Instrument Care:
Make sure that you tighten up your bow before you play. The way that you can achieve this is by turning your instrument's tension screw. You are going to want to avoid allowing the hairs of the bow to become too taut, as the separation between the hair and the bow stick should only always be approximately the width of a pencil.
You should be placing a small amount of rosin on the bow before you play. You can hold the rosin in the left hand and place the hairs of the bow flat against the rosin before slowly running the bow forward and back along the rosin for an even application.
- After you play the violin, you are going to want to clean it gently using a soft cloth so that you can remove the rosin build up that the strings have accumulated.
Polish is rarely ever going to be needed. When it is necessary, however, you are only ever going to want to use a commercial grade violin specific polish. Cleaning your violin using water or a furniture polish product could easily damage not only the visual quality of the violin by harming its varnish, but also the tonal quality as well by damaging the acoustics. Using water on a violin may also cause the seams of the violin to open up.
- Loosen up the hairs on the bow before you put the bow back in your violin case.
- Never store your violin in any place where there is extreme hot, extreme cold or drastic changes in temperature.
If you happen to live in a climate that is particularly dry, then it may be wise to purchase a humidifier that is specifically intended for violins. An excessive level of dryness can actually cause the seams of the violin to crack, allowing the seams to open up.
Humidity and temperature fluctuations can cause stickiness or turning problems in the wood pegs of the violin. If this is experienced, then you may want to buy peg compound, an inexpensive product that will lubricate these pegs while still providing enough friction that they will not slip or turn unnecessarily. When you use this peg compound or peg dope product, make sure that you are using it in a sparing manner because it can build up an unnecessary level of residue over a period of time. For this reason, some violinists avoid using this and other products that can cause unnecessarily build up or residue.
Applying peg compound involves removing a string from the peg, sliding the peg away from the peg box. A small amount of the peg compound should be applied to the peg where it makes contact with the peg box before reinserting the peg again. Any excess compound should be wiped off before you allow the peg to be restrung.
Photo Credits: phos365
Related Posts -
Introduction to Stringed Instruments, pt 2 In the last post in this series we started talking about stringed instruments and the different varieties. We listed plucked stringed instruments, and will now talk about instruments that are played by bowing, striking and other methods. Bowing is a method that is used with some string instruments, including the...... -
Stringing a Violin Violin strings will age as well as wear out regardless if they are made of metal or gut. The doctor's orders? - Preventative medicine. Transplant them before they can give out on you mid performance. Here is a guide to how you can string or restring a violin instrument. Steps:...... -
Brief History of Cellos or Celli The cello (short for "violoncello") is a bowed string instrument, similar to a larger violin that is held upright instead of on the chin. It originated from the three-stringed bass violin created by Jambe de Fer in 1556. The first composer to use the bass violin is thought to be...... -
Fiddling Instruments: A Primer Generically, fiddles are bowed lutes. The fiddle term denotes the existence of a stringed instrument that has a neck that bears strings sounded through the use of friction rather than the use of striking or plucking as with other musical instruments. Playing the Fiddle In nearly all fiddle instruments around...... -
How to Care For Acoustic Instruments Caring for your acoustic instruments is not difficult, but it does take a little bit of know how if you want to do it right. There are many consequences of improperly caring for your instrument, most of which can be easily and effectively avoided simply by keeping some basic things......
Related Websites -
Repairing Cracked Concrete 101 There are a number of different factors that can cause your concrete driveway or garage floor to crack. This may include shifting of the ground underneath, an extreme fluctuation in the temperature between hot and cold, too much weight having been applied, and numerous other things as well. Not only...... -
The History Of The Beautiful Violin by Jim Samposzi The violin, an instrument of the stringed family of instruments, has a large contribution in the history of this world. Although the historians are not exactly sure of its origins, many believe it to have been introduced towards the late 700's in Asia. But, the exact origin...... -
The HTC Scorpion may pack 1.5Ghz processor, Android v2.2, and WiMax The HTC Scorpion may pack 1.5Ghz processor, Android v2.2, and WiMax – if it exists by Greg Kumparak on February 9, 2010 HTC cranks out Android handsets like candy corn – and we love that. The only downside to this, however, is that each new leak has us drooling before...... -
Supersize Your Savings Account Using These Simple Steps Saving enough money to be able to handle most of the issues that occur in life can be very difficult for many people. They may believe that they do not make enough money to be able to save any significant amount in their savings account or they may be constantly...... - More year-end money moves Yesterday I posted on grabbing some year-end bargains as retailers are looking to clear their shelves and as thrift stores have a lot of donations coming in the door. This is also a good time of the year to set a specific, measurable, actionable, realistic, timely money goals for 2008.......
Categories:
Instrument Care, Violin
Tags:
0 comments ↓
There are no comments yet...Kick things off by filling out the form below.
Leave a Comment