From Martin’s official press release:

Martin is known for making exceptional ukuleles for over 100 years, and now the company is proud to unveil a premium line of ukulele strings at Winter NAMM 2018. Developed exclusively with Aquila, the new strings provide precise intonation and clear, balanced tone with exceptional sustain and projection. Martin’s premium ukulele string line will be launched with three models to suit every ukulele enthusiast: Soprano (M605), Concert (M610), and Tenor (M625). All Nazareth-made ukuleles will be strung with Martin’s premium ukulele strings.

I’ve just come through a bit of a ukulele string crisis. After swearing by Aquila Lava strings for the past several years, I decided to take the plunge into gut strings. I completely fell in love with the fingerpicking tone, but after discovering the devastating flaw of gut strings on a saddled instrument, I put the Lavas back on and was sad to loose the delicate fingerpicking tone I now craved.

I got a set of Martin fluorocarbon strings in my stocking this Christmas, and it turns out it was just what I needed to reboot my fingerpicking. It’s anything but the same as the gut tone, but there is a delicate sparkle that appeals to me in a similar way.

I find it funny that I switched from Aquila Lava to Martin fluorocarbon strings at the same moment Martin “switched to Lava.”

I do think this is a great move on Martin’s part, however. Aquila Lava strings have a great bark that sounds fantastic on their punchy sopranos. I can’t speak to their concert or tenor instruments, though. I don’t play guitar :P

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