Jon, As a thrift shopper, garage sailor and swap meeter you KNOW I know the word cheapskate. I've mostly have never paid more than $35 for any of my instruments. The exceptions are $100 for Weiss (Helikon Harmonika) button accordion. And $400 to buy my hammer dulcimer which I earned by selling plastic bird whistles for 75 cents (I bought them for a nickle a piece).

The inside of my Violin-uke (which I bought at a swap meet for $35) says: VIOLIN-UKE patent applied for guaranteed 5 years $35 Marxochime Colony New Troy, Michigan

You can play melody and chords at the same time (and sing if you are very coordinated). To play a violin-uke you bow up one side and down the other like a bowed psaltery and you strum the middle strings which are arranged in chords. The chords from right to left are GBDG, F#DCD, GECC, and GECA#. Notes going up the right side are A,C,E,G,B,D,F,A and on the left are G,B,D,F,A,C,E,G. So you can see that to play a scale you'd alternate bowing one side with the other.

On a bowed psaltry the natural notes are all on the right side and the sharps and flats are all on the left. You can play a scale mostly by staying on the right side and not have to jump over to the left side too often. Perhaps this was the cause of the violin-uke's lack of popularity and longevity. Of course one could just retune the strings, but there aren't very many compared to a bowed psaltry because of the chord strings going up the middle.

I'm sure this is more than you ever wanted to know about a violin-uke. It would be a lot shorter if I could show it to you. But then again maybe it wouldn't because I DO like to talk about folky stuff.

judy