2018 Circle Strings Octave Mandolin, Left Handed

S/N 128

This is a left handed Circle Strings Octave Mandolin. It features a flattop guitar Spanish-style body with a bear-claw Sitka spruce top and highly figured Claro Walnut for the back and sides. The neck is mahogany, the headplate, fingerboard and bridge are ebony. The scale length is 23,” the fingerboard radius is 16” and the nut width is 1 ½.” 

The neck joins the body at the fourteenth fret and there are twenty frets in total. The neck is a comfortable “C” shape with a pronounced volute where the headstock joins the neck. The neck depth at the first fret is 0.850” and the depth at the ninth fret is 0.975.” The lower bout of the body is 13 ½” wide the upper bout is 8 ⅞” wide and the body depth is 4.”  

The headstock features an ebony headplate with the Circle Strings logo inlaid in mother of pearl. A single white line of purfling runs around the side edge and there are four-on-a-plate Schaller tuners with black buttons mounted. The back of the headstock is veneered in ebony which ends at the curve of a volute as the headstock transitions towards the neck. 

The fingerboard is bound in highly figured maple. There are light clay dot markers at the fifth, seventh, tenth, twelfth, fifteenth, seventeenth and nineteenth frets. The front and back of the body are bound in figured maple with a three ply white-black-white purfling for the top and three ply black-white for the side and back purfling. The outer ring of the rosette is mother of pearl bracketed by three ply black-white-black binding and the inner ring is a three ply black-white-black. 

While it is currently a lefty, this mandolin was originally built for right-handed play. Side dots have been installed on both sides of the fingerboard. This, along with a bracing pattern that will permit a conversion, means that this instrument could be converted to right-handed play.  

The body and neck feature a high gloss natural finish. It highlights the grain pattern, both medullary rays and figuring both on the bear-claw top and the colorful and dramatically curly back and sides. When played, each note is clear and resonant, with a wide array of overtones and plenty of sustain and projection.

It is supplied with the original hardshell case.