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hi fiddlerman I used to play the violin as a child for a short time,but with a bit of encouragement from my husband and family (they dont know what they are letting themselves in for) i have decided to take it up again. your website is great so helpful thank you, this time im never going to stop playing.
Honorary advisor
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I know you addressed this to the big guy, I just wanted to say Welcome. I am in a similar position. I played for about four years starting at 9 years old. That was 40 years ago. I have been playing for about 3 or 4 months now. I love it. It is difficult, but what worthy enterprise is easy? There is a great bunch of people here, no attitudes. We all share the same goal, make music fun.
Honorary tenured advisor
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You're going to have so much fun! Do you already have a violin?
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Great SecondViolin, I look forward to seeing your progress and hopefully helping along the way. Welcome to Fiddlerman.com 
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
Regular advisor
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Welcome SecondViolin! You have certainly come to the right place. I am looking forward to seeing your progress.
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Welcome Secondviolin you are going to have fun with this site i have learned so much from it and fiddlerman since i started!!!!!!!!!
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hi everyone, thank you for the warm welcome, or cead mile failte as we say here in Ireland.I have my violin for about a week now,practising every day, and loving every minute of it. My husband bought it for me as an early Birthday/Christmas present ,its made in china cvn160 ,I think it sounds pretty good.I read somewhere that after about two weeks of playing a new violin it " wakes up" and begins to sound even better is this true, or nonsense. At the moment im playing twinkle twinkle slowly You have to start somewhere, I feel like im at the base of mount Everest.The piece of music i would most like to be able to play well, is the Marino Waltz by John Sheahan of the Dubliners.
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Hi! Welcome to the forum! I'm sure you'll be able to play Marino Waltz someday.
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New violins do "Wake Up" as they say. The instrument needs to vibrate for a while to become flexible. There is however no guarantee that your instrument will sound better but most likely it will.
The two weeks thing is nothing that I have heard personally. My guess is that it was someone's opinion that spread and others agreed. Your instrument should get better constantly from day 1. When I start playing these new instruments that Cecilio sent me they begin opening up right away. I can play pretty aggressively and that will help. Your fiddle will probably continue to get better for a long time as long as you take care of it properly and make sure the bridge and sound-post are set correctly. Good strings make a big difference. My recommendation, though it differs from violin to violin, is that Dominant is a safe bet for most instruments. Many great fine instruments such as Guarneri and Stradivarius are set up with Dominants. Steel strings are so stiff that if you draw the string hard enough with your bow the tension brings the pitch up.
Glad to hear that you are happy with your CVN160
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
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hi Fiddlerman, thanks for the advice, I had to reset the bridge as it was too far back near the tailpiece , The sound is much clearer now more ringing if that makes any sense. I have just bought a new set of strings Roto Sound RS6000 are they any good,have you ever heard of them? Im having a few problems with tuning I have an electronic tuner and its registering all kinds of everything on each string.I already broke the g string trying to get the right pitch 
Will playing more and adjusting the strings as I go along help.Next time I think I will get the dominant strings you suggested.
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I never heard of Roto Sound RS6000 but they appear to be steel strings and I am not sure that they are better than the ones that come with the violin. Some people buy the clamp-on tuners. Have you tried the tuner on this site?
/fiddle-learning-tools/online-tuner/
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
Honorary advisor
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I have been using a free tuner app on my droid phone, it works great. It is called gstrings. I just made a horrible video of a comparison, and the errors in the tuner that came with my Cecilio violin. I will post it in a few minutes.
Honorary advisor
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Ok, it took longer than a few minutes and it is really bad, I hope no one gets motion sickness.
Tuner comparison, quick and dirty, not very pretty!
I did notice when playing the open A the Cecilio tuner did register A. However it was just in the A range, both tuners are set to 440 A. It used to work ok. One day it just went haywire, started getting readings all over the place.
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That was real fun David. I too have a tuner app but I think I'll switch to "gstrings" cause I really like the way it looks. Then again, if you want to train your ears use fiddlermans free tuner 
You get to see a real picture of my scroll every time too.
Thanks again for your video. 
After a few videos I feel like I am getting to know you all personally.
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
Honorary advisor
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I'm picking up the violin again (3rd time lucky hopefully) and when I was tuning my violin against my phone app 'gstrings' and then I compared it to the tuner on this site I noticed the tuner on this site is slightly sharper? I would compare it to our piano too which is how I use to tune my violin but our piano is way out of tune itself so it's not a very good reference point. Which tuning reference would you guys recommend I use?
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Hi Chinny and welcome to Fiddlerman.com
You are exactly right. I made the tuner with a 443 A instead of 440 because I prefer it and it is used much more often in orchestras than the lower tuning of 440.
It really doesn't much matter which tuning you choose to use unless you are playing with a playback file or other people. At that point you will need to readjust your tuning to match whatever you are playing with. For example, I have a "Learn To Play Blues" section on this site and our member "MGN" made us a couple of playback tracks to practice with. For those tracks you need to tune to his A for best results. I just use my ear and play most comfortably with the higher tuning because I've used it my whole life.
Hope that we can help maintain your interest now, the third time around and that you find all the help you need here.
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
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I too am picking up the violin again after a brief encounter many years ago in my elementary school orchestra. I play piano at the advanced level and taught myself a bit of guitar. I am looking forward to re-learning the beautiful violin. I really appreciate what you are doing Fiddlerman! After extensively browsing this site and others, I can say, this is by far the best. I just ordered a Silver Creek SC3EL acoustic-electric violin from musiciansfriend.com after seeing rave reviews. I look forward to starting your lessons as soon as it arrives. Thanks for all your work! 
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Hey PorschaB,
Happy you found this site. I'm glad that you will be following my lessons. I have been fortunate enough to get a bunch of great people as members here on the forum and they are extremely helpful and friendly. Look forward to following your progress.
Welcome to fiddlerman.com
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
Honorary advisor
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Fiddlerman said:
That was real fun David. I too have a tuner app but I think I'll switch to "gstrings" cause I really like the way it looks. Then again, if you want to train your ears use fiddlermans free tuner
Thanks again for your video.
Speaking of scrolls...lol
I left my Fiddlerman's finger board chart on my coffee table and the dogs were loose in the house and unattended. That is the only thing they shredded from several bills, and other papers on the table. They also chewed a hole in the sofa cushion.
Tuning by ear, I had a pitch pipe when I was a kid, I could not tune with it. The same note on different instruments sounds different. I don't get that "feeling" like fourth finger gives. I do not hear the difference between 440 and 443. I try listening to my violin when I first take it out of the case. I close my eyes and play an open string and try to determine if it is low. It is mostly a guess, and a 70% chance it is low. But it is a guess. My hearing is good, I just don't hear subtle changes in pitch, and don't have good "tone memory" for lack of a better term. I can sense it is getting slightly better, and hopefully will improve to a point where I can tune by ear. I see you tuning by fifths and it blows my mind. How can you tell which string is off pitch? All I can tell is two very different notes are being played at the same time. I guess it is a start. It could be worse, I could be deaf.
If you could accurately reckon which note(s) were out of tune "by ear", that would make you the third acquaintance I've known who can do that. The other two happen to be church organists but I don't think that means anything about organists.
You will get the trick of 5 th's. It's really no big deal. If you can (and you can) sing the first 5 notes of a major scale, you got'it. 
People with perfect pitch can also be a pain so be careful with your new skills
PS Those 2 organists are the only ones I've witnessed live and I can assure you that I am older than sand and would have noticed any others.
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