How to play the violin

This article gives the basic ideas of how to play the violin. Generally violins are quite common instruments and it is reasonably easy to rent or buy a violin. Children may need smaller violins (from an eighth, quarter, half, three-quarters, seven-eighths up to full size) to accommodate smaller hands. (See the violin page for the basics of the violin).

The Basics

The bow is held in the right hand with the thumb bent underneath the frog to support it and the other fingers loosely gripping the wood. The middle and ring fingers should wrap around the frog and the pinky finger should be curved. There are many different variations on this hold and it its important to find one thats suits your hand size and strength. The violin is held with the left hand, with your chin on the chin rest supporting the weight, and the fingers loosely coiled around the neck of the violin. The left elbow should be curved under the violin. The violin should be roughly horizontal and the right arm held high.

The main methods of playing the violin are bowed and pizzicato.

Bowed

The bow should be drawn swiftly and smoothly across the strings, about halfway between the fingerboard and the bridge. A downbow starts with the hand close to the strings pulling across the string from left to right, and is generally used on strong beats. An upbow goes the opposite way, right to left, and is used on weaker beats and upbeats. However with practice downbows and upbows should be difficult to distinguish.

Pizzicato

To play pizzicato (often abbreviated to pizz.) the right thumb should be placed under the fingerboard and the index finger used to pull the string quickly upwards and across. For faster passages, the bow can be held while playing pizzicato, still using the index finger but without the support of the thumb. In more complex and advanced pieces, a small cross above the stave indicates the fingers of the left hand plucking the strings. For more information see the Wikipedia page for pizzicato.

Fingering and positions

As there are no physical aids such as frets for violinists as there are for guitarists, accurate tuning comes with immense practice. On a full size violin, the tones are roughly two centimetres apart, but this is difficult to judge when playing since you are seeing from a different perpective. To aid tuning, it is very helpful to have a piano or other keyboard instrument when practising. The fingers of the left hand are conventionally named one (index finger) to four (little finger). When playing notes other than open strings (G, A, D and E), these fingers must press down hard, so that the string is shortened convincingly for a higher pitch. The standard intervals taught to beginners is tone, tone, semitone, tone (ie. G-A-B-C-D, D-E-F#-G-A, A-B-C#-D-E, and E-F#-G#-A-B). Of course the notes in between can be played by rearranging the hand position. This is known as first position, where the first finger plays up to a tone above the open string.