Mandolin Arranging Cheat-Sheet

[zeeku777]

Just stumbled across this thing the other day! Made it for a composition&arranging course I took last semester -

Hope someone else gets some use out of it! (plus this is an excuse to peer edit haha)

[Adam Sweet]

I don't understand what it's for...vocals?

[MikeEdgerton]

I see nothing in that chart that would even suggest vocals, I do see mandolin and a whole lot of other instruments.

[SincereCorgi]

It's a combination of a transposition chart, ranges chart, fretboard diagram, and a chromatically arranged series of ascending 5ths (for... circle of 5ths?). I'd probably just open to the last ten pages of an orchestration book.

[Mike Bunting]

What's that got to do with arranging?

[SincereCorgi]

When people learn to arrange for ensembles with transposing instruments, they'll often refer to transposition and range charts to avoid making dumb mistakes.

[zeeku777]

Made it, as a poster - on my wall next to my bed where I compose most my work, super quick reference for when I need it, plus it made it easy to memorize a lot of it while laying there with nothing else to do haha.

Circle of 5ths also for sharps and flats, just didnt write it in there - vocal ranges also included.

Just something a bit helpful to me, instead of having books or tabs on the internet, one nice poster haha