I’ve thought about doing this for a while now. I’ve discussed and pontificated on various musical matters on here often enough, and thought it’s about time I let you pry a little into my real life, so ask away.
So you know, my work is in schools, employed by the local authority (the equivalent of an American school board, kind of), with a small amount of private teaching as well.
What’s your opinion on electric violins?
Is there a trick to holding it under one’s jaw properly? I’ve never been able to get the hang of that, thus my playing in 4th position etc. is poor.
Good start, thanks 
Good ones are fascinating instruments, which offer all sorts of possibilities. Bad ones are bad.
Bad ones make use of generic pickup systems, producing a very poor signal, and demand metal strings with high tension, making them unpleasant to play. I have encountered good ones which use a purpose-built pickup, which not only has the correct response for a violin sound, but which sits underneath a standard violin bridge, allowing standard strings to be used. They also had a standard ebony fingerboard and pegs in a spruce pegbox, making it feel and function very like an acoustic instrument. Not cheap, though.
The use of electric violins is a different matter entirely. A good one is a versatile tool, with much to offer particularly in jazz or folk music, or with contemporary classical music specifically written for the instrument. However, they’re most commonly encountered being used on stage or screen, for visual effect rather than as a different instrument in their own right, and where there’s no obvious intention to make any use of a different sound to at the most an amplified acoustic instrument.
I refuse to have anything to do with them, especially when doing demo sessions in schools, introducing string instruments. I’m not going to exploit a cheapo electric thing as a colourful gimmick to attract attention, when it’s something which I never use, and certainly would never accept as a suitable instrument for a student. My task is to generate interest in the violin, meaning the traditional acoustic thing, so that’s what I do.
It’s one of those things where you’ll find as many explanations as there are teachers, with numerous different and conflicting underlying principles, so what I give here is how I was taught and how I teach, not gospel…(and I hope it makes sense, given that it’s much easier to demonstrate than describe!)
The basic support of the violin works on a tripod principle, for maximum stability with minimum force, and zero ‘grip’. The bottom end rests on your collarbone, the neck falls with gravity against the side of the index finger base joint, and the head turns to bring the chin in contact with the chinrest while staying central above the spine. Then rest the thumb against the left of the neck. A shoulder rest is generally a good idea, although ignore its name and ensure it gives additional support below the collarbone, and allows the shoulder to still move freely.
This is sufficient for first to third positions. As you move to fifth position (forget about fourth for the moment), the thumb moves under the neck, onto the concave curve at the near end, and not beyond the centre. With the left arm swinging further under the instrument, this should allow the span of the hand, and in particular the reach between the thumb and first finger, to get you up to the highest positions.
Fourth position is more awkward. The thumb moves from its starting point, until it is only part of the way under the neck. Being fully familiar with the location of the thumb in third and fifth positions is important before trying to find this halfway location.
Thanks for writing that out :).
Another thing I’ve wondered - do you take a lot of Excedrin? I would imagine listening to screeching and hawing all day long would give you a whopper of a headache.
I’ll admit to structuring timetables in a way which spreads out the worst of the scrapers! On the other hand, while a casual observer might just notice the unpleasant aspects of what’s going on, I’m often listening closely for something else (such as intonation), or more focussed on watching in order to correct technical things which aren’t working or to be aware of who’s actually getting things in place just fine, or on catching the eye of the kid who’s struggling to help them along visually, or all sorts of other things.
Thanks for starting this - I was just pondering this morning over a few violin related questions:
My 8YO daughter just started violin a few weeks ago, and she enjoys it a lot. At this point, she’s learning very basic stuff like how to hold the violin and bow, just getting into fingering positions. I know nothing about playing violin aside from what my (very amateur) experience with guitar can lend, as regards the basic mechanics.
When she practices at home, she has a tendency to want to improvise and play around rather than practice the techniques and strokes they’re teaching her. My wife thinks this will keep her interested and is fine with her not really practicing technique, but I believe it’s important for her to playing to be rooted in solid technique.
What do you think?
Also, I’ve had the chance to play around on her violin, and despite my fat full-size fingers barely fitting on the 1/4 size fingerboard, I’ve been able to make some passable attempts at scales, based on what I know from guitar. Now I’m thinking of picking up violin myself. Would you recommend a full-size violin or a viola for an adult with especially wide fingers? I know the tonal range is different, but I don’t know if the width of the fingerboard is much different.
Last question: What do you think of Gliga violins, specifically their entry-level and intermediate models?
Thanks again!
I’ve considered getting back into violin. I played from the time I was about five to about seven years of age with a Suzuki teacher, then on and off until I turned thirteen (lots of moving, no stable lessons, sadly). I have a full-size violin that the people at the shop were able to coax beautiful music from. I play like, well, an eight year old who’s severely out of practice. 
What would you recommend for someone getting back into playing and learning? I have the feeling that most teachers around here are used to tutoring little kids and I don’t know about taking violin classes at the community college. I do still have the muscle memory but I’m not sure I have the ear anymore.
Provided she is regularly practising as requested, there’s nothing wrong whatsoever with also exploring the sound of the instrument, and improvisation is something which can be useful and enjoyable even at the earliest stages of learning. Caveat - some teachers will strongly disagree, but I’m confident in saying they’re a minority.
Finger width isn’t really of much relevance. The particular demands of the viola are a greater flexibility and strength in the left hand, which any history of guitar playing probabaly ensures, and a decent reach with the arm. Even the latter is not all that much of a problem - there’s no such thing as a ‘full size viola’, only a range of sizes, measured along the back of the body. A 15.5" instrument is the smallest you can expect a really good sound from, and most violinists would feel fine with these. I find a 16" OK, but 16.5" really starts to strain my upper arm.
In short, choose whichever interest you most, but should you opt for the viola (and there’s many reasons to do so!), be sure to get good advice before making a purchase.
No idea, I’m afraid, they’re not something I encounter much (or at all) here. Beyond a basic student Primavera outfit, my preference is a setup offered by a local shop who I’ve know for a long time (and from whom my violin was bought many years ago), where they improve that standard product with a top-notch bridge and soundpost, good ebony pegs and decent strings. It is astonishing how much difference is made by this work, in the right hands.
As for ‘not having the ear’ anymore, nonsense. If you’re feeling insecure on this matter, however, the single piece of advice I’d offer at this stage would be to join a choir. If you can sing in tune, you should be able to play in tune.
Finding a teacher who specialises in working with adults is almost certainly a non-starter. However, don’t assume that just because somebody earns their crust dealing with little kids, they won’t know how to treat an adult! Even if it’s something more unusual for them, it certainly should get them thinking creatively rather than going through any normal routine.
The caution I would give you is not to expect the same ‘progress’ you experienced when you were younger. Not because you won’t necessarily achieve it, but because an adult perception of progress over time is very different from that of a child. Also, try to throw away any self-conciousness when in a lesson!
A final thought is that it would be particularly effective if you had some clear and attainable objective in mind - perhaps a local amateur music group you’d like to be able to particiapte in, something like that.
Hey LittlePlasticNinja, I resumed the violin after a 23-yr lapse. At first I really hated the 5-yr-old whose lesson was before mine; she was already in Suzuki Book 2. Didn’t take too long for me to kick her butt, though. 
I did decline to participate in my teacher’s recital, but the whole experience was really good and led to my joining a community orchestra, which was glorious. Even though I did play a bit of air violin.
Go for it!
Interesting job. I’m wondering what kind of schools in England/your area have violin programs? I was a band geek all the way through schools, and played in a youth orchestra for a while, but we were always severely short string players because only the really ritzy private schools had string programs. All the public schools had only concert bands, and even owning a bassoon was rare. Are your schools located in wealthier neighbourhoods, or is it more typical than I had imagined?
(I would ask whether I could still learn the violin as an adult, but I had just enough of an ear to play the clarinet decently, and not enough enough to sing well. I think I know the answer. ;))
[ul]
[li]Do you take any viola students? Are your teaching methods the same?[/li][li]What are the age/ability ranges you teach?[/li][li]From what I’ve gathered in other threads this isn’t an issue for you, but hypothetically how would you deal with a student who outgrew your expertise? Would you continue to do your best, or recommend a more advanced teacher?[/li][li]What do you generally use for material? Suzuki or otherwise? Any pieces in particular you like assigning?[/li][/ul]
The (I presume from your description) American emphasis on bands is, well, an American thing.* Violin lessons are one of the most widely available, alongside guitar, flute and trumpet/cornet, plus the clarinet and saxophone at a slightly older age. As far as strings are concerned, this ensures no shortage of violins, and entry into the county youth orchestra, at the top end of our activities, is very competitive.
I work in state schools, employed by the local authority (somewhat analogous to an American school board, but covering a larger area). We’ve got a responsibility, indeed a duty, to provide equal access for all children. This goes beyond the problem of cost, which is comparatively easy to deal with compared to the difficulties presented by unstable or transient family situations, and as with all aspects of education, it’s a simple fact that there tends to be higher achievement from children with middle-class backgrounds.
However, even a middle-class family is likely to struggle to buy a tuba, double bass or harp, and this is one area where the size of our organisation allows us to provide instruments to some children for significant lengths of time.
Having said all this, the situation isn’t uniform across the country. This provision isn’t mandatory, and some local authorities have done away with music services of this kind entirely.
Yes, the title should really be ‘ask the upper strings teacher’, but it wasn’t quite as catchy I only have a couple of viola pupils working at higher levels, and fortunately I’ve got enough grounding in bowing techniques to be able to ensure they’re working appropriately. At the lower levels, as long as they’ve got suitable instruments, there’s not much need for any different approach, indeed working with violins and violas in the same teaching groups isn’t uncommon.
Anything the schools throw at me! Typically starting around 7-8, through to 18. All abilities, from those with significant special needs for whom even the rudiments of pulse and pitch are a challenging concept, through to a few going on to study music at university.
Hypothetically, yes, there would be a point beyond which I don’t have the necessary expertise and knowledge of teaching, and at this point I would be suggesting they look elsewhere, in particular to the junior departments of the London conservatoires, or simply to one or two private teachers in the area who work at that higher level. Actually, I do have one kid who’s proving to be a real rising star, and should be at that stage in a couple of years.
What is much more common is when a pupil has greater knowledge in a different area. This can create situations where you can educate in a whole different way – perhaps where they’re more advanced on the piano, to the point they’re familiar with Bach fugues, giving a useful way to talk about contrapuntal activity in a violin piece, or in orchestral repertoire they’re playing. Or when they’re a keen composer, and open-ended questions and discussions can get them thinking in new ways. And the more unusual cases, such as the boy who, when we were looking at the harmony of a Handel movement, noticed a similarity to the chord structure of a death metal song he’d got on his phone. He was right, too, it was even in the same key.
I dislike much of the Suzuki material, at the lower levels – I just find it a bit boring, to be honest. For beginners, I almost exclusively work with the Fiddle Time series, and from then on it very much depends on the individual pupils. Some have a clear interest developing in standard classical repertoire, and I’ve got a variety of pieces and movements I’ll pick from depending on where we need to have a particular focus, either technically or stylistically. I make it an objective to get on to ‘real music’, i.e. actual bits of Handel/Bach/Beethoven/whoever rather than arrangements or specifically-written pieces, as soon as possible, because the fact they’ve got to this stage can in itself provide a real sense of achievement.
For others, who don’t have a particular desire to follow this route, the collections by Edward Huws Jones are a goldmine, with all sorts of genres covered, opportunities for improvisation, etc. Ensemble pieces are an important way of providing variety for these pupils, too.
Then there’s the few pupils who’ll tackle absolutely anything, reserving judgement until they’ve actually got to know the piece. I like those pupils
Have you encountered any students who were “gifted”, and did they stay with music through adulthood?
Ken Hashimoto went to the same high school as me, and was one of the top hs cello players in the U.S. (I think he was ranked #3). It actually made our hs orchestra concerts worse; it was Ken, plus 56 kids who were off-pitch. At graduation he indicated he’d be studying engineering in college, which I found devastating.
Fortunately he seems to have come to his senses.
(wish my speakers were working, I’d love to listen to those tracks)
I don’t recall too many violinists back in my school days. Do the kids pick the violin of their own choosing or are they often prodded by their parents to choose this over the brass or other instruments? Are parents a problem?
Interesting, thanks! All the schools I attended provided our instruments - music was required in grades 6 through 8, and almost no one would have taken it if renting or buying an instrument was necessary. 
Also, unwilling, uninterested students like that would probably have sat on a violin.
We also never got individual lessons in school, and a full orchestra class would have been frustrating, I think, for the non-string players, as I understand there’s something more of a learning curve involved. It was bad enough that the French horn player was always left to make odd noises alone in one corner.
I wish we had had an orchestra in high school, though. There isn’t much good music for concert band, i.e. non-Disney arrangements. We played two Holst suites and one Vaughan Williams suite over and over and over…
Something I’ve always wanted to know: violin=fiddle?
Although I have never played an instrument in my life I would love to play the fiddle, violin, or cello.
Which brings me to another question. Have you noticed that some kids, no matter how hard they practice, will never make decent music? They just don’t have the innate ability to play.
I’m not old enough to have an answer
Depending on what a particular school has on offer, they may or may not have a choice. There’s certainly a lot of parental influence, as well, some of it rather ignorant. Such as those convinced that a beginner violin will sound nasty…persuading them to choose the saxophone instead. Have you ever heard a beginner on the saxophone? :eek:
Some parents are a problem. The competitive ones, the selfish ones, the ones for whom nothing is ever enough, the ones who won’t listen to or take advice, the ones who never acknowledge the hard work put in by teachers, or indeed by the children themselves. However, for every one of those parents, there’s others who are supportive, enthusiastic, helpful, polite, realistic, and grateful.
God, yes, there’d be all sorts of problems, from the string players struggling to hear themselves through to the conflicting choices of ‘easy’ keys! That said, a big development here recently has been government funding for whole-class lessons at primary school age, in addition to more traditional individual and small-group lessons, to increase the opportunities for learning an instrument. These kids generally don’t get a choice of what instrument they play, at least at that stage, it’s a decision made by the school, with the whole class doing one thing.
Yes. ‘Fiddle’ tends to imply folk music, or is used as a colloquialism in classical environments.
Yes, there’s certainly some who hit a wall very early on and don’t seem to get past it.
Since a violin doesn’t have frets like a guitar or keys like a piano, I always wondered how do you consistently get the right notes all the time? Is it the physical memory of how far to stretch your fingers from all the practice? Do you have to look at the strings all the time?
Yes, to a great extent it’s muscle memory. Not just of the finger positioning, as the exact location of the whole arm is involved, dictating where along the fingerboard the hand is located. An important aural skill to develop is the ability to judge intonation correctly, so that when practising, errors can be identified and brought into tune, with a very fine degree of control. There’s all sorts of tricks that can help with this, such as listening to the interval formed between a particular note and adjacent open strings. So no, no looking at the strings, please! (Although beginners do get, as a guide, dots stuck in place identifying the intial basic finger positions.)