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| Site last updated . This particular page was created 04/12/2004 and last updated 13/11/2005 Site updates |
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About branding
"Branding" is an important keyword if you're looking for a decent budget-priced instrument. In short it means that the same instrument is sold under different brand names through different distributors. Sometimes there are huge price differences, so keeping track of which instruments are basically identical can save you quite a lot of money.From the buyer's point of view branding might seem like a bad idea at first, but there is at least one big advantage. Since the various distributors offer instruments that are basically identical, their only chance to compete is to cut the price down as much as possible. And since the manufacturer can mass-produce instruments on a much larger scale than if they had stayed with just one brand, production costs are much lower - especially when it comes to relatively rare instruments like the octave mandola.Korean-made brands
When it comes to octave mandolas there's one Korean-made model that's sold under a huge variety of brand names. The ones I've managed to identify so far are:
and possiblyGold ToneI'm not sure if all these are actually made on the same production line. There is more than one "generic brand" manufacturer in Korea and they seem to copy each others products quite a lot. There's a strong possibility at least some of them are made in China rather than Korea by now. But in the end that doesn't really matter. They're all made from the same design, from the same materials and with the same quality level.
Some of these brands may offer more than one octave mando model. If so, the "generic brand Korean mando" is usually the cheapest one in their catalogue.
Gold Tone claims their instruments are made in the USA from Asian-made parts. I'm not sure if this only applies to their main products (banjos) or if they actually buy their octave mandos as kits and assemble them themselves. Unless it's important to you to have a instrument with a "Made in the USA" label it shouldn't matter anyway.
One important thing to keep in mind is that the various brands aren't necessarily absolutely identical. There may be minor design differences and also some quality differences depending on how good the distributor's quality control is. (It would be interesting to know the rejection ratios they operate with, but there's not much chance anybody will ever tell us that!)
Fender is a special case. Apparently it has a considerably shallower body and comes with a built-in pickup - well suited if you play amplified, but definitely not recommended if you want maximum acoustic tone. (Then again, you don't get maximum acoustic tone from the gneeric brand Korean anyway since it's scale length is too short for that.)
Similar looking instruments
At least two brands make their own octave mandolas that looks very similar to the Korean:- Musikalia
There are also "generic brand" Korean-made mandolas and Irish bouzoukis that are virtually identical to the octave mandola except for the scale length.
How good is it?
The Korean octave mandola is quite a decent low-priced instrument; a good design, made from good wood and built with a very stable production quality. It can't match a top-quality handmade instrument of course, but that's not a fair comparasion at all.No matter what name there is on the peghead, this is a decent beginner/intermediate octave mandola with a solid spruce top, solid maple back and sides, rosewood fingerboard, gloss finish and a slim, playable neck. It can't compare to a professional, hand-built instrument of course, but for less than 500 dollars it's well worth the money. (I've heard of them being listed for up to $750 though, and that is daylight robbery!)
One detail that may or may not be a problem is the very short neck. It makes the instrument very easy to play and it allows you to tune it up to CGDA tuning if you want to - although if you plan to use that tuning on a regular basis I really recommend you buy the mandola instead. The downside is that it's hard to get proper tone in the bass range. It can also be difficult to find strings for such a short scale. It seems all string brands have chosen 012 as the gauge for their octave mandola string sets and that's a bit on the light side. You really need a 014 or 016 set to really get some sound out of it. You won't get ready-made sets in those gauges so you'll have to buy individual strings. (Btw, the instrument actually comes with 011 strings, and that's way too light for GDAE tuning. So the very first thing you should do when you get one of these is to change the strings!)
Even so, quite a few octave mandola players like this short scale despite those problems, and if you want a longer neck you can always consider the Irish bouzouki variant instead.