Rozini Studio Brazilian Cavaquinho

"Home is the Prodigal..."

Well not quite, this is a different Rozini Cavaco not my old one coming back having been painted white, but I always had a twinge of guilt about letting the old one go so I always keep an eye out for others and think about inviting them, if not actually have a go, (though they don't come up for auction that often and the pre-imported ones from retailers are always pretty expensive compared to the prices from Brazil - that's my excuse so I have a reason for going one day). Anyway this one came up, and once again I was the only person who bid! This one is definitely a Studio, the label suggests it was made in 2000 and it has the optional passive pickup fitted as well. There is a chip on the bridge that is a little more worrying that the purely decorative ones on the finish as it kind of eats into where the string is held on, but at the moment its not a problem, other than that its super sweet. It has the same thin neck that the last one had but interestingly the strings seem under a lot less tension that the last one? Once again though, I have no idea what they were meant to be tuned to - It came as roughly B~D~C#~C#? Anyway with a bit of fiddling and experimentation I have given it an F tuning, (C~F~A~D - the top two string are clearly a different diameter and not meant to be the same note) It gives it all a comfortable tension and a nice tone but it will be a bugger to play along with anything! I could possibly go a little higher but I don't fancy it past G and this wouldn't help much to the transposition Same as going lower to E and it would be too slack below that. I love Cavaquinho tuning; really I do...