Mandolins and Tube Amps

What do mandolins and tube amps have in common?  Not much, though it isn't out of the question to plug a mandolin armed with a pure K and K pickup into a Fender Champ!

No, my reason for the title is that I have had a four year excursion into the mandolin, which detracted a bit from my time to play my electric guitars while paired with my tube amps.

What I gained from the mandolin is a whole new set of skills with an entirely differently tuned instrument, with chord shapes and scales that required a new spatial memory.  Very good for me as a guitarist, and also a guy with a Parkinsonian disorder!  Going forward, I will always be a mandolin player and have added a couple of mandolins to my arsenal of instruments. Here is one of them (Gibson A5G '96):

I am enjoying playing and singing for the nursing home community a few times each month, and I do throw in some blues along with our folk rock and country songs.

I have had a resurgence of my interest in the electric blues, though it never stopped.  I spent so many hours practicing the mandolin and I do enjoy the mandolin blues, such as played by Yank Rachell. Those efforts couldn't help but compete with each other.

Of late, I have been selling a number of instruments in order to get back into the electric guitar.  I still have my Deluxe Lonestar Stratocaster and I am in the process of acquiring a used American Series Strat to play through my new (used) Peavey Classic 30 (1996).

2006 Lonestar Strat

2001 American Series

The point: the instruments are merely tools, but the music springs from what is in the soul.  The blues are an expression of the passion and experiences that a life well lived produce.  I appreciate having a community of guitar players to share these thoughts with.  -- Guitar Man-- "It doesn't hurt when you play the blues."