it's one finger per fret or that your fretting hand should be perpendicular to the fretboard. as to whether you can hold a mandolin via strap down below your waist sticking out toward the audience and make music -- i'll leave that to people who actually play rock-and-roll mandolin.

All joking aside, congrats and welcome to the café! you're prepped for a great time, great music and a great community!

[Seter]

Welcome Tim, what mandolin did you order? I found the tab library right here on the Cafe to be a very handy resource of things to learn: https://www.mandolincafe.com/tabarc.html

[Roger Moss]

YouTube will have a squadron of general lessons as well as for specific songs. A few searches should get you started. You might start out by searching for Brad Laird lessons to get started with. He also has a website.

[Tim Farney]

I'd start with mike marshall's youtube on how to hold the instrument. The link is around here somewhere ... but it does help overcome the guitarist's misinformation that a mandolin is a "little guitar" and that technique simply transfers over. It'll put you on strong feet so you CAN transfer over stuff like strum technique, rhythm, love of music etc. but it should short-circuit the idea that it's one finger per fret or that your fretting hand should be perpendicular to the fretboard. as to whether you can hold a mandolin via strap down below your waist sticking out toward the audience and make music -- i'll leave that to people who actually play rock-and-roll mandolin.

All joking aside, congrats and welcome to the café! you're prepped for a great time, great music and a great community!

Ah, the Jimmy Page Mando stance is not going to work for me? Pity. Anybody wanna buy a trans blue Eastman 805 with two humbuckers? 😎

Thanks for the advice. That’s probably a great place to start. That’s probably THE place to start. I’d guess that chords and scales, then learning some of my guitar songs on the Mando would come next. I can probably get to some useful stuff to add some color to my two guitar duo pretty quickly from there, but I’m retired and have the time to learn more than that if y’all have any recommendations for online lessons; I prefer visual instruction.

[Tim Farney]

It’s a trans blue Eastman 805 with a K&K pickup. It leaves Arizona today for its long ride to NC. I got a great deal because it’s blue and evidently that wasn’t well received. I personally kind of like it. Thanks for the tip. I’ll check out the tab library.

[Seter]

The blue will look good in a rock setting, nice find.

[Br1ck]

I find the site Mandolessons.com to be very good in that it might not be what you end up playing, but learning fiddle tunes will give you an understanding of the fingerboard, and they are fun to play. There are tracks without the lead, and without the rythem. You can learn simple chord comping too.

Mandolin for dummies is a great book to have close by.

The Eastman will be great to learn on and fit with what you want to do. Beware though, I just bought my forth mandolin.

[Tim Farney]

I just found Mandozine. It looks like it has most of what I need to put some mandolin in my existing music. Then, if I get ambitious, I’ll try to learn some fiddle tunes. I love Celtic melodies. I need to write some songs under that influence. One remaining question for the moment: are double stops as chord substitutions/partial chords a thing? I love double stops on the guitar, though I’m often bending one string for pedal steel effects. I don’t imagine that’s a thing in mandolin...

Thanks for all the suggestions; I’ll follow up on them. Great community you’ve got here.

[Tim Farney]

I find the site Mandolessons.com to be very good in that it might not be what you end up playing, but learning fiddle tunes will give you an understanding of the fingerboard, and they are fun to play. There are tracks without the lead, and without the rythem. You can learn simple chord comping too.

Mandolin for dummies is a great book to have close by.

The Eastman will be great to learn on and fit with what you want to do. Beware though, I just bought my forth mandolin.

I just put Mandolessons.com in my instruction folder. And yes, I understand the perils of acquisition syndrome. I have 9 guitars.

[Tim Farney]

The blue will look good in a rock setting, nice find.

I wonder what I’d get plugged into a Deluxe Reverb? ��

[Randi Gormley]

I like the blue -- double stops and two-finger chords are perfectly acceptable, but that may vary by genre (jazz and bluegrass like the four-fingered chords). bending might be harder than you're used to because the double strings and short scale mean there's tons of pressure there, but it can be done (I think. I don't know from my own experience). Mostly you'll be using hammer-ons and pull-offs and whatever electronic extras you like, though. for stuff like hornpipes and reels and suchlike (ITM-wise) you'll be adding triplets to melody lines for some depth along with double-stops. and i just noticed i typed 'one finger per fret' (one hopes!) when I meant one fret per finger since most mandolin players generally use one finger per two frets. I gotta proof-read better.

[Loubrava]

Get a few lessons from here best few hundred I spent. Don will get you going no matter what type of music your into.
https://mandolinshealtheworld.com/categories/MTF
Lou

[Denny Gies]

If you're into Americana, check out Jason Isbell and Tyler Childers on YouTube. Have fun.

[HonketyHank]

Welcome to the bunch. I see someone already mentioned mandolessons.com, which I have learned a lot from. I'll also mention mandozine.com as a resource for finding tons of tab files in TablEdit format. There are a fair number of same here in our library, but a lot of them are in ASCII format or are duplicates from mandozine.com.

I assume you know about TablEdit. If not, get it or TEFView, available at tabledit.com.

[Mark Gunter]

String bending is tough on mandolin with its high tension, short scale length and double courses. That makes bending a different animal from guitar, where you can bend pure notes a half-step, whole step or higher. With a double course, it would be quite a trick to bend both of a pair of strings to produce a note in unison for a full note half step or higher bend. Maybe not impossible, but very difficult.

OTOH, "choking" the strings, or bending a note less than a half step for a bluesy feel can be very effective and not too difficult to get right.

I think if you want to play with a lot of string bending, one of the four string electric models will be the bee's knees for you.

[mandolin tony]

Tim welcome aboard, and I think your blue Eastman is cool. rock on & have fun.

[MikeZito]

As a guitar player you might be able to use your knowledge and abilities of music, chords, scales, rhythms, etc., to make a fast start for yourself. Start slow, experiment, remember that a mandolin is not just a small upside-down guitar, and see what comes to you naturally. This way, perhaps you can develop something of your own unique style, before you start to lean too heavily on internet lessons and wind up sounding like somebody else.

Just my 2-cents.

Play, learn, enjoy and keep us posted.

[lflngpicker]

Love that transparent blue Eastman! Enjoy!

[Mark Wilson]

I’ll be playing rock and Americana, not Bluegrass.

I started with same thought. I found that the most accessible online lessons were for fiddle tunes. I started there and didn't regret it. Great way to learn the basics

[indexless]

Hey Tim, a good buddy of mine, Adam Traum just put out Mandolin for Guitar Players on Homespun.....check it out, it's really good...I really dig the blue, I'd love a guitar that color

[EdHanrahan]

Decades ago, a small music store near my in-laws in FL had an, uhmm, economical blue guitar that I almost sprung for, just to have it there when visiting. Kept looking for another to show up, but no luck. Of course, now a mandolin is there!

BTW, if you haven't figured it yet, the majority of folks here started on guitar, and many still play both.

[Br1ck]

I defy you, double dare you, to learn a couple of bluegrass double stop licks. Learn to play them really well. Then go cold turkey and never learn or play another one. Betcha can't do it. Ask me how I know.

I was never, ever going to play bluegrass.

[Bill Romansky]

“String bending is tough on mandolin with its high tension, short scale length and double courses. That makes bending a different animal from guitar, where you can bend pure notes a half-step, whole step or higher. With a double course, it would be quite a trick to bend both of a pair of strings to produce a note in unison for a full note half step or higher bend. Maybe not impossible, but very difficult.”

Guitar background, I can get vibrato on the strings, but it sounds like “a duck ####### in the fog”, to quote Leo Kottke.

I tune my Irish bazouki to G-D-g-d, and get some banging blues riffs out of it, maybe explore alternative tunings. I work the third and fifth positions.

[CES]

I like the blue as well! Used to have a blueburst Fender FM-62SE that was fun to play around with...

Check out jazzmando.com's FFCP exercises. Very helpful!