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I wanted to know if a baritone ukulele tuned in 5ths was something I could use to accompany myself while singing and if so how the scale length would impact the mandolin fingerings I am used to using.
I am putting this out into internet land as I had a lot of questions when deciding if I wanted to even bother checking this out or not and didn't find any videos that checked these boxes:
(1) tuned GDAE
(2) with vocals
(3) baritone ukulele
(4) swing
Here is what I learned from the experiment:
(1) you can tune a baritone ukulele to GDAE. I used the E A G and B strings from a classical guitar set. You can hear the tone is very different between the nylon and wound strings, which kind of sucks. I'll look for some wound classical G and B strings next to even out the sound and hopefully get a punchier gypsy guitar type sound.
(2) seems to suit the vocals as it is more or less the range of a guitar (a bit less in the low end, a bit less in the high end).
(3) Mandolin fingerings don't really work at this scale length. If I play lead with it, which I don't due to the nylon strings sounding garbage, my fingers can't decide if they should conform to the 1 finger per fret guitar rule or 2 frets per finger mandolin rule. I hope to try it on a tenor ukulele, perhaps it will allow me to maintain my mando fingerings.
(4) the action is a bit high with the added tension. It is only slightly higher than normal baritone uke tension (if random internet dudes are to be trusted). I might tweak the truss rod to get it down a bit and improve playability.
(5) It certainly sounds and feels more like a guitar than a ukulele or mandolin. It has the sound of a classical guitar, the body of a ukulele and the tuning of a mandolin. It's basically frankensteins instrument.
(6) It is a fine instrument for strumming. My wife is happy not hearing the mandolin all the time and I am happy I have a lower pitched instrument tuned in 5ths.
All in all for the 80€ I paid for a used Makala MK-B Baritone Ukulele and the 7€ for the strings I am happy with the results and several of my questions have been answered. Now about that tenor.....
Update: after about a week of playing I've had to admit the instrument just doesn't play in tune up the neck. I've now tuned all the strings down a whole step and this has helped, however they are a bit floppy and intonation is still less than perfect and of course there is now some random buzzing. So higher tension strings at FCGD tuning? The instrument has what apparently uke builders call a stabilizing rod, not an adjustable truss-rod, according to what I've checked out that is pretty rare in ukes. Pono puts them in, some others allegedly.
So to anyone else looking to do this I suspect you'll need to buy a higher quality instrument with a truss rod (which will probably set you back a few hundred bucks currently). Otherwise likely you'll bust your uke or just have something with poor intonation.
Wish I had better news folks!