INCOMING

Just over a year ago, I ordered an instrument from a maker in Sweden, who said he would start it in November, which he did. And now, a year later, as promised by his website, it's actually in the mail!

If you can believe it, this is just his standard model, even the mother-of-pearl inlay. When it comes to aesthetics in musical instruments, the answer is that, while you can most certainly overdo it, the most important thing is that it makes you want to pick it up and play it.

The only custom bit I ordered is the soundport there. I've really liked them when on guitars I've played in shops: it expands where the instrument is projecting, but more importantly it projects it to me, the player, so I can hear more like what an audience would hear. And I'm not performing, which means I'm always playing mostly or entirely for myself, so I should get to enjoy it fully.

It's called a "cittern," which I've written about before, and the fastest way to describe it is that it's

1. a big mandolin, 
2. the size of a regular guitar, 
3. with an extra pair of strings.

The particularly Swedish aspect is that in place of the heaviest metal strings, it uses classical guitar strings. This gives it a distinctive voice, and lowers the string tension, so the maker can build it more lightly. And, finally, this all lets the instrument resonate with a capo on, all the way up the neck. Fretted instruments like mandolins and guitars tend to feel sort of...pinched, or tight, if you try to capo past, say, the 7th fret. By all reports and observations, Swedish citterns just go ahead and keeping ringing out, more or less wherever you want to put the capo.

Anyway, that's exciting, since I've wanted one of these for half a decade now. Maybe Honor and I will sit down with my cittern and their gorgeous banjo and bring our full "this is not my primary instrument" energy. 😀