From the age of 9 I have had nothing but Dominant strings, for no particular reason other than my first teacher liked them. I have been reading the reviews on some other strings and wondering if it might be nice to have a change, or if that's pointless. I need a full set of violin spares anyway, so it seemed a good time to branch out.

I am pretty happy with the Dominants, but then I heard you can get more mellow tones on the E string. I am something of a reluctant violinist and anything I can do to make it sound, well, more like a viola would be great. I find that the A string 'shouts' compared to the others, there is just a sense of hey, look, I don't fit in at all, yeah guys, we're on the A string, woo hooo, IYKWIM. Any recommendations for something that will mix OK with the existing Dominants but might cure the yelling A?


Incidentally and off at a tangent, what's crossposting? I keep seeing the rules telling me I mustn't do that, and I hope I am not, but since I have no idea what it is...

You'll probably have to do a bit of trial and error to find an A string that works best for you and your fiddle, but as a first try I would strongly suggest a heavy gauge Thomastik Vision. This has a nice mellow sound after a few days (sounds rather metallic when first fitted, but this soon wears off).
For "E" I like the Jargar Forte with Dominants (a la Hilary Hahn).