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Intro: I'm a guitarist of nearly 20 years who has played violin for maybe 45 minutes. I'm probably quite decent for someone who has played 45 minutes, but on an absolute metric, no doubt absolutely terrible. My father casually mentioned wanting a violin months ago, and I happened upon a never-played beginner's violin at work. At $50, I took it (Cremona SV-100--laugh it up. Shouldn't sound quite as bad when my Pro Arte strings arrive), and knowing he will never take lessons and likely won't put forth any effort at all, I've decided to teach myself a little before Christmas so that I can at least help him get through the books I intend to buy.
All of that out of the way, I've been playing some slow motion fifth caprice (something I can play much faster on the guitar), but find myself a little confused on how to skip from, say, the G string to the A string without slurring over the D. It's not as intuitive as everything else has been. We call this "string-skipping" on the guitar, but I've had no success identifying the technique on the violin. Could someone give me some advice on how to skip over strings without doing any collateral damage in between?
P.S. Before anyone assaults me for the disservice I'll be doing my father, I'm of the mind that the world's worst violin teacher will be better for a demotivated late student with no ear than leaving him on his own with a couple books for him to likely never even open 
Regulars
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You have to either lift the bow or just make sure you aren't moving the bow. Practice on open strings. Play a G stop the bow move to A and start bowing. Make sure you move from the shoulder to chane strings and from the elbow to bow.
King
Regulars
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I think Kevin is saying to kinda roll the bow on the string's.
I think. 
Regulars
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Love the intro Farroxis very funny.
As usual, Kevin's advice is faultless. That's why he's my hero!
Look forward to seeing more questions from you.
Ps, is my iPhone dicky, or is Kevin now an icon?
I am amazed at how old people of my age are.....
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Much thanks for the technique advice, and the warm welcome. Exactly what I was looking for 
I find it funny that this concept isn't really singled out or spoken about as much pertaining to the violin (from my limited Googling), whereas skipping strings cleanly while maintaining full speed on the guitar is among the hardest right-hand techniques to master when playing advanced material. Perhaps it's because the challenges presented by the bow in general are myriad. Maybe it's my background, but my impression is right hand technique is the more difficult to master and many a player's left hand progress will tend to outpace it...
Regulars
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Hello there
I made a little video which concentrates on crossing to a non-adjacent string :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....FXQcadFNjE
Mr Jim 
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Great advice above. It's all about angles, bow pressure and timing.
If you are playing a slur you need to move the bow fast enough over to the correct angle for the string that you want to get to without adding pressure. If you have something specific in mind we might be able to answer more specifically. 
You can actually play octaves on the violin easily without having to skip a string using the first and fourth finger, which also means that the smaller intervals are even easier.
I admire what you are doing for your dad. Hope it's something you feel like doing for yourself as well.
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
Regulars
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you make it look so easy Jim...
"If you practice with your hands you must practice all day. Practice with your mind and you can accomplish the same amount in minutes." Nathan Milstein
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Great video... I will have to work on controlling the sort of 'bounce' I get when coming back down to the next note after leaving the previous.
Fiddlerman said
Great advice above. It's all about angles, bow pressure and timing.If you are playing a slur you need to move the bow fast enough over to the correct angle for the string that you want to get to without adding pressure. If you have something specific in mind we might be able to answer more specifically.
You can actually play octaves on the violin easily without having to skip a string using the first and fourth finger, which also means that the smaller intervals are even easier.
I admire what you are doing for your dad. Hope it's something you feel like doing for yourself as well.
Ahh you're right... I was thinking too much like a guitarist. I can bypass this particular skip by just playing it higher up on the neck on the lower string (I'm assuming we call toward the bridge 'higher' with violin as on the guitar 
). And yes, I'm afraid I do feel like playing for myself now... I've already looked into 5-string electrics. I'll have to hold off for a while, but one would sound nice through my all-tube Mesa half-stack some day
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We are in the process of uploading information for all the Mark Wood violins on FiddlerShop too
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
Regulars
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Welcome to the forum, Farroxis!
Thanks for the lesson, Mr. Jim.
Fiddlerman said
We are in the process of uploading information for all the Mark Wood violins on FiddlerShop too
Maybe You are in process of uploading information for Yamaha violins too 
.
I'm in process of saving money for Yamaha SV 150 =)
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You crack me up Naska. I might just do that for you.
"The richest person is not the one who has the most,
but the one who needs the least."
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