Andrew Fryer said
@Shane "Chicken" Wang You have to choose a teacher with good paper quals, and they don't come cheap. In the UK it's pretty easy - you find someone who has a performer's diploma and/or a teacher's diploma (many have both) from the RCM or the RAM.

When I was a kid I was on a piano scholarship, and so I was lucky enough to have such teachers provided for me.

But my experience of guitarists on a CG forum I won't name, is that some guitarists will take a lesson from a guitarist who has had one lesson from a guitarist who has had one lesson!

I'm lucky - my violin teacher is a friend with a performer's diploma on the viola and who charges me mates' rates and cooks for me, lol!  

Firstly, I can't even find a woman here that knows how to cook.

Secondly,We have plenty of those One lesson teachers here, but no real teachers. I searched the internet for local violin teachers and it gave me a dance studio looking for instructors.

I live between Memphis,Tn, home of Elvis Presley and the delta blues, and Nashville Tn, home of the Grand Ole Opry and country music. Seems you have to be in school to learn strings here. I'm ready to get closer to civilization.

markcobb said
@AndrewH Love love love violin lab. beth is amazing.

I did catch Allison Sparrow showing 2 different ways to do finger vibrato and neither one made a whole lot of since to me.

I may be wrong but it seems that it would be easier to land just below the note and push into it than to land on the note and pull away from it,( Sparrow technique ). In one video she showed a hand vibrato with the finger going sideways against both knuckles. with arthritis that's impossible for me to do. 

@Shane "Chicken" Wang I watched this vid and you’re absolutely right.  This is completely improper.  Because the ear hears the higher note intuitively, the proper vibrato is played pushing from low to high... not high to low as she shows.  

Sideways vibrato is poor technique as well.  

 

Sidenote, I've been trying to learn amazing grace, and a few minute ago I was watching Fiddlerman comparing master violins for a customer and he was playing Amazing Grace in the video. I walked through the living room and my mother says you are really getting good with that fiddle. 

I said thanks and kept going.  

That’s funny!!!!  I don’t care where you’re from!!!!!

Andrew Fryer said
Good diaphragm vibrato on the oboe takes about 6 months of daily practice to learn, so I expect to allot 6 months of next year to learning good violin vibrato and tone, although hand movement should be easier than diaphragm control. Should be!

I don't know why I thought my musical experience would transfer over, it's been a hurdle in many ways and a blessing in others. I can't remember the oboe set up but I remember it's a double reed and as expensive as my ex wifes taste in jewelry. Some of the fingerings were the same as saxophone, but that was it. We learned diaphragm vibrato because it was easier in soprano, bite vibrato in alto down. I thought the shaking of the hand would be easier too, but,(always a but, right?), when my left hand wants to shake, my right hand wants to wave. It tries to match what my left hand is doing. brings the bow to a dead stop, and jerks with the action of my left.

I understand what your teacher is doing, once you get passed thinking about your bow hand it'll want to work independent of your left. I'm sure those dexterity exercises are helping with that also. On one hand I, and you too obviously, want to be extremely good with the violin, but we still remember how easy it was to hit those keys.

When your just tapping your notes out on the fingerboard, not bowing, have you caught yourself humming the notes and listening to the vibration through the corpus? (I think that's right, corpus, I keep wanting to call the body a carcass. Which further explains my playing at the moment.)

@Gordon Shumway I appreciate you mentioning Glenn Gould. started watching a documentary on his life and He is a fascinating character. Will be trying the Galamian approach before long. Thanks for that also.