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Daniel's practice takes
Topic Rating: 5 Topic Rating: 5 Topic Rating: 5 Topic Rating: 5 Topic Rating: 5 Topic Rating: 5 (2 votes) 
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NoirVelours
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I bet minstrels and troubadours were all adding their personal touch like we do today! note

"It can sing like a bird, it can cry like a human being, it can be very angry, it can be all that humans are" Maxim Vengerov

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devil-violincheerleaderserenade

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DanielB
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I haven't posted any practice takes in a bit, so I guess I should bite the bullet and put one up.

With trying to get used to playing on the acoustic violin/fiddle, I feel rather like I've gone backwards rather than forwards on progress.  So maybe more of a "regress" post in some ways.  

The problem has been that while the acoustic is very pretty and nicely curved and much lighter than the electric, it is also thicker.  Much thicker.  My electric is about 5.5 cm from the back of the instrument to the top of the bridge.  The acoustic is about 9.5 cm from the back to the top of the bridge.  That's almost twice as thick.  Now 4 cm may not seem like a lot, but i can tell you that it makes one feel kind of like a very small child peering up over the edge of the kitchen table. LOL

The action on the acoustic is nice, and as low or a little lower than on the electric, and the neck is even thinner than the electric.  But that height difference has been making it necessary to sort of learn bowing over again.  Considering I switch back and forth between the two several times a day often even in the same session, it is taking some work.  I'll get it eventually.  Like electric and acoustic guitars, it will get to where I'll automatically adjust when switching instruments.  But for the past several days, it has been being a bit of extra challenge. LOL

Another difference between the two instruments is that the acoustic is actually much more comfortable to play without a chinrest.  I can get an easy hands-free hold without lifting the shoulder or pinching down with the chin, the acoustic just happens to be shaped so it fits right along my jaw bone well with no chinrest.  I use the cheapie plastic shoulder rest it came with, but that actually holds well and is comfortable on the shoulder.  I can just shift the violin up onto my shoulder a little more to play it without the shoulder rest, but I have to turn my head a bit more and press down a bit with the edge of the jaw, so I only do that when I'm just going to play for a minute or two.

But having the chin right on the top deck of the violin also changes the angle one sees things from.  See above, where I was talking about feeling like a little kid peering over the edge of the kitchen table.  LOL

Anyway, the tone on this recording may be a bit thin, since I was experimenting with recording a fair distance from the mic.  About 4 meters or 12 ft away.  I was trying to see if the room acoustics were worth trying to catch.  Don't think so. 

I feel it has been a bit of regression, but actually I *did* sound even worse on the acoustic at first.  So I guess it is progress of a sort. LOL

Oh, and no noise reduction or reverb, so you get to hear fans and air conditioner and doors opening and closing in the background and etc. LOL  You have been warned, this is not great. 

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"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman

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coolpinkone
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I thought it was just fine.... Thanks for posting. Yay.

Vibrato Desperato.... Desperately seeking vibrato

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Mad_Wed
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DanielB said 
...With trying to get used to playing on the acoustic violin/fiddle, I feel rather like I've gone backwards rather than forwards on progress.  So maybe more of a "regress" post in some ways.  

...

It's not a regress, Daniel! =) Acoustic is just more picky, LOL... That's why i think it's more prefered to start with an acoustic one - it gives more feedback =) (EV gives You more fun though instead of feedback LOL)

Wery nice actually! Love the intonation, as usual... I would just suggest that maybe You could play the whole bow strokes for a while (on open strings works well, or playing scales, which is more beneficial) - it gives more freedom for right hand, when You play some piece...

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DanielB
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I agree, Mad_Wed.  A big part of the "problem" is that violin is such an amazing range of sound in such a small space.  The acoustic one is even more of that.  Even a small difference in where the contact point is between the bridge and neck makes a huge difference on the tone of the sound.  It is only a couple of centimeters between sounding so relaxed as to be almost sleepy or drunken to sounding shrill as if it were angry or frightened.  A small amount of pressure with the bow can take it from a soft singing voice to a shout. 

The electric is more steady.  It does not express quite as much as the acoustic and it is easier to play "safely".  I mean, if you bow staying in a certain range between the bridge and fingerboard, and a certain range of pressure, it gives nice steady tones.  You have to push it a little to get into the "risky" sounds. 

I like them both though.  The electric, I have put in more time on so far and it is easier to sound decent.  The acoustic is much more expressive, and it is when I try to really make some use of that expressive quality that I "get my fingers burned" and sound like a noob who has stumbled over the instrument and fallen down a flight of stairs. LOL  But that is part of the fun of it! 

I do not think I am loving the strings I put on the acoustic though.  I had not planned on getting an acoustic this soon, and I had just gotten a new set of strings I was going to try on the electric just as an experiment.  My electric is strung with a "student" set of silver wrapped strings.  They are rather forgiving and sweet.  The experimental set I got in is a "professional" set, with chrome wrap.  They forgive very little and are only sweet with a bit of coaxing.  They have a good bit of "sting" to their sound.  Both are "silk and steel" set from the same string maker (Rotosound), so it seemed logical to try them.  If I had wanted easy, I would have been better off with the silver wrap on the new violin.  But I had them, brand new in the package, and I really didn't want to string the new instrument with the Cecilios it came with.  But I will stick with them for at least a couple more weeks and see if I like them as I get more used to them.

The wrap/winding makes quite a bit of difference on strings.  Strings wrapped with something heavier and softer, like silver tend to be softer and more forgiving.  Because silver is heavier, the strings take a little less tension to tune to pitch, and so they play easier and have a more mellow sound.  A winding like chrome is very light and hard and tunes at a bit higher tension and they are much easier to squeak or get an "off" tone with, but they have more possibilities for expression.  I used to use chrome wrapped strings for electric guitar in rock and jazz bands.  For things like acoustic guitar or harp where I play more folk music I usually use silver wrap. 

If I had known I had an acoustic violin coming in, I would have ordered a set of silver strings for it.  But maybe the chrome is actually a better choice and I just need to get used to it and learn how to use them better.  Time will tell, and it is worth taking a few weeks to see before changing.

Or maybe someday I just really need to try a set of strings that cost more than 10$ or so.  roflol

"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman

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DanielB
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I did some work on the circuitry of my electric violin, replacing a section o it with one I built to get a cleaner sound.  I like my electric so far as how it plays, but it has always had a bit of distortion in the factory pre-amp, and I wanted it to be able to play very clean.  Yes, electric violins can sound really neat with some guitar-type distortion, but I want that to be something I add, not something that was always there.  So I built a new pre-amp circuit and opened up my electric and replaced the factory circuit with it.  I like the clean sound, especially with a bit of reverb added. 

I also have been playing with recording a track of violin and then recording another track of myself playing against the first track to basically do some duet sounds and begin to think out arrangements for more than one violin line. One of my goals has been to learn to play enough to be able to use violin in recordings and actually be playing strings rather than using a string patch or sample on a synth.  So this is progress towards that goal.

This is a clip from where I was playing around with the Eric Clapton song "Wonderful Tonight" to try out the new circuitry and also working at coming up with a simple arrangement for 2 violins.  It is just the basic verse part.

 

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"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman

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coolpinkone
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Nice Daniel. Good work.

Vibrato Desperato.... Desperately seeking vibrato

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DanielB
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Thanks Coolpink.  It isn't a stellar performance or anything, but I hadn't put up anything for progress recordings for a bit.

"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman

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DanielB
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About time for another progress recording, I guess.

This is maybe a little different than what some folks here do, but it is something I practice at a bit.  Improvising against backing tracks.  Even though improv is kind of composing off the top of your head as you go along, it does still take practice to work on it as a skill to be able to pick the notes and techniques/sounds you are going to use on the fly.  This isn't what I'd call "skilled" yet, by any means.   But I'm kinda ok with it as a beginner's attempt at improving a lead over some medium fast blues.

duncecap

There's at least a few moments that happen now and then where I kinda like what I'm doing.  Others, well, I am less pleased with, of course.  Yeah, I know, before anybody says it, "Don't quit the day-job!!!"  LOL

 

I'll get it, eventually.  Maybe.  LOL

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"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman

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Fiddlestix
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Good licks, dannyboy. Try a little bass too.  clap

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coolpinkone
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Fun!!! Daniel... Yay... got me tapping my foot and moving before I even poured the coffee. Good Job and thank you.  I am going back for more!!!!!!!!!!

Vibrato Desperato.... Desperately seeking vibrato

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DanielB
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Thank you both, you are too kind.

The second half of that recording def shows an "Uh.. what should I do now?" moment happening.  But I wanted a clip that was representative of what I'm working on, not just what I can safely do without messing up too much. 

This is the fastest backing track that I use so far, and it is a bit challenging, especially thinking of stuff to do for the whole 5 min or so it runs.  Frustrating at times, because on electric guitar, I have a pretty ok idea of what to do with something like this.  On violin, my fingers are still pretty clumsy comparatively.  But it comes, a bit at a time.

Anybody wanting to try jamming on some backing tracks, you can find this one on http://www.guitarbackingtrack......es_a.htm  There's other similar ones if you search using "jamtracks" as the band name.  Or search for a fave song and they might have tracks for it.

Even a complete beginner can jam on something like this backing track.  Just take easy single bow strokes on the open A, D and E strings and work on trying to get them to fit with the rhythm and what the music is doing, and then try adding fingered notes from there.  One at a time, figure out what works. 

 

@Fiddlestix:  Oh, I do play lower, as well as higher.  I just didn't happen to during this particular 40 second or so clip from a 5 minute jam. LOL

"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman

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i love seeing these and trying to measure my own progress.  I would post my own but still trying to figure out my vid problem.

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DanielB
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Nothing stellar, as usual.  But I hadn't put anything up in this tread for a while, so I figured I may as well for documenting progress (or lack thereof). 

I had put up a quick take of this song before, but not in my practice takes thread. 

Not particularly happy with the sound/tone I got on this recording, but I'm experimenting and trying to find a decent mic angle and distance.  Sure the strings are Shar's cheaper type, but still they sound considerably better in person, even when having someone else play the violin and standing several feet back.  Oh well.

I had done a recording of Annie Laurie a while back, but it was with the electric.  

For my own "records":

Equipment- Hoffmann violin recorded at approx 10 ft with MXL990 condenser mic and ART tube preamp running directly into a laptop.

Location- Basement hallway (crummy acoustics)

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"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman

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DanielB said
I read just the other night that to hit every note on the violin perfectly, one would have to bring the fingers down with an accuracy of something like 1/30th of a millimeter. 

Apologies to Maestro Flesch, but It is nonsensical to ask how much the fingering can be wrong while keeping exact pitch.  Of course the fingering can't be off in the least!

As FM said, the question is how much of an error is tolerable.

I've seen it written that it is very hard for people to detect an error of five cents (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C.....28music%29 for the definition of cent).  My chromatic tuner has a resolution of five cents.

The ratio between two frequencies that differ by n cents is 2^(n/1200) where '^' is exponentiation.  Similarly the vibrating lengths of two pitches differing by n cents and played on the same string are in the ratio 2^(n/1200), i.e. 2 raised to the (n/1200) power.

As a concrete example, consider a 5-cent error when playing G on the D string.  With a length of 328.00 mm from nut to bridge, the note should be fingered with a vibrating length of 245.72 mm (+/- 0.01 mm).  A 5-cent error will result when that length is wrong by 245.72 x (2^(5/1200) - 1) ~= 245.72 x (0.0028923) = 0.71 mm.  A variation of 245.72 x (2^(1/1200) - 1) ~= 245.72 x (0.0005778) = 0.14 mm gives an error of 1 cent.

So it would seem that if you hit your first-position notes within about 7/10 mm, almost nobody is going to notice.  Easier said than done, o' course ...

semiquaver-1214

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DanielB
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"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman

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RosinedUp

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DanielB said
http://www.gunsandmagic.com/im.....033-1a.jpg

Daniel, if that Bloome County cartoon saying "Just wing that mother!" refers to the above discussion of intonation and the precision of fingering, it could be you are saying to learn vibrato!

violin-student

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DanielB
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Well, it seemed shorter than repeating much of what has already been said.

But first off, there is more than one "correct" way of intoning the notes depending on what tempering system is used.  Most digital tuners I have seen are strictly "equal tempered".

Digital tuners also have their limitations.  If you tune a string slowly up to the bottom of the "dead on" mark, and then keep tuning it slowly up to where it starts to go off that mark, that is a noticeable change in pitch.  That sort of thing as well as tuning the instrument by harmonics and seeing the most digital tuners aren't as accurate as that is more than enough reason for me not to rely on electronic tuners too heavily.  I'll usually get a reasonably good A off the digital and then tune by harmonics.  I do use it to get the A, since I do not have "perfect pitch".

So, if the correct frequency for the pitch of a given note can be debated in at least some cases, and the most commonly available way of checking the pitch may have some degree of inaccuracy, I personally don't think it makes much difference if we are talking about 1/30th of a mm or .14 mm. 

My point with posting a link to that particular cartoon relates more to the passage quoted from Flesch, "To play in tune, in terms of physics, is an impossibility."  in that we will probably get further by actually playing than we do in analyzing how difficult playing should be, in terms of the math and physics.  

If we approached walking by analyzing the math and physics involved, would it actually help?  It is a very complex process involving shifting weight, dynamic balance, etc.  But most toddlers learn to walk quite well by the repeated process of trying and self correcting the problems to learn to walk better.

So, "Just wing that mother!"

"This young wine may have a lot of tannins now, but in 5 or 10 years it is going to be spectacular, despite the fact that right now it tastes like crude oil. You know this is how it is supposed to taste at this stage of development." ~ Itzhak Perlman

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cdennyb
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That's what I do...

 

WING IT! exactlybananabananabananabanana

"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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