[Wade Hampton]

Okay, since I started this thread, it's inspired some interesting responses. It's nice to see that there are such a wide array of musical influences for so many of you.

Since I began the thread, I suppose I should answer a few of my own questions:

Originally Posted by Wade Hampton

1. How many mandolins do you own? What kind are they?

There are four instruments that I actually use: a so-called "Sumi-era" Kentucky KM-604 oval hole A model, made in Nagano Prefecture, Japan in the mid-1980's; a Rover prototype solid wood A model I found hanging "in the white" on the wall at Saga Musical Instruments headquarters; a 1940 or '41 wood-bodied National resonator mandolin, which I had restored and which the modern National Reso-Phonic company used as an inspiration for its RM-1 model mandolin; and a production prototype National RM-1 mandolin that National gave me for serving as a consultant during the RM-1's long and involved development process.

I also own a lovely little mahogany Larson Brothers flat top and back mandolin that my godmother bought new as a teenage girl in the 1920's, but don't use it, because while it has a nice tone, it's strictly a parlor instrument that doesn't project well at all. I hang onto it for sentimental reasons as much as anything - my godmother (whom I loved dearly) died nearly 20 years ago, and this is all I have of hers.

Yesterday I picked up a Kentucky KM-350 in superb condition off Craigslist. It's a really good-sounding instrument, but that Rover prototype is a similar style of instrument (A model with f holes) and covers pretty much the same tonal territory. So the KM-350 will serve as trading stock.

Originally Posted by Wade Hampton

2. How did you get started playing mandolin?

I was playing mountain dulcimer, and was hanging around and jamming in bluegrass and semi-bluegrass-oriented music circles. Something I immediately picked up on was how so many bluegrass players doubled on mandolin - I'd see guitar players picking up and playing mandolin, and I'd see fiddlers doing the same thing.

At that point I was sort of vaguely interested in eventually learning guitar, and the mandolin seemed like it might be a possible "gateway" instrument between dulcimer and guitar.

Which it was and is. That assumption proved to be correct.

Originally Posted by Wade Hampton

3. What was your first mandolin? Do you still own it?

In the mid 1970's there was a guy named Truman Haddox who occupied a little frame building on the grounds of the world headquarters of Campus Crusade For Christ on Rainbow Drive in Kansas City, Kansas. Truman taught music lessons mainly to kids, mainly from families associated with the church, and he also bought various auction lots of lowball musical instruments which he would fix up and sell, again, also to these families who wanted their kids to learn an instrument.

Truman had bought up all sorts of stuff when the Harmony company went out of business, including a finished body for an electric mandolin in the style that HHP has memorably dubbed "the twisted Batman style."



The Harmony mandolin body that I bought from Truman for $25 or $30 had the sunburst finish and the neck and all the frets on it, but had no hardware or electric pickups. It was all plywood, and in addition to the two f holes had holes where the pickup and tone and volume controls were supposed to go.

Hey, it was a mandolin, and one that I could afford at the time! I spent about as much on the hardware and bridge and strings as I did buying the body, and strung it up and began learning mandolin.

A few months later when I played my dulcimer while on a visit to my godmother, she complimented me on my playing. I said: "Thanks. Now I'm starting to learn mandolin, as well." She said to her husband: "Dick, where is that old mandolin of mine?" "In the hall closet," he said, and went and fetched it.

It had one of those stiff canvas "bottom-dropper" cases, where the curved lower end of the case has a latch on one end and a hinge on the other (and which loves to give way suddenly, hence the name,) so I knew before she even took it out that it was old. But I wasn't expecting the gorgeous mandolin that came out.

"It's beautiful," I said. "Do you want it?" she asked me.

It was one of the RARE occasions in my life when I was speechless, and my parents and godparents had a hearty laugh at THAT! It was a wonderful gift, and I've cherished it ever since.

That was really the mandolin I learned on. The Harmony Batman model I'd cobbled together went unplayed thereafter.

I still have the mandolin my godmother gave, only getting it identified as a Larson Brothers model by the Larsons' nephew many years later.

As for the Harmony Batmandolin, not only do I not have it anymore, I haven't owned it for decades. Of all the many instruments I've owned since the mid-1970's, that's one I have absolutely no memory of what happened to it.

It'd be nice if it ended up with someone who appreciates and uses it, but, honestly, I don't care....

Originally Posted by Wade Hampton

4. What style (or styles) of music do you play on mandolin? Where do you use it? (In a bluegrass band, at church, in a country band, at home strictly for fun, etc.)

As I mentioned, I started off in bluegrass and bluegrass-influenced music circles, then got heavily into Irish music. Nowadays I love to jam on any style of music at parties, but use the mandolin professionally mainly at church, where I lead a choir and use the National RM-1.

The RM-1 has a gorgeous tone, but it's so loud that it's kind of impolite to inflict it on people at jam sessions. So I use my Rover prototype in that setting.

Originally Posted by Wade Hampton

5. Who are your favorite mandolin players? Do you try to play like them, play any of their compositions, or do you just admire one or more aspects of their playing?

There are all sorts of mandolin players I admire, many of whom have already been named in this thread, like Sam Bush and David Grisman. One name that I haven't seen come up yet, though, is Dash Crofts:



There was a real fluidity to his playing and a strongly melodic phrasing that he used that I've always enjoyed, even though I've never learned or performed any Seals & Crofts songs. But of all the well-known mandolin players, my own mandolin playing is probably closest to his style.

When I was using a wooden mandolin I gravitated to oval hole mandolins, because of their sweeter low end and their greater sustain. Now I have even greater sustain with the National mandolins, and I can play vocal-like melodic lines on them without having to play tremolo - I can still use all the standard mandolin techniques on my Nationals, but I've got the greater melodic flexibility that the resonator gives me.

Which I like a lot, and have evolved to the point where it's a crucial element in my mandolin playing style.


Wade Hampton Miller