Bickford Mandolin Method

[domradave]

I saw on Craigslist that someone is selling all 4 volumes of the Bickford Mandolin Method for just $25! It is offered on the Rhode Island Craigslist.
The Bickford Method was endorsed by Marilyn Mair in her Mandolin World News column years ago. I understand that volumes 3 and 4 are out of print.
She also endorsed the William Place, jr. method, 3 volumes, which I have used.
Is anybody familiar with both methods?
David

[mandopops]

I'm got the 4 Volumes of Bickford. The 1st 2 Volumes I used when I studied w/ Mr. Vicari. The other 2, I picked up years later-repro copies-from "someone" here. I think they are superb, very through, detailed and planned out. Highly recommended. For $25, sounds like a deal.

The Place, I have volume 1 & 3, I'd like to find Vol 2. I like the Place method also. Good details & organized.

I also like the little Christofaro method. It's small, just one volume, but a nice compact method.

Joe B

[mandoisland]

You can find some information and a link to a download of the first book on my website:


Bickford Mandolin Method

A set of all 4 books for 25$ would be great, I have books 1 and 2 and copies of 3 and 4.

Bickford describes the technique very detailed, I think his method belongs to the very good ones.

[Jim Garber]

I have all 4 copies and was selling photocopied and coil-bound on quality paper a while ago. I believe the first book may still be in print but the others are not.

[mandopops]

I'm glad Jim jumped in. He was the "someone" I got Vols. 3 & 4 from.

Hey Jim,
I didn't to put your name out there if you didn't want. They are excellent copies.

Joe B

[domradave]

If I get a mandolin and the Bickfords are not sold, I think I would get them.
Toni Nigrelli has the full set. She also has the Bickford Mandocello Method book.

[Beanzy]

I used the four books, very methodically for book 1 but kind of superficially for the books 3-4 that I bought as PDF from Djangobooks because I was really focussing on other methods. I will go back to them in detail once there is space in my schedule.

They're wonderfully 'old-school' but I found them rewarding. I would have liked to access the further tunes he lists after sets of exercises as the example ones are all too brief to spend too much time on.

[Jim Garber]

Michael from Djangobooks bought a copy of my volume 4 so he could scan it and sell it as an eBook. I think his source was not as clean as mine. So it goes...

[Beanzy]

is this "The Circle Of Lifts"?

I meant to add that if anyone comes across any Bickford tunes it would be nice to get them on here so people could use them in conjunction with the books. ta

[domradave]

The set of Bickfords is not on the list any more. I will look for the Goichberg book of etudes.

[MandoBetsy]

Do you still have any copies of all four volumes available for purchase? If so, how much? Please send me a private message if you'd like.

[Jim Garber]

Do you still have any copies of all four volumes available for purchase? If so, how much? Please send me a private message if you'd like.

I PMed you.

[August Watters]

Michael from Djangobooks bought a copy of my volume 4 so he could scan it and sell it as an eBook.

I hope someone will just take all four books and put them on IMSLP for free download. It's in the public domain!

Thanks to Jim for making these available (at cost, I'm sure) up to this point, but sure would like to see this in free circulation like the other classic methods out there.

[DavidKOS]

I hope someone will just take all four books and put them on IMSLP for free download. It's in the public domain!

Amen! I love IMSLP and the resources it provides for musicians.

[Mandolin Cafe]

This subject hasn't come up in awhile. Noticed amazon.com added a listing since yesterday for The Bickford Mandolin Method as a reprint which has apparently occurred a number of times. At under $10 not a bad price for those that want a hard copy. Appears it might be available in electronic form in various places on the web.

[Jim Garber]

Django Books had it. In fact when I was selling comb-bound copies of the later volumes he bought a copy of my volume 4 to make his eBook.

It looks like the Amazon version is a print-on-demand edition. That would be an amazing bargain if it had all four volumes for under $10, although I do wonder about this:

Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.2 x 9 inches
Shipping Weight: 5 ounces

That is pretty small dimensions for the book which should be closer to letter size. Also all four volumes I would guess would weigh more than 5 ounces. I would also have it spiral bound for easier day-to-day use.

[fatt-dad]

Skeptic Alert!

Could it be a paperback "booklet" that holds a CD of the original restored pages?

f-d

[SincereCorgi]

I wonder whether their print-on-demand set-up requires typical paperback-novel dimensions. I find playing out of books that small to be a pain in the neck.

[Jim Garber]

I wonder whether their print-on-demand set-up requires typical paperback-novel dimensions. I find playing out of books that small to be a pain in the neck.

That is sort of strange. I think Mel Bay does POD and sells them with a generic cover on a standard size, like their other books. For instance, see our friend John Goodin's Telemann book.

[Vangelis M.]

I have bought several technical books from this website, which as far as I am concerned offers free delivery everywhere:
https://www.bookdepository.com/searc...arch=Find+book
Bickford's Vol.1 seems to be available there too.

[Martin Jonas]

I have bought several technical books from this website, which as far as I am concerned offers free delivery everywhere:
https://www.bookdepository.com/searc...arch=Find+book
Bickford's Vol.1 seems to be available there too.

Volume 1 is a free download from archive.com in wonderful quality -- no need to pay anybody:

https://archive.org/details/bickfordmandolin01bick

The other three volumes are harder to get at the moment, although equally public domain. All of them are at Djangobooks.com (who also have the Bickford tenor banjo and ukulele methods and the Olcott-Bickford guitar method), but it feels wrong paying them for PDFs of public domain books although I did buy Volume 2 from them a while ago. The Amazon.com deal linked by Scott above is much better value, we just need somebody to try it and confirm that it's all four volumes in decent quality. I suspect it's actually only volume 1, prepared from the free archive.org scan. The title page of the archive scan also refers to all four volumes, but includes only the first.

Martin

[Beanzy]

I suspect you're right about that being book 1 only Martin.

I bought books 2,3 & 4 but didn't mind paying Djangobooks for them as they've done the work of sourcing & scanning them for me so that's really what I thought I was buying there. I like to encourage that sort of effort so they see it as worthwhile and may try other similar publications from hard to get sources. I do think it would be good to get hold of the tune books with the additional examples listed in the text. I might make a list and post it here so we could go rummage various collections & see if any are available.

[mandoisland]

I think paying for a printed and bound copy is ok even if it's from a public domain PDF - if you take into account that paper, ink and binding is not free...
But maybe sombody can make a good scan of the volumes 2, 3 and 4 and post it to IMSLP.

[Scott Tichenor]

OK, all these questions...

I did a lengthy recording session recently and the person that did it gave me a gift certificate for amazon.com as part of the payment. After my daughter bought a bunch of cosmetics I still have plenty left over. Who wants to be the recipient of a mighty $10 purchase I'm offering to make on your behalf? Would ask you post a review and answer questions about this publication for others. Would prefer it be someone that has already posted above and has questions and is truly interested in the content.

[fatt-dad]

Not sure. What I'm saying yes to. . . I'm interested in this publication to some degree and will give full report to the best of my ability.

f-d