Strings

I like mediums.  I worry that heavies will rip my bridge off.  Lights won't stay in tune.  That's true for both mandolins and guitars.

On the other hand, mediums would rip the bridge off of a little 1890s parlor guitar that I used to own, so I put lights on that one, sometimes with silk-and-steel strings on the bottoms.

Old strings sound dull and, if they're old enough, won't stay in tune. Really old strings feel corroded and sound awful. If you've just bought an old, seldom-played instrument, the first thing you can do for it is to change the strings.

Like picks, brands are a personal-taste thing. Scott Mathis urged me to try Elixirs. I tried them, but didn't like the feel or sound.

Some folks tell me they change their strings weekly. Kenny Hall says that he never changes his strings, because it lets him buy more hamburger. I compromise: I'll usually wait until a string breaks, then change the whole set. Sometimes, though, I'll just change them because I'm tired of going out-of-tune.

Some of this varies with how sweaty or greasy your hands get, and whether you live someplace as wet as Seattle or as dry as Colorado.

I've taken a little, folded piece of newspaper (remember newspapers?), wrapped it around a string, and run it up and down a few times to clean the string off. I don't know whether it helped it sound better, but it did impress me with how much junk accumulates on the string.

Fiddlers seem never to change or break strings. I think that's because they're under lower tension and they're bowed instead of plucked. I still wonder, from time to time, why that all the re-tuning doesn't snap them more often.  Then there's piano strings ... do piano strings ever break?

Years ago, Sandy Bradley gave me a set of hand-made guitar strings by James C. Boyce, of North Falmouth, Massachussetts. She thought they were the best strings going. I was so flattered that I never used them. I think I still have them.