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Hi, this is probably a silly question but as I was perusing the internet, I have seen that there appear to be two types of bow - a normal, Renaissance? style and this 'Baroque' bow as illustrated above. What, if any, differences are there between the two in terms of sound produced/effect on playing? I like the style of the Baroque bow but if it's hard to play etc. then I'm obviously wanting to avoid buying one! I love the style of it though ... someone please enlighten me!

That looks like a Baroque bow to be used with a Baroque violin to me, as opposed to the other which is a "normal" bow far as I can see.

No idea what a Baroque bow is like to play on an ordinary instrument though - sorry.

I was of the understanding that a baroque bow was a lot more curved than that though. I may have to find somewhere that sells them and try one out

Sarah is correct, one is a Baroque bow, the other is a 'normal' bow.

I have used a Baroque bow. They are quite common around here. The one I used was very light and quite short compared to a normal bow. I was taught to hold it differently from a 'normal' bow ( a bit further along the stick, at about the balance point of the bow).

The bow I used also wasn't as stiff as a 'normal' bow so I had to play with a lighter bow stroke than usual. I think this is typical. I found it easier to do triple and quadruple stopping with it. The Baroque bow produced a beautiful, but light, delicate sound which suited the Baroque music that I was playing at the time. I found that because the length of the bow was shorter that I had to use much less bow than usual and had to constantly think about how much bow to use and whereabouts on the bow I wanted to be, but that was probably only because I wasn't used to it. I didn't find it particularly hard to use, just different.

If you are interested in playing Baroque music, I would definately recommend trying out a Baroque bow.

The baroque bow allows you to play chords a lot easier ie you don't need to separate them into two strings but can actually play four strings all at once.

I doubt if you could play all four strings at once on the bow illustrated - you may be thinking of a peculiar bow called, I think, a Bach bow, which looked more like a fretsaw....

The balance of a baroque bow is different - it is really agile and it is much easier to do fast passage work and string crossings (think the Seasons!)