I was reading that Andy Irvine had a guitar bodied bouzouki made for himself because "it's easyier to hold".

This would apply to ocatve mandolins, waldzithers, Banjolins, and a host of other teardrop shaped instruments.

Is there anyone out there making such beasties? Or would they have to be special orders?

On another topic since I've recovered from frozen sholder I've lost some flexability in my left arm and find that with full scale fretboards my playing's a bit off. Stick a capo on the third or fourth fret however and I'm OK. However that changes the keys; which I don't want. Downtuning to get the right keys with the capo on just makes the strings floppy and buzzy .

So once I'm solvent again and looking for a new instrument I'll be looking for shorter scale necks, but I don't want to loose fretboard width either. Anyone know of an off-the-shelf range that would suit me? I ask about off-the-shelf instruments in both cases because on a fixed income like mine a custom job is just out of my reach!

Wrinkles