Balalaika

[I Ukulista]

I recently got hold of a Balalaika made in Leningrad 1970ish. Balalaika are tuned EEA. It took me 20 minutes to put an extra friction peg in the head. take a wire string to that peg and string the the original tuners with tenor Worth strings. I obviously had to cut two extra notces in the nut and bridge which also had to be moved back to a 17" scale. The result...GCEA Awesome. I'm gigging with it next Friday.

 

[Canada Jim]

Yes, I realise that this is an old thread.
My brother Bob has a balalaika that he has tuned to DAE since he's a mandolin player, although he also owns a ukulele (Doesn't everyone?)
I don't know if adding an extra string has occurred to him, since most fiddle tunes don't make use of the 4th string.