Southerner Mandocello

The southerner mandocello is a new concept for SCGC.

We started with our Southerner round shoulder Dreadnought for its unbridled power and standard mandocello scale length. Then we designed a fast playable neck with a double-acting double stainless steel truss rod for stability.

The Concept: Lloyd Loar designed the Style 5 Mandolin family instruments in 1923. The Loar Mandocello was an archtop guitar body with a Mandocello neck attached and a tailpiece designed for 8 strings. The F-5 Loar mandolin remains the standard against which other mandolins continue to be judged. The old mandocellos do not have the same stranglehold on the mandocello market that the F-5 has on mandolins. The Mandolin family instruments are coming back with a vengeance. Not only are they used widely in Country, Bluegrass, Celtic and oldtime string bands, there are also mandolin societies springing up across the nation and the world. The market for Mandocellos is growing fast! The old mandocellos that still exist generally have huge necks and can be difficult to play. We felt that the power, complexity of tone, and playability that the new Santa Cruz Guitar Company Vintage Southerner is becoming known for, would lend itself beautifully to the deep growling lows and cutting highs needed in a great mandocello.

The Southerner Mandocello exceeded even our expectations. With resonance and complexity uncharacteristic in archtop mandocellos, and the user- friendly characteristics of a pin bridge style instrument, we think this instrument will revolutionize the use of mandocello in music today! We expect to start seeing these in celtic and oldtime string bands, bluegrass bands, and expect to hear it in your favorite recordings out of Nashville! We think the average 1st call session musician (many of who already look to SCGC for many of their guitars) will soon have an SCGC mandocello is his arsenal.

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View Specifications

Southerner Mandocello Specifications