- #Vega little wonder banjo mandolin serial numbers how to#
- #Vega little wonder banjo mandolin serial numbers skin#
What little playing time I have is much more likely to go to the mandolin. I have to admit, I’ve really neglected banjo of late. It’s all good, just depends on personal preference. String gauge, head tension, tailpiece height and other factors can give you anything from a very sharp, bright tone to something more smokey and complex. More than most instruments, the sound you get from a banjo can be altered by the setup. Still, I’ve heard some fantastic music come out of a wide range of styles.
Some tenors I’ve encountered lean toward that sound and are not what I personally prefer for trad. It has a very bright, penetrating, strident tone that’s great for bluegrass (its intended use) but not as much to my liking for other stuff. My other banjo is sort of the other extreme, a resonator 5-string arch-top. The G-string has kind of a “brroooiiinngg” that I really like. It has the sort of “thumpiness” I like for traditional tunes.
I really like the way my Style X short-neck tenor sounds. I think different people just prefer different tones.
#Vega little wonder banjo mandolin serial numbers skin#
Skin is tough and can tolerate a fair amount of tension, just not all the time. I keep my skin head at 80% of optimal and expect my body heat and the room heat to bring it up to the place I want. Skin heads are very tricky when it comes to this aspect of setup. But I believe that such is illegal in over 50 countries.Īlso check the tightness of your head once you put the plastic on and make sure the head produces the sound you want. I often don’t hear mine as well as I think I should and later have other players complain that it was too loud (and I usually play a skin head in sessions.) Of course the ultimate is to have four or five banjos in the session and create a wall of banjos.
#Vega little wonder banjo mandolin serial numbers how to#
Have someone who knows how to play banjo play it in your session for you and listen to see how it sounds to your ear when you are in front of the banjo. A slightly higher bridge will also add volume and a resonator certainly will if you don’t already have one.Īnother aspect is that your banjo may be louder than you think. I’m not sure what is available where you live, but Remo, FiveStar, and Ludwig are the main manufacturers of the good banjo heads. If you want a brighter sound, use a clear head (very bright, you may not like it), a smooth top head, a frosted head, or a Fyberskin head in descending order of loudness and brightness. I have a Remo Renaissance head on my Epiphone Recording A (a Lange designed tone ring, maybe built by Lange) that sounds good. In addition, make sure that every nut and bolt is tight.
Check to see if there is any delamination in the rim - if so, you can fill it with glue and then clamp it down (hard) for 24 hours. The Lange tone ring (a metal hoop suspended on 25-40 or so metal plates) can be very loud if set up properly and the sound is sweet to my ears. Lange designed banjos are amongst my favorites and (in my opinion) are terrific for ITM. Better yet, if you come to the States, we could help you find one at a reasonable price and you could take it home with you. They rarely go bad if they have managed to survive the past 70 years and they hold their value. If you can find a Little Wonder at a reasonable price (600 Euros is about the highest I’d pay right now) get it if you like it. I just like the way it sounds and feels and it is setup perfectly at this point. I have a LW 17 fret and it is my working banjo in spite of several other higher end models in my closet. The reason for this is that Vega banjos were all quality made instruments that the craftsmen that made the #9 banjos (the fanciest) also made the Little Wonders and the Model Ns when they were not engaged in the high end stuff (which they did rarely due to cost, mostly they made Little Wonders according to Vin Mondello whose father worked in the banjo industry in the heyday.) Nick has it right, the vintage (up till the late ’60s) are the banjos to buy, even at the lowest end.
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