My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Metchosin
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 02:29 PM

Are you sure its a banjo mandolin?

Uncle Jack's has eight strings and a banjo body with an open back and skin top. He purchased it from a catalogue over fifty years ago and that is what they called it then.

Rawhide, if uncle Jack's instrument is not the same as Bob's, what is my uncle's instrument known as?

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Downeast Bob
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 02:21 PM

Rawhide is right. He even spelled the name of the maker correctly and corrected my misspelling of "mandoline-banjo." It is tuned and played exactly like a five string banjo. I usually use the same tunings I use on the banjo.

Fie on Spaw for his dislike of bastardized instruments. I like this little sucker because I'm not very accomplished on guitar and sometimes I want a mellower, deeper tone than I can get on any of my other banjos.

I can even play blues on it. One of the nicest compliments I've ever had was when a listener said, "Reminds me of Robert Johnson on an old National steel guitar." That's overstating it, but it can achieve a funky, old-time blues sound.

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: GutBucketeer
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 02:02 PM

I've seen/heard a Mountain Dulcimer with a banjo type head. It sounded really neat, and was loud!

JAB

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: catspaw49
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 02:01 PM

No offense here Bob, but I classify all those things as "Bastardaharps." Every once in awhile, for reasons unclear to me, folks seem to get a wild hair up their ass and whip together some assorted parts in the hope of creating a new and wonderful sound and instrument. Mostly they drop off the face of the earth with a few loyal follwers tagging along like the marxolin or they actually make it, like the autoharp. Harp is a popular word since it associates with a pretty sound, even though the instrument does not fit the harp definition......an autoharp is a zither, not a harp.

Personally, I'm thinking of attaching a set of drone pipes to an accordion with French Horn bells on the end of each pipe with strung banjo pots atop the bells. I'm thinking that Flatulharp would be a great name.......

Spaw

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: death by whisky
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:58 PM

Whats peoples opinions on hybrid instruments?I've tried a couple of six string banjos,,but they just sound awful.What does your mandybanjy sound like/play like?

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Sorcha
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:55 PM

Tuned I would guess, e A D G C ? Like a 5 string violin with a viola C string? If so, I neeeeeeeed one.......

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Metchosin
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:53 PM

I should have known that, my Uncle plays a banjo mandolin, Duh!!! but that would have been too easy.

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: JedMarum
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:48 PM

sounds cool. I think I need one!

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Dee45
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:44 PM

It's a "mandoline-banjo" built by August Pollmann of New York.

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Downeast Bob
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:42 PM

Okay, it's a five-string banjo neck on a mandolin body, invented in the 1880s by a NY Luthier. He called it a banjo mandolin or a mandolin banjo (I forget which) but these days, they seemed be named after the luthier himself. I'm sure at least one or two banjo pickers here will know his name.

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Metchosin
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:17 PM

Looks a bit like a banjax? or banjacks that one of the fellows from Shooglenifty played when I saw them a couple of weeks ago. The body of the instrument was round though.

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:16 PM

A banjolin is another name for a mandolin-banjo and has 8 strings. It is a banjo bodied instrument with mandolin tuning and is similar in size to a ukele-banjo. I own one and love it - great fun instrument.

Jon

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: death by whisky
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:14 PM

A banjolin has a banjo type body,but smaller,double strung like a mandolin.I reckon its a mandjo

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: JedMarum
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:03 PM

banjolin?? Is she Banjo Bonnie's sister?

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: MMario
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:02 PM

obviously it is a five string banjolin!

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Mbo
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 01:01 PM

It's a banjolin.

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: katlaughing
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 12:57 PM

Nice picture, but sheesh! I went to Lark in the Morning's site and the list is endless of what it possibly could be, so hopefully someone with more knowledge will recognise it and get us out of the blue! Looks pretty interesting....

katlaughing

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 12:56 PM

Great photo!. I have to admit defeat with the name of the instrument. It looks like a mandola body with a 5-string banjo type neck.

Jo

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: JedMarum
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 12:56 PM

a cleverly designed prop from wierd instrument photo studio?? jes kiddin

don't know, but it looks like fun! What is it??

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: death by whisky
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 12:46 PM

It's a bizzare 19th Century 5 string thingy.A strange hybrid type gizmo.

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: SINSULL
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 12:46 PM

Or just go into Mudcat Resources, select photos, and scroll down to Downeast Bob. Looks like a cross between a mandolin, a five string banjo, and a guitar. Love the beard and twinkle in you eye.

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Kim C
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 12:42 PM

well, since the whole thing doesn't show in the picture...... ;) It's shaped like a mandola or something but if it's only got five strings I don't reckon that's right...

Subject: RE: My pic. Can you name what I'm holding?
From: Downeast Bob
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 12:40 PM

Uh.. It might help if you could see it. Click here.

Subject: My pic. Dig what he's holding!
From: Downeast Bob
Date: 10 Aug 00 - 12:38 PM

Just posted a pic of myself to the member photo gallery. I'm curious to see how many can correctly identify the 5-string thingy in the pic and who made it.