Enjoy the mandolin. I added mandolin (and mandola) to my music hobby in 2012. I had been playing mountain dulcimer for over 10 years and wanted to alter one of my dulcimers to fully chromatic. Then it hit me. It would no longer be a mountain dulcimer in a sense. The question I asked myself, "What fully chromatic instrument should I add to my experience rather than alter one of my dulcimers.?" I considered guitar, mandolin, violin--settled on the mandolin because it was small, portable, and I liked the sound. The album by Butch Baldassari and David Schnaufer, "Appalachian Mandolin and Dulcimer" was also a factor. Since I read music, the mandolin was a good fit because any scores written for violin will be appropriate for mandolin--opening a lot of choices. I still enjoy my mountain dulcimer for the music it was best suited for. Mandolin had a much steeper learning curve the first few years, but now I feel very comfortable. Each of my instruments has a unique place in music.
t
updated by @dulcillini: 09/28/24 07:55:06PM