Resonance of a fiddle vs mandolins (wow)
On Friday I took a day trip to a music store that might have a bigger selection of higher-end mandolins than any other music store in Missouri (that store is Morgan Music in Lebanon, MO) and definitely more good mandolins than I've found in any stores that are a day trip away from Kansas City. I got to play a Northfield F5S and Big Mon, a Gibson F5G, a 1924 Gibson A4, a 70's Gibson F12 (shockingly bad, even after what I've read over the years, lol), an assortment of Collings from MT to MF5, and some miscellaneous Chinese and American brands. (My favorite mandolins this time were the two Northfields. On my last visit last summer, my favorite was a Ratliff R5F - wish there had been one this time.)
While at the store, I talked to Bobby about fiddles and how I had dabbled on my son's fiddle some years ago and had kept wanting to buy a lower-priced fiddle just for the fun of it. Bobby gave quick demos of a wide range of new and old fiddles, from $100 and up to about $2500. Bobby then left me to my own devices. I played one particularly rough looking old German fiddle and was shocked by the resonance from that fiddle's body (even with my rusty playing). These days I'm mainly a mandolin player, but even after playing some very nice mandolins that day, the rich reverberation of that relatively cheap fiddle was a revelation!
I will still buy a step-up mandolin one of these days (hopefully this spring), but I walked away with that beat-up old German fiddle. I probably overpaid because it IS so rough and is just a trade violin from a time and place that generated a lot of junk violins (and Morgan Music's Reverb entry called the condition "fair," lol), but I was going by my ear and that $500 fiddle just sounded so rich.
Doug Brock
2018 Kimble 2 point (#259), Eastman MD315, Eastman MDA315, some guitars, banjos, and fiddles
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