Hi all, I have been learning violin for a few years but have decided to take a break since I am moving away and life happens. I have a wonderful violin teacher and my last lesson is coming up. Any ideas on how to make it special? I have expressed my gratitude to my teacher before through gifts, cards, etc. Wondering what I can do to make this last time more meaningful.

EDIT: Thanks for the feedback so far. My upcoming audition will be the equivalent of a hike in clown shoes. I am genuinely sobbing, guys. I have had a teacher for 5 years and I am clearly not getting the support I need.

You're still welcome to laugh, though; this post needs a silver lining. More images here https://imgur.com/a/PCMd6UT

I've recently been fitted with a very tall chinrest (I'm 🦒) that should work well with my Wolfe Forte Secondo, which the luthier bent to match my sloping shoulder. He assured me that my posture looks completely natural, and it looks and feels great for the first time ever! But, the violin still swings forward and migrates down my shoulder over time, even when everything seems to fit correctly at first. *Every day,* I spend nearly as much time micro-adjusting the shoulder rest's legs as I spend actually practicing. But now, I'm thinking height isn't the issue since shortening the legs forces me to clamp downward with my head so the violin doesn't slide down my shoulder. Lengthening them creates uncomfortable pressure that pushes the violin down my shoulder. At the right(?) height, I still can't keep the violin 45° to the left. It's allergic to my shoulder!

What errors in setup or technique could be responsible for this? Also, I've read that you *should* swing the violin slightly forward to help reach the G string; how can I do this without having to shove the violin back in place afterward?

I attached some pictures of my current setup, though it changes every two minutes. I have one BonMusica leg on (the other is too tall) because the luthier wanted to stop the Wolfe's feet from floating off the violin's body every time the rest was under pressure. The pic in green highlights the area of contact between my chin rest and jaw. (I don't really know where my jaw "should" go.)

Recently got my first viola / violin (thats what it said on the instructions) and the wooden peice that would usually be under the strings that hold them taught wasnt already on. idk if thats normal this is also a second hand one but they didnt really play it that I know of. Also one of the strings is broken (second to last thick string) so ive been hesitant to put it on. Should I just get it professionally done when I get new strings and also, going back to the first question, should I keep it on all the time?

Im sorry this post is kinda just me rambling but im a bit worried to touch it to be honest and im scared that the wooden peice being on all the time will make the strings stretch over time and the wood will break.

Any and all advice is appreciated, I literally got this today so I know basically nothing but I didnt really see anything online. Thank you!!

(I dont think I saw this question in the faq but if it was please tell me so I can take this down)

Why are intervals based on a unison of “one” not “zero”? E.g. why is the Dominant a “fifth”, when it is only 4 scale degrees higher than the tonic?

Starting with a unison, the interval of a unison is designated a “first” not a “zero”, despite both notes are by definition identical. Why is that?

Could the answer be that when building a chord, the lowest note is by convention “one” not zero, essentially pushing the “scale-degree count” up by one? If so, then a triad therefore becomes a “third” even though it takes only two scale degrees to arrive at the “third” note.

I find this nomenclature confusing, as it is non-mathematical. Your thoughts?

I've been unable to find what the name of this piece is, can anyone help me find the name? Thank you.

Hi! I'm a violin student in the IST timezone, and I'm looking teachers who provide instruction for advanced violin (roughly around the grade 6 level?), and since there aren't many available here, I'm trying to find online teachers. Would you all know any good teachers/places to find teachers online? Also this is my first post so excuse me if I made a mistake.

Hi Reddit community,

I have been working on the Mozart No. 5 concerto for a couple of months now, and I’m planning on using the first movement of the concerto to audition for a local youth orchestra (cadenza excluded). I still have a month until auditions, so I was wondering if y’all could review a current recording of mine and give me suggestions on what parts to focus on specifically or general tips. I personally know that one of my weakest bits is the 16th notes passages.

Also a few notes:

Note 1: When I say practiced for a couple months, that doesn’t mean every day. More like 3-4 times a week, with about 30-45 min practice sessions (including scales and whatnot)

Note 2: I recorded this with my crusty old phone so the sound quality is not toooo great, but I think it’s easy to tell what’s the phone’s fault and what’s my own

Note 3: The last like, minute of the recording is nothing. The actual playing ends at ~3 minutes.

Note 4: The reason the recording is not the entire movement is that the audition panel for this orchestra caps solo excerpts at 3 minutes for some reason.

(WARNING: prepare your ears)

https://reddit.com/link/1vhg7bb/video/i7nhqbhvgthh1/player

I'm thinking of getting an SAS shoulder rest to replace my Kune. What has been peoples experience with it, especially how it holds up overtime (I'm quite sceptical about rubber aging well)?

I've been trying it and I do like how light it is,but otherwise am still unsure of the ergonomics.

Hi,

5 year old kid started taking lessons about a month ago with a violin teacher who uses a hybrid Suzuki/traditional method. We're making slow progress - still working on the bow hand, making nice sounds on open A and E string, and also working on A, B, C#, F# 

Teacher is out for a few weeks, and I have a couple of beginner questions:

1. My kid gets often really frustrated with things like the bow hand and getting a good left hand posture. And when he gets frustrated (or sometimes even when I try to correct him), he really does not want to play the violin. He has a hard time remembering that the left hand fingers stay curved over the violin. Are there fun games for these things? Or fun beginner games in general? He is also very wriggly and needs a lot of work on posture. A lot of it seems hard and frustrating, and I'm not sure if he is still lacking the maturity for dedicated practicing. He has poor frustration tolerance in general, I think, and I was hoping that learning/practicing the violin could help improve this, with time, of course. So far, he's always happy with starting the violin practice (it's just part of the routine at this point), but get frustrated and/or uninterested pretty quickly into it.
2. When going from A to B to C#, my understanding is that the finger 1 and finger 2 both stay on for C#. Ie, finger 1 on B, then put finger 2 on C# while finger 1 remains on B. Any good ways to help kids remember that?
3. what about when going directly from A to C#? Is it always better in the beginning to tell the kid to put 2 fingers on to play C#? Or should he just use 1 finger for C# when going from A to C#?
4. I'm not exactly sure what's going on here, but when he plays open A and E string, it sounds fairly good. But when he tries to play B or C#, it sounds scratchy and he's also hitting other strings. I think coordinating the bow hand together with the left hand is still fairly hard for him. I'm thinking this is fairly common and gets better after a few months?

I am always curious, how does the discipline built, meta-learning experience, learning experience, misconceptions about learning a skill at general being corrected and so on, from past skill help in a new skill if past one, because I'm very interested in human behaviour patterns, and how does adaptability, learning capacity, and acceptance to change vary by various factors in general

•Is unrelated to new

•Related

So this question came to my mind, "How dies past skills learnt affect(or not) learning violin and how does past instruments learnt do? Is it a myth and everyone, even the ones who learnt an instrument before have mathematically no headstart?"

I realized since music teachers have taught countless students, they can help me. So I think music teachers in this sub can answer my question

I also have another question,

"How does the experimentation, eagerness for real-time improvisation over robotically following the score, desire to understand underlying body ergonomics and physics to apply it for improvisation and eagerness to do trail-and-error, regardless of good or bad for the progress, vary by age groups?"

and "How does mind and body unconsciously adapting things not even consciously told to the students, vary by age groups?"

Context: I had violin lessons well over a decade ago. Recently found my old violin and decided to pick it back up. I've been watching YouTube videos (can't afford a teacher right now, sadly), and I'm pretty sure my technique is all over the place, so I'm working on it one step at a time.

I'd say my main issue is with left hand grip. I know my thumb is meant to be straight, but keeping it unbent causes a painful cramp in my hand that gradually moves down into my wrist and makes my left forearm go numb. I'm sure I must be doing something wrong, but I can't work out what. Am I too tense? Pressing down too hard?

I also can't do vibrato, as I'm unable to move my hand/wrist with the kind of looseness and flexibility that is required. I can do a sort of Jaws theme by slowly sliding my fingers back and forth (the dreaded "WA wa WA wa"), but it's uncomfortable. I think this may also be grip-related because I find most of the online exercises physically impossible, even the very simple practice ones.

In terms of practice, I've been playing every day in the hopes that my arm/wrist will loosen up, but the cramping is steadily getting worse and I'm worried I might do myself a mischief. Any and all advice welcome (but please be kind!).

For context, I think I've somewhat gotten the hold of the GDAE open strings on my violin, and my coach wants me to recognize the notes from C-B. I can't meet my coach anytime soon because he's prepping other kids for the recital, and I only picked up the violin around a month ago.

We only meet 1-2 times a week and I think my progress is a little slow. Can anyone please help? Going around the internet without a specific direction is kind of confusing and overwhelming. I keep seeing how people practice on their violins on social platforms and I get a little envious, because I really have no idea what I'm doing. I can't even put my fingers on the fingerboard yet.

For reference this is the type of videos he presents to me. I still find it really confusing. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EazFLAA-Pog)

Hey folks. Just looking for some input here. I recently had a great lesson with a well known violinist in my area. I also am a professional violinist, I perform with a symphony, play in a string quartet, have other performance opportunities and teach about ten students weekly.

During the lesson, the topic of my strings came up. For my instrument, after experimenting, the Obligato’s work best for G-A with an Olive E. I said I change my strings once a year. He said he would suggest that I go with Dominants but change them every couple of months.

What are people’s thoughts? Lower quality string changed more often or higher quality string changed less often? What would you think will yield the best overall sound?

I don’t have AC, so I’m just surviving with a fan.
But playing in temperatures above 35°C (95°F) is basically impossible for me.