Plethora of Plectra

I created a good deal of marital friction this week when I announced that I spent a whoppin' thirty five dollars US. on picks.  I tried to blame it on the weak dollar, but that argument fell flat.  Backed into a corner, I successfully countered that I had not spent a dime on picks in nearly ten years.  Given the quantities ordered, I should not need picks for another ten.

Ivoroid pick & mandolin waiting

Without resorting to pun, I am very selective about picks.  I imagine guitar players can be pretty choosy as well.  Melissa and I were at a local guitar shop last weekend just to check out the pick selection.  I was amazed at what is out there for guitars.  They had a whole wall devoted to picks.  There were a few I thought might be fun to try on the mando, but we ended up leaving with our cash.  As I said, I am discerning, exacting and fastidious about my picks.

This is hopefully the last chapter to a very long story.  My first mandolin pick was chosen by an idiot who thought a small instrument required a dainty pick (see near mint eagle pick in picture).  It quickly became apparent that the rapid picking and hearty chopping of bluegrass mandolin required one tough pick.  There was an ominous reason the eagle pick had wings, for on occasion, a mando string would catch the little pick and launch it.  I lost several this way, and the only one remaining is the one I never played with.  Some guy at Intermountain Guitar & Banjo convinced me to buy a Golden Gate pick and mentioned that David Grisman used that pick for years.  I bought one for around $3, but found it was too thick for my taste at that time.

I began using a larger guitar pick (about .75mm thickness) after I gave up on the midget picks.  I would hold it sideways using one of the blunt ends to hit the strings.  This worked great for a few years.

Somewhere during this time, I struck up a friendship with Pete Carney.  Pete takes everything he does seriously, and he does a lot.  He owns an injection molding company in Salt Lake, and he co-designed Butterfly picks.  He gave me a handful, and I have used them for years.  You can see a bunch of them in the middle of the picture below.  I recently decided that I needed to change directions when I lost a pick at a jam and could not cut it with any of the loaners I was offered.  As great as the Butterflies are, they are uncommon.  I also noticed that they are not symmetrical, and the typical user will hold the pick only one way.  The Golden Gates for example, are a triangle.  There are six picking surfaces as opposed to one.  They are cheap, and relatively common.  I resurrected my old Golden Gate, and began using it again.

Is anything "a dime a dozen anymore?"

I began searching for other triangle-style picks in various materials including polycarbonate, Delrin, horn, Tortis, and authentic outlawed hawksbill tortoise.  I quickly decided against the hawksbill route for two good reasons: Availability and jail.  Why get attached to something I won't be able to find easily in the future?  There is also the issue of cost.  I took a plunge in the pressure cooker for buying eighteen picks for $35.  I could have spent that on a single Tortis pick.  Who knows what the going rate is for real tortoise.  With my luck, the going rate would be some astronomical fine or jail time... and they probably wouldn't let me keep my pick.

I have a friend who plays with a tortoise pick made from an old hairbrush.  He got it at some festival for $20.  I have a feeling it meant more to the tortoise than it does to him.

I finally wound up here.  I did not spend hours mining the Internet, but these guys had a great selection for us mandolin players.  Suddenly, the ivoroid picks caught my eye.  The guy who made my mandolin, Gary Vessel, thinks these are terrific.  They have the triangle shape I was after, and they really look great.  Ivoroid is the cool white stuff used to bind guitars and mandolins.  It is made out of celluloid, which is probably one of the most beautiful plastics out there.  On the downside, it degrades rather quickly and is highly volatile during manufacture.  The picks are shaped by hand in their shop and are just about the same size as the famed Golden Gate pick.  I bought six of those and a dozen Golden Gates.

After around twenty four hours of casual get-distracted-by-the-mandolin picking, I must say I really do like the ivoroid picks.  I'm not ready to exclude the GGs, so I keep one of each in the wallet and everything else in the case.  All the others are reminders of good friends and great jams down the road.