About Time Too - Octave Mandola

A tune which took me an awful long time to write 'cos I kept changing it until it finally settled down, hence the title. It's played on an octave mandola which tuned GDAE (an octave below a mandolin) and accompanied by Tom on his guitar.

[@Mandolin1944]

I like the tune -- it moves along sharply and is catchy! The instrument is interesting too. Here in the USA we would call that an octave mandolin (I guess because it is an octave below the mandolin) - -but I realize the conventions are different in Europe. But the scale looks short for a GDAE tuning below a mandolin? I have an octave mandolin with a 21" scale and a mandola with a 17" scale (CGDA)-- typical for here. I guess the convention here follows the violin family.

[@ised-5239]

Mandolin1944 Yes octave mandola is the mandocello which is one octave below mandola.

[@17thmarchpatrick]

Thanks for the compliment - I made the mandola myself for one of my customers who couldn't get down to Cornwall to pick it up for a month so I uploaded this for him to see in the meantime. Google "Martin Cole Guitars" (KZbin won't let me put a link up here)

[@17thmarchpatrick]

@Mandolin1944 Thanks for the compliment on the tune. The name octave mandolin probably makes more sense than octave mandola but what can you do if all around you call it a mandola? The scale is 20 1/4" just shy of your 21" I have it strung with .013"p, .026"w, .036"w, .046"w which gives it pretty good tuning stability for the short scale.

[@ised-5239]

17thmarchpatrick Yes the instrument should be called octave mandolin whereas octave mandola is mandocello (tuned cgda but one octave lower to standard mandola).