Electric Mandolin Sighting at the Grammys!

**5thBeliever** · Feb-16-2011, 5:53pm

Anybody else catch Bob Dylan at the Grammys? Donnie Herron, multi-instrumentalist with Bob's current touring band, can be seen playing electric mando with His Bobness.
Here's the link, starting at 5:05. Donnie has been with Bob for a while, but I haven't had much luck figuring out what mando he's playing.

**Ed Goist** · Feb-16-2011, 6:09pm

That's a cool video...
Looks like Herron plays a 5 string Blue Star Mandoblaster.

**mrmando** · Feb-16-2011, 7:22pm

Don played the Mandoblaster with BR5-49. Didn't know he was with Dylan's band now. What happened to Bucky Baxter?

**5thBeliever** · Feb-16-2011, 8:36pm

According to Expecting Rain, Don's been with the band since March 7, 2005. He's played at the last dozen Bob shows I was at (going back to around '05), so that seems right. Really integral addition to the band, I think, and I'm sure my fellow Bobcats will agree. It seems like Bucky Baxter's been gone since the late '90's. I saw His Bobness on his most recent winter tour, and the mando came out for one song. It didn't look like the Mandoblaster to me, but I could be wrong...

**mrmando** · Feb-16-2011, 9:11pm

Well, the Mandoblaster Don played in BR5-49 was a custom job with a natural finish rather than the bright blue phenolic stuff. It looks like the same instrument in the Dylan video ... there's a shot or two where you can see the distinctive shape of the upper body bout, which is cut just a little differently on Mandoblasters than it is on any other e-mando.

Mandoblasters are built by Bruce Herron, and he and Don may be related ... I don't know whether that's true for certain or whether I'm making it up.

**Ben Milne** · Feb-17-2011, 5:34am

This would be the same one then, I presume?

**mrmando** · Feb-17-2011, 5:54am

Could be. It's definitely got the Mandoblaster cut. I think when you posted this before I might've misidentified it as belonging to Baxter; I didn't know Donny had replaced him.