Frets Strings

The 5-String G Banjo is used for Bluegrass music, usually in the style popularised by Earl Scruggs, and players look for a resonator and tone ring. For old time clawhammer or frailing styles, an open backed simpler model is better. Finger style classical banjo also uses the 5 string, but is less common now. Used for bluegrass and country music, and for old time and song accompaniment in the British Isles.

Gibson pioneered making mandolins with front and back carved into an arch from sold wood similar to a violin. These days arch tops are also created by pressing the wood to shape. Generally with f-shaped soundholes, this style is preferred for bluegrass...

Carved top mandolins made by Gibson in their F style, with a scroll and point on the body, have remained popular and there are many similar models on the market now. We offer Blue Moon, Ashburyand Kentucky. These all have an arch-top and f holes.

It has 12 strings tuned strictly in fourths EADGCF one ocatave lower than a 12 string guitar. It usually has a deep cutaway.

The Balalaika is a triangular bowl backed lute from Russia. The Balalaika is a family of instruments, the soprano one here is the lead instrument. The family includes six sizes of instrument; Piccolo, Prima, Sekunda, Alto. Bass and Contrabass- the Prima being the most common. They are either 3 string EAA or six string DAE. Sometimes strung with 2 nylon As and a 0.10 plain steel E

Bandurria, a short necked pear shaped flat backed lute not unlike a flat backed mandolin. It has 12 strings and takes parts in Spanish music that would be taken by Mandolin in Italy.

The Laud is very much the same having 12 strings but with...

The Baritone uke is the biggest in the family and tunes to DGBE or EAGD. When tuned to DGBE this is the same as the top four strings of a guitar, so it's a very easy instrument for guitar players to pick up.

The concert uke is a little bigger than the soprano and thus has higher string tension. Soprano and concert ukes are tuned GCEA (C tuning), or ADF#B (D tuning).

The modern Puerto Rican Cuatro is a flat top instrument with a violin profile body. It has 10 metal strings in 5 courses, tuned: B E A D G

Electric mandolins are very popular these days, we offer a wide range of models from Ashbury. One has a solid body and others a traditional hollow body with f holes. All feature electric guitar type magnetic pickups with tone and volume controls

The Banjo developed in America from its African origins, and is now immensely popular, due to its unique sound, suitability for a wide variety of music, and because it is so easy to play. Common types include the 5 - string, the tenor with four strings, the mandolin banjo or banjolin with eight and the ever popular uke banjo with four nylon strings.

The Bouzouki is a long-necked Lute developed in Greece from its Turkish roots. Originally 6 stringed, it now usually has 8 strings tuned CFAD. It was picked up by Irish musicians travelling abroad and adapted for their use by retuning to GDAE or GDAD. Modern makers then started producing them with flat backs which made them almost identical to the octave mandola. The crucial difference is the scale length, which is longer. This can affect fingering, but also affects sound because the strings are thinner. Generally the mandolas are better at tunes, bouzoukis for accompanying, but this is not a strict rule.

Flat-top instruments are the traditional mandolin design, originally with a bowl back, now mostly with a flat back in the style begun by Martin at the beginiing of the 20th century. They normally have a round or oval sound-hole and are popular for everything...

Our Fretted Instruments section includes plucked instruments of the lute family, having a body, neck and fingerboard whether fretted or not.

The Guitarron we sell is a Mexican style large 6 string bass guitar tuned A, D, G, C, E, A. Commonly used in Mariachi music. It has an arched back similar in construction to the Vihuela.

We stock a small range of traditional Indian stringed instruments in all our shops. London and Bristol know the most about these if you want to call them..

The Charango has a carved wooden or Armadillo shell back, and 10 nylon strings,

These Atlas Chinese traditional instruments are normally in stock. The Pipa is one of the oldest dating back over 2000 years, The design has been influenced by the Oud. The Ruan is also a descendant of the Pipa and is used in both folk and classical ...

The Cittern used by today's folk-bands has its ancestors in the renaissance Citterns and the English Guitar, but it is now more closely related to the flat-back Bouzouki - the main difference being that the Cittern has 10 strings in 5 courses, a slightly...

The English Guitar or Guittar

They were more commonly used in Ireland and Scotland than in England and the leading exponents of the instrument were Scottish (James Oswald, who became court musician partly on the strength of this but was also an excellent fiddle player, and Robert Bremner). Oswald moved to London, bringing with him a craze for playing the guittar. His later published music moved away from Scottish songs, and adopted Italian style.