My new fiddle

I’m almost a month into playing my new (and first) fiddle, a $1,500 Owens & Parkley Chinese-made 4/4 dubbed by its maker Cantus Dubois, which I have freely translated from the Latin and French as “singing wood.”

My teacher was somewhat bemused by the fact that Singing Wood is Chinese, having an old prejudice against such as being more like VSOs (Violin Shaped Objects) than worthy instruments. But I’m not worried because I bought it from a reputable violin shop and he also praised its volume and warmth in the upper register, which he said was unusual.

The volume has diminished somewhat as SW is no longer new, which is normal, and it is settling in to realizing (I say mystically of this most mystical of musical instruments) that it is no longer part of a tree, a spruce-maple-boxwood-ebony combination. I only wish I was a better player to be worthy of its warm upper register which continues. But I’ll get there.

Five months ago I decided to abandon the Suzuki One book after getting hung up on trying to learn its first Bach minuet. I decided to be a Celtic/Old Time/Bluegrass/Irish/Klezmer/Country fiddler instead and was recently rewarded when my teacher (who plays such himself) pronounced me having arrived by finally “getting” the all-important rhythms involved.

He even gave me the names and addresses of two local fiddle “jams” for beginners. I’m not quite ready for them, though, as I have only one or two pieces memorized and they generally require twenty or more. Bringing sheet music to a jam, even a beginners one, is considered rude.

Besides, I’m still enjoying doing this for myself, or as Aaron Smith put it so succinctly at Violinist dot com, for the sake of the music itself:

“I will practice. I will improve. I will play for the sake of the music again this week–even if it is for God’s ears alone. It is a gift to be able to play. It is a gift to play on despite the effort and focus required. The wood will sing this new year with its sweetest song yet.”

Indeed it will, and that, for me, as for Mr. Smith, is more than enough. And, I should add, I will very happily go on practicing and playing in the blessed absence of the wolf tone (C natural on the A string in first position) that I struggled with on my $500 student rental. I don’t miss it.