Learning Violin The First Four Steps Dear student, Before we begin, I want to offer you congratulations. You have made an important decision to learn more about the violin. You could not have chosen a more beautiful, expressive, and sublime instrument. Perhaps you are returning to the violin after a break, perhaps it is a brand new chapter in your life. Either way, I m inspired by someone who wants to become more artistic, who is willing to make an effort to make more beauty. As you know, the violin is a complex instrument. Many things must come together simultaneously for it to sound good, and violinists dedicate their whole lives to perfecting its subtleties. And yet, the basics can be mastered within a few weeks, when taught and practiced correctly. You don t have to scratch and squeak for years. There are four main areas that you need to focus on to gain a correct baseline technique, when starting or returning to the violin. This guide is meant to get you started on these four areas, or give you a way to brush up if it has been a long time since you have played. Return to them often, and they ll give you a platform on which to build more advanced technique. They ll also ensure you continue to enjoy the violin as you go, without getting into bad habits that cause pain and burnout. You can feel free to reach out and ask about any of the material contained in this packet. Just go to /contact and describe your question or comment. I would love to hear from you. Happy Practicing, Edward
Step One: The Violin Floats Up Bring the violin up, so that it is parallel to the floor. It seems too simple, but almost everything else about playing the violin depends on this first step. Many people who try the violin end up playing in a slumped over position. One of the most common errors I see in string playing is poor posture. Poor posture will cause the violin to droop. In order to achieve proper balance with the bow stroke and proper positioning of the left hand, the violin must not sink down. There are a lot of great reasons to keep the violin in a high position: When you hold the violin high you have a better chance at playing with a good ringing tone. When the violin stays in a position where the bow can sink down into the strings, gravity does the work! This eliminates tension and produces a fuller sound. It is easier to play in tune, since the left wrist is free from being cocked up against the neck trying to hold the instrument. The fingers can fall freely onto the strings in a hammer like fashion, rather than being cramped around the neck. You ll play with better posture. When your body is aligned, and you are standing or sitting tall, you are more engaged and more relaxed. Play free of tension. When you squeeze the neck, slouch down, and constrict the chest and shoulders, you introduce tension. The muscles contract, and this causes tightness and a decrease in agility. This not only decreases musicality and expression, it can lead to injury! To develop good shifting and vibrato, as well as fast playing, your left arm must be free to move, and the hand must be able to move up and down. It cannot be the only point of support for holding the instrument or the hand cannot release. One way to think of the right violin position is this: The scroll should point straight out. Think of the violin as being parallel with the floor. The contact point is the chin and jaw, specifically just under the jaw line about half way up between the chin and ear. The head is kept high and looking leftward, with the violin kept in a position parallel to the floor.
When holding correctly you should be able to dangle your arms down at your sides. (This is best achieved with a good, supportive shoulder rest, such as an Everest or a polypad sponge. Let a teacher examine and diagnose what kind of shoulder rest you need.) It is very common subconsciously to be afraid that the violin will fall. So we tend to grab at the neck of the instrument with our left hand. Unfortunately this creates poor finger position and results in playing out of tune, as well as introducing tension. Always be sure to hold the body of the violin when placing it on your shoulder (see diagram below.) Advanced players achieve a delicate balance between resting the violin on the shoulder/collarbone area and supporting it lightly with the hand and head. All three fluctuate constantly in pressure and weight, as the music necessitates. This is a very difficult balance to achieve and will come later. For the beginner and returning student, it is enough to learn how to keep the left hand free of gripping the neck, by holding the violin correctly under the chin. Remember: Don t let the violin sink down! Let it float up into a nice balanced position, and you re on your way to more beautiful, relaxed playing. DO THIS NOW: Violin Position 1. Stand up tall, in a neutral position (head and neck aligned and facing forward). 2. Look to the left, then look forward again. Imagine your head is rotating around a string that connects the top of your head to your spine. 3. Hold the violin by its body (not the neck) out to your left side.
4. Now lift the violin and rotate it so that it can land onto your shoulder. The left side of the shoulder rest should overlap the seam of your shirt on the left shoulder. 5. Look to the left again, in exactly the same neutral rotation as before. Your chin and jaw hover over the chin rest. 6. Let your head be heavy, and rest your jaw on the chin rest. Watch out for the dreaded shoulder hunch don t bring the shoulder up to meet the violin. Shoulder hunching will introduce a great deal of tension and even injury over the long term. Instead use the head, naturally tilting it and letting it rest against the chin rest. If you are holding correctly you should be able to swing your arms free. Try clapping, walking around, doing knee bends, all while holding the violin with no hands. Practice this daily to build confidence and ease in your violin hold. **For Children** A box violin is the perfect way for a child age 3 6 to practice holding an object under the chin. Practice steps 1 6 above with a box violin until it becomes comfortable. Balance a block on top of the instrument while playing to raise awareness of how to keep the violin up in position. Step Two: Holding the Bow A bow is not a baseball bat. Neither is it a fragile feather. Seems obvious right? Yet a beginning player will tend to hold the bow in one of these two ways. Either the instinct is to hold the bow tightly, making a fist with the right hand over the bow, or to hold it too delicately, with the tips of the fingers. A good bow hold is somewhere between those two extremes. The bow can be held in a way that delivers both sensitivity and power, allowing finger agility as well as solidity, finger flexibility as well as weight. The best way I have found to accomplish the bow hold is to place the middle two fingers around the frog and then touch the stick lightly with the index and pinky. (See the Bunny Hand exercise below.) The middle two fingers should reach the bottom edge of the frog. The pinky should be curled and touch the top of the stick lightly just next to the nut (metal piece that screws in and out to tighten the bow).
Note that the index finger is splayed out slightly, leaning into the thumb grip (black part) and touching with the second digit. **For Children** Going to the Gym / Playing Baseball With kids, especially boys, I call the first extreme the overly strong, baseball bat hold going to the gym. This works especially well for young boys (and is very entertaining to them) who tend to want to grip the bow too strongly and flex all the muscles in their arm. If they are too young to know what going to the gym means, I will ask them if they have ever held a baseball bat. This is a good way for them to begin to distinguish between how the bow hold feels vs. the Water Spider I call the second extreme the overly gentle, fragile feather hold water spider. The most common mistake is to let the fingers ride on top of the stick instead of curling around the stick. The fingers resemble the legs
of a water spider skimming over the surface of water. This helps children understand the concept of producing surfacy tone, rather than a deep ringing tone. DO THIS NOW: Getting the Bow Hand Make the Bunny Hand 1. Without your bow, hold your right hand up and tuck your thumb underneath your two middle fingers. 2. The middle fingers are the bunny s teeth. Make them extra long by hanging them over your thumb, so that your thumb is touching under your second knuckle. 3. Point your pinky and index finger upward. These are the bunny s ears. 4. Wiggle the ears. Point one and then the other upward. ( FYC A fun addition for kids is to mimic emotions with the ears Sad Ears, Happy Ears, Curious Ears to encourage independent finger movement.) Make the Bunny Eat the Chocolate 1. Hold the bow with your left hand out in front of you. 2. Nestle the bow up under your Bunny Hand, touching the stick to your second knuckle. 3. Move your hand so that the two middle fingers are falling over the frog and touching the base of the frog.
4. Imagine the frog is a piece of chocolate. The bunny s teeth need to stay completely over the chocolate in order to eat it. Don t let those middle fingers ride up. Then let the index finger and pinky gently come down and rest on the stick, slightly spread out from the two middle fingers. The hand is splayed out slightly, all fingers curved, not flat. Index finger wraps slightly and touches at the second digit. Thumb rests in its natural resting shape between the stick and hair, touching at the top corner of the thumb. Things to watch out for If any of the following start happening, take your hand off the bow and form the bow hold again. Pinky straightening and locking Thumb pressing inward (banana thumb) Knuckles held stiffly in a pointed position (instead of flat to gentle curve) Index finger touching stick at first digit (it should touch at second) Middle fingers sliding upwards
Water spider hold, with all fingers on top of stick Hard, stiff hand. This happens from trying to grip, press, or squeeze. Keep the hand soft and springy. Step Three: Moving the Bow The motion of the bow is the most deceptively complex aspect of the violin. It is a lifelong process to learn to do it with skill and with sensitivity to the myriad sounds that can be produced. You might expect a lot of squeaking and scratching when getting started. This was how I sounded for the first year or two! However, it doesn t have to be that way, if the proper bow motion is learned early on. Before we begin, I want to emphasize an overall point that you should keep in mind: let gravity do the work. Don t work so hard! Much of poor violin sound is a result of not trusting that the bow can produce a good motion if we relax and stop trying to press, squeeze, or force. A relaxed arm will produce a fuller, more even and beautiful tone than pressing with the hand and fingers. Maintaining the bow hold in Step Two will be easier once you begin to feel the relaxed weight of the arm producing sound through the following exercises. Bow Movement There are four main things that will help produce a good sound: relaxing the shoulder, moving mainly the forearm from the gate hinge at the elbow, using a controlled area in the middle of bow, and keeping the elbow in a lowered position. I remember these four things with the acronym ROPE. R Relax the shoulder O Open the gate P Playground in the middle E Elbow sinks down
Give yourself lots of ROPE! Let s go through each of these in turn. R elax the shoulder It is important always to be aware of a natural, relaxed shoulder. When the muscles tense, the tone quality of the bow empties and can become at once tepid, heavy and scratchy. Stop periodically in your practicing and do the following exercise. Take a deep breath, and on the exhale, imagine a waterfall pouring down from your shoulder through your arm and into your hand and fingers, and finally through the bow itself. Let the bow be a part of you. Move your arms up and down like seaweed, letting the elbow and wrist bend. Many people work all day with tense shoulders, Relaxing them will also take stress out of your body for other tasks! Stop during the day to shrug your shoulders in a circular motion. It will relax you, but more importantly, it will increase your awareness of how you carry this part of your body, preparing you for your next round of practice. O pen the gate The gate is the hinge point, where the elbow opens and closes. Good contact with the string depends on moving the bow mainly from this hinge. If your elbow is stiff and does not open and close, the bow will travel up and down the fingerboard instead of moving in a straight line. Do eight bow strokes on your shoulder, watching your right elbow open and close. Then do it on the open A string, listening for a good ringing sound. Try it on other strings. Whenever you feel like your sound is becoming papery, cloudy, or squeaky, go back and check the gate! P layground in the middle The extremes of the bow are hard to control. For the beginning and returning violinist, it is important to stay in the middle third of the bow. Use the following sequence to get in the habit of playing in the middle of the bow. 1. Use tape or sticky tabs to mark the middle third of the bow. This is your playground! 2. Play your open strings in only that section until you feel you can reliably stop the bow before leaving the middle area.
E lbow sinks down Imagine an anchor tied around your elbow, and every time you make a downbow motion, the elbow sinks down with the weight. It therefore leads the downbow motion. You may have heard it said: Keep your right elbow down and slightly tucked in toward your ribs. This is correct in a way, but misleading, because we never want to hold a part of the body in one place. The elbow must actually move in an ellipsoid pattern. It will do so naturally when you think of it as moving in a relaxed and fluid way. Don t hold it in any one position. Better to feel as though something heavy were causing it to lead the motion downward, and to maintain a feeling of weight into the string. Let the feeling of weight pass through your shoulder, your elbow, and your fingers to the bow. If your fingers are not placed correctly on the bow, this weight transfer cannot happen correctly. Go back to Step Two and repeat until you can feel the weight of your fingers, particularly the middle two at the second knuckle, sinking into the bow. DO THIS NOW: ROPE Exercises Rainbow. Imagine drawing a rainbow with the bow. Play all four strings in one down bow, G D A E, then reverse the bow and play E A D G in one up bow. On the up bow, lead with the wrist, on the down bow, lead with the elbow. Repeat this 10 20 times, using the entire middle area of the bow. Really try to move the arm, engage the large muscle groups. Pepperoni Pizza. Play Twinkle Variation A (the taka taka ta ta, or pepperoni pizza rhythm) on the A string, making sure to stay in the playground, the middle third of the bow. As you play this rhythm, be sure to move the lower arm from the gate hinge. Let the bow come to a stop on its own during the last two notes. Try not to press or force the bow into this rhythm. Optional: Return to playing a scale or easy piece (if you already know one), attending to all of these elements, and staying in the middle third of the bow. Remember to stop after each exercise and check your bow hand. A tight hand will prevent good relaxed bow motion in the wrist and arm. Relax the hand, shake it out, go back to Step Two and form the bunny hand.
Step Four: Placing the Fingers One of the first things people notice about the violin is that it is a fretless instrument. This will garner much praise and admiration for you along the way! When people ask about the frets, just point to your head and say, They re up here. Violinists program the frets into our mind and muscle memory. Beginning and returning violinists often start out with tapes on the fingerboard, as temporary frets. This helps program the fingers where to land and assists the ear in tuning. Don t be afraid to use tapes to achieve better intonation. The best way to place fingers is to have tapes placed according to the following diagram: The tapes are positioned for the most natural position of the hand. This happens to be along the A Major scale pattern. (The first half of Suzuki Book One is all in A Major to encourage familiarity with this finger pattern.) The taped finger pattern also works with the intervals present in the D and G Major one octave scales (starting on the D and G strings).
DO THIS NOW: Left Hand Position and Movement The following exercises are designed to help you achieve good finger position, along with developing finger strength, agility, and independence of movement. Do them every day for the first six weeks that you are starting or returning violin. (You should at this point be able to hold the violin up parallel with the floor, and at least for a few seconds at a time with your head. If you cannot do this, you will automatically approach the left hand position incorrectly see Step One.) Swing the Arm. Swing your left arm down at your side, then float it up, resting the thumb across from first finger. Resume the finger taps as above. Fall Like Raindrops. Let the fingers drop onto the tapes in a hammer like motion from above. Important : Move your fingers from their base, from the lowest knuckle, in an up and down motion. Try not to retract the fingers, especially the pinky, into the hand. This introduces tension. Curved and hovering. The fingers should never poke up in the air or suddenly become straightened. See if you can hover the fingers over their respective tapes, and note the relaxed, gentle position of the hand. Finger Taps. Tap each finger up and down 10 times. Try to land them directly on the tapes. You want to train your muscle memory to land each time in the same place. Alternate between different strings. Feel the strings beneath your fingers. Thumb side corners. Your fingers should land on the side, nearest the thumb. When the hand and wrist are in the correct position, the fingers naturally land this way. Half A Major Scale. Place the fingers one at a time on the tapes, on the A string starting with first finger. Leave first finger down as second finger is placed. Leave 1 and 2 down when third finger is placed. Switch strings and try this for E Major, D Major and G Major. Each of these exercises should only take a minute or two. Spend about 10 minutes per day on these and you ll feel much more natural about placing the fingers. Things to watch out for Tension! If your hand becomes tired, pause and rest it. Don t squeeze! If you must squeeze the neck of the violin, it either means you are not holding the violin correctly, or that you need to train your fingers (and retrain your brain) to move your fingers independently of your thumb. To correct this tendency, take your thumb off the neck entirely, float it in the air, and resume the finger taps above. Face your thumb. Don t press your thumb into the neck. You should always see the face of your thumb resting gently against the fingerboard. Don t let the fingers collapse. They should land in a rounded position, rather than pushing into a flattened position.
Don t let the wrist collapse. The left wrist has a tendency to collapse upward, against the neck or body of the violin. To correct this tendency repeat the Swing The Arm exercise above, and do the finger taps while paying attention to your wrist. Taking the next steps Once you have become familiar with these four steps, you ve learned the basics. Now it s time to go to the next level. Private instruction is a great way to further develop and strengthen these basic areas while learning music appropriate to your level. I highly recommend starting with Book One of the Suzuki method, and memorizing the pieces. If you would like to talk with me about in person or distance instruction, please contact me at /contact. Most of all, I want to encourage you to stay with it. Give the priceless gift of music to yourself, and a great deal of personal fulfillment and life purpose will follow.