The Steel Guitar Forum

Anyone have a recommendation or two? I'm not looking to spend a lot or money, just want decent intonation and action, basically.

I'm not a mando player, but two that I've heard played are the Godin A8 and the Ovation, both with excellent on-board electronics. However, count on spending at least $500-$600 new. Also, they're not traditional looking mandolins, but they do sound great plugged in.

Hey Jeremy,
I play mandolin quite a bit and have tried a lot of different ones live at gigs. If you want something reasonable I'd get one of the Fender A-style electrics. They've got a magnetic style pickup like a guitar and a volume and tone control on top. This mandolin doesn't require a pre-amp which is also a plus and doesn't sound too bad unplugged either. They go for around $250 more or less from Musician's Friend or any music store which handles Fender instruments. Wow, I just looked at the MF catalog just now and they're $189.99 w/o case but you can order the case for $59.99. If you have a Fender dealer near you, the model number is: FM-52E. I have a Fender FM-62SE which is a sort of F-style electric with a piezo bridge pickup factory installed. They go for around $450. Musician's Friend also handles a Rogue electric mandolin which is similar in appearance to the A style Fender electric and it goes for $129.99 but I think I'd be a little suspect of the quality here maybe. I have played the Fender and I'd recommend that if you want one. I've even seen some of the acts on CMT & the Opry who have musicians who double on mandolin playing these low priced Fenders....Have a good 'un.

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Livin' in the Past and the Future with a 12 string Mooney Universal tuning.

<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Jerry Hayes on 18 February 2003 at 10:39 AM.]</p></FONT>

Jerry, you hit the nail on the head. I am also a mandolin player and I'll tell you an interesting story about the Fender 53S mandolin (same as the 52E except without the pickup). They are GREAT mandolins for $250.00! I played an Ovation electric for a few months but could never get it to intonate up the neck so I checked it at the twelth fret with a meter and sure enough two of the strings were 15-20 cents off at the twelth. Its had a plastic bridge so I couldn't modify it. I also found it tinny sounding and could not equalize it out to get a realistic mandolin tone. I called up Ovation and asked them about it and was told " oh yeah, the first production run of those went out with mis-manufactured bridges and they are out of intonation". So instead of sending it back and waiting at least a month I went down to Guitar Center and saw the Fender 53S on the wall. When I took it down and played it I couldn't believe the sound. It sounded better than $1000.00 Kentuckys. I thought there was something wrong with my hearing. It had a floating bridge on it and I moved the bridge around at the store and intonated it with a meter. It played perfectly in tune up the neck. I wound up putting a Fishman bridge pickup on it and running it through a Peavey Ecoustic 112 and it sounded killer.
Fast forward a few months. My band gets a call from the local radio station to open for Shannon Lawson. Well Shannon's got a Kentucky smokin bluegrass player with him who plays both banjo and mandolin. What does he pull out when he comes on stage? A Fender $250.00 53S with a Fishman bridge pickup!!!
We talked after the performance and we both were laughing because we both agreed that the Fender A's sound better than some $2000.00 mandolins that we tried. By the way the Fenders are made in Korea by Samick. They are great sounding mandolins. Jeremy, hope this helps.
<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Kevin Hatton on 18 February 2003 at 04:51 PM.]</p></FONT><FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Kevin Hatton on 18 February 2003 at 04:51 PM.]</p></FONT>

I also play mandolin. I have an electric Gibson hollow body, but it tends to feed back sometimes when I play it with distortion at high volume in my rock band. I'm going to eventually get a Godin solid body in order to eliminate that problem.

Meanwhile, here is a link to the Electric mandolin rescources page on gthe web. http://www.emando.com/

Thanks, guys for the info. I think I'll brave the slush and head to 48th Street today and check out the Fender mando.

Are you looking for a bluegrass or western swing mandolin?
By bluegrass I mean a hollow-body, 8-string... the kind everybody plays. By western swing, I mean a solid-body 4 or 5-string mandolin, like Tiny Moore and others play.

I've always wanted Fender to make a mandolin that's built and shaped like a mini Telecaster.

Hey Scott,
Fender does make a solid body 5 string mandolin but it's shaped more like those old Fender 4 stringers from many years ago. I never liked those or and other electric without the unison strings as on some things they just sound like a guitar. As far as swing or jazzy stuff goes you can't get any better than what Jethro Burns did or David Grisham and they both play(ed) 8 string instruments.....JH

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Livin' in the Past and the Future with a 12 string Mooney Universal tuning.

Definitely looking for a standard mandolin with 8 strings and a pickup. A friend loaned me one of the old Fender solid-bodies with 4 strings, and it sounded like a guitar to me (albeit capoed very high up the neck).

Hi Jeremy

I have an Ibanez hollow body,and I put a Kent WC18 pickup on it. It's a pickup made expressly for mandolins. It has tone and volume controls. BTW, Ibanez mandolins have the height adjustment knobs on the bridge, so you can raise and lower your strings. I forget what I paid for it many years ago, but I know it wasn't that expensive. I played it through 2 Peavey amps in stereo chorus, and it sounded great. It was one of 4 instruments I used to play when I was in bands, and when I broke that baby out, everybody would get off their a$$es and dance. LOL!!

Good luck......Harry

Marietta Music Company, Marietta, Ohio, has had one on the wall that they have been trying to get rid of for several months. I bet you could get it at a pretty good price. Their number is 740-376-9490. Talk to Jeff George. (owner)

Here's another vote for the Fender. The FM-52E is probably the best-sounding mandolin I've ever played. (I have played two of them, and they both sound this good. Action was superb, too.) I like them better than a couple of $3000+ Gibsons I played in a store. The Gibsons were all right, but overpriced in my opinion. Anjo makes one that's not too bad, and it stays in tune.

There's my two cents.

Lincoln

Based on this 'thread' alone, I've ordered the Fender from MF - $189.99 + $12.50 shipping. That's a great price if it's half as good as you guys say it is!

I don't play mandolin - yet - but I'm about to play 'Chicago', and the banjo parts call for some mandolin, too; I've long wanted to try one - this was all the push I needed!

The charts also specify ukelele for some tunes - does anyone have any recommendations for a good, but inexpensive, uke? I played uke (the only time I ever did) with Herb Remington at Gerry Hogan's Festival of Steel Guitar back in England a few years back - that was fun!

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Roger Rettig