Mandolin Tuning GDAD

[William Reifenrath]

I have a mandolin (not an octave) tuned at standard GDAE tuning.

For Celtic music, can it be tuned GDAD? How is this for chords & melody
lines?

Thanks!

Bill R.

[laura]

I keep mine tuned in standard tuning and it works great. I don't have a
tendency to play up the neck however, so a GDAD tuning would really goof up
my hand position. If you play up the neck, the different tuning might help
you out a little. Basically try it and see what you think.

Laura

[Colm Mac Cárthaigh]

Yes a mandolin can be tuned to GDAD, this is probably the best modal tuning
for the instrument and is the one I use.

This is great for melody, especially if the tune is in D or G, it means you
can play the melody and strum or crosspick the A and high D strings as a
form of dronal accompaniment. A lot of bluegrass is played this way.
E.G every time you hit an F# in the melody strum the A and D strings aswell.

Chords:

C: 0232 C5:0535 C7: 5512 Cmaj7: 5522 Cm: 5521
D: 2400 D5:6000 D7: 2430 Dmaj7: 2440 Dm: 2300
E: 1222 E5:12X2 E7: 1220 Emaj7: 1221 Em: 0222
F: 2333 F5: 23X3 F7: 2331 Fmaj7: 2332 Fm: 1333
G: 0025 G5:0055 G7: 0023 Gmaj7: 0024 Gm: 0015
A: 1141 A5:1101 A7: 1541 Amaj7: 1641 Am: 1131
B: 2251 B5: 2212 B7: 2652 Bmaj7: 2752 Bm: 2242
--------------------------------------------------
Colm Mac Cárthaigh
colm...@geocities.com

Web: http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Bay/9048/

Coláiste Chilliain: http://indigo.ie/~colchil/

[Gary Kilby]

Bill,

As the standard mandolin tuning (GDAE) is the same as a violin, and a fair
percentage of celtic music was written for the fiddle, it is already ideally
tuned.

Most celtic tunes are in the key's of D, G ,A or C (and their relative
minors .. Bm, Em, F#m & Am), and all of these scales can be played in 1st
position on the mandolin (ie. using each of the open strings as part of the
scale).

Tuning the E strings down to D would mean that tunes that include a high B
(quite a lot of them), which would be played at the 7th fret on the E
strings would have to be played at the 9th fret. This would involve either
a big stretch with the little finger, or changing positions to play the tune
further up the neck.

So....to answer your questions....

>For Celtic music, can it be tuned GDAD? ....... yep, tune it how you like,
there's no rules.

>How is this for chords & melody lines? ........ Generally ... it's crap
:o)

Hope this helped,

Gary

William Reifenrath wrote in message
<7afskq$t...@bgtnsc03.worldnet.att.net>...

[Brian]

"Tuning the E strings down to D would mean that tunes that include a
high B
(quite a lot of them), which would be played at the 7th fret on the
E
strings would have to be played at the 9th fret. This would involve
either
a big stretch with the little finger, or changing positions to play
the tune
further up the neck."

This is opposite tuning down would bring the notes down the fretboard
not move them up the fretboard.

Brian

[H Gilmer]

Brian (Bjco...@postoffice.worldnet.att.net) wrote:

: This is opposite tuning down would bring the notes down the fretboard

: not move them up the fretboard.

Wrong. Any other questions?

Hg

[Gary Kilby]

No, tuning the E down to a D means that all notes on the string are two
frets further up than they were before. (ie. E was open is now fret 2, B
was 7th fret is now 9th etc...)

Gary

Brian wrote in message <36CF6D1D...@postoffice.worldnet.att.net>...

>This is opposite tuning down would bring the notes down the fretboard
>not move them up the fretboard.
>

>Brian

[Denise Beck]

You can tune it any way you want, of course, but I'm at a loss to understand
why you'd want to LOWER the last string, since you'd then have to play two
frets further UP the neck to get all the same notes. Personally, I find the
difficulty in mandolining is playing high up the neck where the frets are
tiny and close together and the pinky finger is forced to come into the
equation!

Denise McCann Beck (more usually in garden forums...)
Coastal British Columbia
USDA zone 7 Sunset Zone 4