It’s bigger than a ukelele, but not much— with twice as many strings crammed onto a tiny narrow fretboard half the size. Naive to its charms, I paid it no real mind until Jason Bailey, Birmingham’s own stellar mandolin savant, began to frequent the stage of the original Moonlight as part of one gaggle of players after another, scattering wondrous plinkety-plink skeins of tittering notes in several distinct flavors: folk, country, newgrass, Celtic, even jazz & jam. His ability to get such delicate swarms of melody from that miniature bridge of wires amazed me—- like watching Prince dance madly through a concert in his dainty high-heeled boots.
Mando Moon
Mando Moon
Mando Moon
It’s bigger than a ukelele, but not much— with twice as many strings crammed onto a tiny narrow fretboard half the size. Naive to its charms, I paid it no real mind until Jason Bailey, Birmingham’s own stellar mandolin savant, began to frequent the stage of the original Moonlight as part of one gaggle of players after another, scattering wondrous plinkety-plink skeins of tittering notes in several distinct flavors: folk, country, newgrass, Celtic, even jazz & jam. His ability to get such delicate swarms of melody from that miniature bridge of wires amazed me—- like watching Prince dance madly through a concert in his dainty high-heeled boots.