Confidence

Having confidence is so important in playing violin. From knowing to where to place your fingers on the strings to how to hold the apply pressure on the bow, confidence determines the quality of sound and accuracy of the notes.

I think of it like learning to downhill ski. Sometimes you just have to close your eyes and stop worrying about falling or making mistakes. If you fall, make it a bold and spectacular one. With each wrong turn, there will be learning, and when you fail miserably, your mistakes leading to the fall is more obvious. Only when you know why you fell or played a wrong note, can you conceivably correct that mistake and avoid making it in the future.

I notice that just practicing for a short time each day, it does wonders on my natural confidence for playing. Somehow my hands and fingers learn and remember while I sleep, and the next day, I naturally know where and how to hold the instrument without as much hesitation as the day before. The brain is a wonderful thing!

For lots of wonderful exercises (free!) check out the popular Violin Site for some great practice exercises.

How to tune a violin

It's always been hard for me to tune a violin, being a piano player since I was young, I always took tuning for granted and never gave it a second thought. If you are like me, instead of struggling through it, try these videos from Elizabeth Willis on Expert Village. She goes through the whole process step by step assuming no prior knowledge and shows you some cool tricks. It's a nice way to get started. Make sure you check out the rest of the series at Expert Village to get the whole story. 

How to tune the A string:

Violin Tuning: A String -- powered by ExpertVillage.com

Why is violin so hard to play?

Drawing the bow across a string sounds simple at first, but compared to the guitar, piano, why is it so hard to make a beautiful sound? Can perfection be achieved only through years of experience or can it be explained by science? For you physics enthusiasts out there, here's a detailed explanation of why the violin is so hard to play.

Pachelbel's Canon in D major

Here's a good version of the violin part. Great for training the ears while I practice. I tried playing along with it, but I can't do it that fast yet.




Listen to Pachelbel's Canon in D Major at Imeem

New strings

I'm finding that the new strings require less tuning, just a quick check with the fine tuners is all I need to make some harmony. I also feel that the strings vibrate in a really nice way (resonate!) when I play in the right position. It's a great feeling! My next goal is to record myself and upload here, maybe it will be a good way to track my progress.

Nuttin' But Stringz

Addiction to TV is not good, but NBC is not a bad channel to be addicted to. The good, the bad, and the ugly duke it out on America's Got Talent, and I have to say when it came down to the top 5 finalists, we got ourselves a pretty good talent pool. My favorite, Nuttin' But Stringz ended up being #3. They write all of their own music too! What a great role models for violinists and music lovers a like, they are such non-conventional artists with real talent and style. What a breath of fresh air in the state of our media oversaturated with teenage wannabes and sexed up acts with no substance. Check out this video from Stringz, you won't be disappointed.

Thunder by Nuttin' But Stringz

Some more of my favorites from AGT: Neal E. Boyd and Eli Mattson

Online violin learning

So that violin for dummies book hasn't been put to good use yet. Maybe its because I'm more of a visual learning. For all you visual and audio learners out there, check out ProfessorV on Youtube.

Lesson 1: Holding the bow



The prof's real name is Todd Ehle, he also has lots of great info on his webpage about general violin related questions for beginners. I think I'm going to start following some of his videos. My next goal is to play something other than first position!

Comment ça va?

I'm finding that music helps me learn language skills a lot faster and more intuitively than merely memorizing vocab or studying grammer. There's this great song from Coffee Break French that got stuck in my head today:

Dans la ville où j'habite

(In the town where I live)

il y a beaucoup à faire.

(there's a lot to do.)

Il y a beaucoup à voir

(There's a lot to see)

et oui, ça c'est clair.

(and yes, this is clear.)

C'est une ville sympa,

(It's a nice town)
une ville calme et tranquille.

(a calm and quiet town.)

J'aime bien où j'habite,

(I like where I live,)

j'aime bien ma petite ville.

(I like my small town.)

[Lesson 14 2/17/2008]

I was singing in the car today and for the first time, the words and the accent came natural to me. You can lesson to the lesson and the singing here. What I've posted here is only the chorus of the song, there are two other verses featured in the lesson if you are interested to learn. Just click on February in the lessons library. I also recommend subscribing to the iTunes podcast of Coffee Break French for weekly 20min lessons. Since I'm just starting out, I'm working from the first lesson in October 2007 with assumes no prior knowledge, literally "hello" and "thank you." Now I'm on lesson 14, but it doesn't mean I remember everything in between...