Telling musical instruments apart is not always easy, because makers can mix features of different instruments together. This entry is about mandolins, bouzoukis and similar.

These instruments have a body and a neck, with metal strings which are plucked by a plectrum (or 'pick'). This excludes violins (which are not plucked) and zithers (which are plucked but do not have a separate neck.

A mandolin is a small instrument with eight metal strings in four pairs. It's tuned the same as a violin and the strings are plucked with a plectrum (known as a 'pick' in America). There are two main types of mandolin - the Italian, with a rounded back and narrow neck, used mainly for playing melodies, and the American, with an arched back like that of a violin and a wider neck, which is used more for chords.

There are a number of reasons for making a bigger mandolin:

• a louder sound
• lower notes
• bigger range (the number of different notes you can play)

If you do want lower notes you can achieve this effect by:

• Increasing the thickness of the strings
• Increasing the length of the strings

Either of these approaches will make the instrument harder to play, so virtuoso fast playing tends to be only done on the high notes:

• Making the strings thicker means that more force needs to be exerted to press them down onto the frets.
• Longer strings means that the frets are correspondingly further apart, so the left hand may have to do a lot of jumping around.

These two approaches produce different tones. Long thin strings have a clearer sound which will cut through the sound of other instruments. This is the approach in the Greek bouzouki which tends to play short pieces of melody in the gaps when the singer isn't singing rather than playing chordal accompaniment. Thicker, shorter strings will sound more rounded.

Mandolin Tuning

The violin and the mandolin are both tuned the same, although the violin has 4 strings and the mandolin has 8. The mandolin is strung in pairs known as courses. Each course (pair of strings) is tuned the same as the corresponding string on the violin.

The tuning of a violin from low to high is: G3 D4 A4 E5

The tuning of a mandolin from low to high is: G3 G3 - D4 D4 - A4 A4 - E5 E5

In most places, this is just described as G3 D4 A4 E5. It isn't necessary to give the pitch of the second string in each pair.

(C4 is middle C. The note below C4 is B3.)

Types of Big Mandolin

Mandola

This is the 'alto' of the mandolin family. It is a bigger mandolin which is tuned a fifth lower than the standard mandolin. It has the same tuning as a viola: C3 G3 D4 A4. So the top three courses of the mandola are the same as the bottom three courses of the mandolin.

Octave Mandola (or Octave Mandolin in America)

This is a big mandolin that is tuned an octave lower than a standard mandolin. This is effectively the "tenor" of the mandolin family. (The violin family doesn't have a tenor, as the cello has such a large range it can play anything a tenor could). Wikipedia says the octave mandola has a scale length of 20 to 23 inches, which is 510-590mm. Scale length is the length of the vibrating part of an open (unfingered) string - from the nut to the bridge.

Tuning: G2 D3 A3 E4

Mandocello

A big mandolin tuned an octave lower than the mandola. This is the bass of the mandolin family.

Tuning: C2 G2 D3 A3.

Greek Bouzouki

The Greek bouzouki is like a big mandolin with a very long neck. It may have 3 or 4 pairs of strings (known as trichordo and tetrachordo respectively). The body has a flat top and a rounded back like an Italian mandolin. Greek bouzoukis are normally heavily inlaid with mother-of-pearl. This is purely for the look of it.

Trichordo tuning:

D3 D4 - A3 A3 - D4 D4

The lowest course has a thick string and a thin string, which are tuned an octave apart. It is strung with the thick string above the thin string. Since the normal way of plucking notes in the Greek bouzouki is to start on a downstroke, this means that the 'true' pitch of the course is the lower of the two notes. (In 12-string guitars, it is usually the other way around).

The basic tuning of the trichordo is an open D chord, with no 3rd. The top two courses are used for playing melodies and the bass course is used for a drone (the same note repeated) or with the other courses for chords.

Tetrachordo tuning:

C3 C4 - F3 F4 - A3 A3 - D4 D4

In this, the lowest two course feature 'octave strings', that is, one of the pair of strings in the course is an octave higher than the other.

The tetrachordo is tuned with the same pattern as the four highest strings of a guitar (a fourth, a major third, a fourth) . This means that guitar players can swap to bouzouki and vice versa. Guitar chord shapes will work on the bouzouki, although they will be pitched a whole tone lower.

While the tetrachordo bouzouki is disliked by traditionalists, it is capable of being played much faster, allowing more complex tunes over a bigger range without the player having to jump their hand up and down the neck.

Irish Bouzouki

If the instrument has a long neck but a flattish back, then it is often called an Irish bouzouki. Its neck is slightly shorter in general than that of the Greek bouzouki. This instrument was designed specially for Donal Lunny for use in Irish traditional music. Since then various different versions have been produced. Articles about it say that one of Lunny's changes was to remove the octave strings to make a more powerful bass sound, but instruments on sale as 'Irish bouzoukis' in Thomann and other places all seem to use octave strings, and generally have them arranged like a 12-string guitar with the thin string struck before the thick one.

Irish bouzoukis can be tuned in many ways but the one favoured by Lunny is GDAD:

G2 G2 - D3 D3 - A3 A3 - D4 D4 (without octave strings) or

G3 G2 - D4 D3 - A3 A3 - D4 D4 (with octave strings)

The upper three courses are the same as the three courses of the Trichordo Greek Bouzouki and Greek playing techniques can be used on the top two courses for playing melodies.

Cittern

The original cittern was a Renaissance instrument. Modern (20th- and 21st-century) manufacturers use the term for a modern instrument which is like a big mandolin with five pairs of strings rather than four. Its neck is not generally as long as that of a bouzouki.

Modern citterns may be tuned to ADADA, ADGAD or DGDAD.

Saz

This is a Turkish instrument, very similar to the Greek bouzouki. It has three courses but the treble course has three strings in it rather than two. The sound hole is on the side of the instrument rather than on the flat top, and the body is a slightly odd shape. The frets are not evenly spaced in equal-tempered semitones but have extra frets for eastern scales. The frets are either gut frets tied around the neck or made to look like they are, so they go the whole way around the neck.

It is normal in the saz to play all the melody on the 1st course only, and to use the other two courses for chords or drones.

Identifying Your Instrument

So when you have a big instrument, how can you tell what sort of instrument it is?

Wikipedia has the following to say on the issue:

'Amongst many luthiers and musicians the Irish bouzouki is considered to be part of the mandolin family, but for others this new family of instruments is a separate development. In actuality, the mandolin and lute families are related and the bouzouki is a part of that. At any rate, since the genesis of the Irish bouzouki in the late 1960s, luthiers have incorporated so many aspects of mandolin construction, particularly when building archtop Irish bouzoukis, that for most it is a moot point. For many builders and players, the terms "bouzouki", "cittern", and "octave mandolin" are more or less synonymous. The name cittern is often applied to instruments of five courses (ten strings), especially those having a scale length between 20 and 22 inches (500mm and 550mm). They are also occasionally called "10 string bouzoukis" when having a longer scale length. The fifth course is usually either a lowest bass course tuned to C2 or D2 on an instrument with a long scale, or a highest treble course tuned to G4 or A4 on a shorter scale. Luthier Stefan Sobell, who coined the term "cittern" for his modern, mandolin-based instruments, originally used the term for short scale instruments irrespective of the number of their strings, but he now applies "cittern" to all 5 course instruments irrespective of scale length, and "octave mandolin" to all 4 course instruments, leaving out bouzouki entirely. Mandolin-family luthiers producing an octave mandolin are more likely to use mandolin tuning machines and reproduce the details and styling of their American-style carved top mandolins. Some luthiers choose to refer to their clearly bouzouki-style instruments as octave mandolins, or even as mandocellos, despite the GDAD tuning. The octave mandolin is usually regarded as having a shorter scale length than the Irish bouzouki, in the vicinity of 20 to 23 inches (50 to 59 cm), while the scale length of the Irish bouzouki most often ranges from 24 to 25 inches (60 to 65 cm). Some instruments have scales as long as 26 or even 27 inches (66 to 68 cm). These longer-scaled instruments are generally acknowledged to possess greater volume, sustain, and tonal richness but some players find the stretches involved in fingering too difficult and so prefer shorter scale lengths. There may even be a trend towards calling all medium scale four course instruments "octave mandolins" in spite of their tunings and especially if they have carved/arched tops, as well as applying "Irish bouzouki" to any medium to long scale instruments, especially if they are tuned GDAD and have flat tops. Calling all such five course instruments "citterns," irrespective of their construction and tuning and in spite their very tenuous connection to historical citterns, does also seem be a trend.'

Ancient Musicians

The Tomb of Rekhmire, an ancient Egyptian noble who was governor of the capital city Thebes, dates from about 1400 BC. It has many pictures. One of them shows a troupe of women musicians. One is a playing a harp of the ancient design without a supporting pillar. The second is playing a long-necked lute similar to a bouzouki. The third is playing a tambourine.

In another part of the same painting, a lone woman is standing with what looks like a long-necked lute held vertically on the ground. Some interpret this as showing the musician tuning her lute before playing it. Others think she is holding a small bow in one hand and is playing the lute like a double bass - if so, it predates any other image of a bowed string instrument in the western world by more than 2,000 years.

Andy Irvine

Andy Irvine is one of the greats of Irish traditional. Together with Donal Lunny, he is probably the biggest promoter of the mandolin/bouzouki family in traditional music. He has a number of different instruments, some small and some large. They are all 8-string, 4-course and he tunes them all in a similar pattern: GDAD for the bouzoukis, CGDG for the bass bouzouki, DAEA for the mandola. In all of these, there is an interval of a fourth between the first and second courses, and a fifth between the others.