hi,

i've only posted a couple times on this board. i am a lefty musician, looking to purchase my first violin. i want to have a pickup put in and have the violin set up lefty. i was wondering if anyone knows the best way to go about this, without spending alot of money. i'm hoping to spend $300 or less, without buying a poor quality instrument. i've looked at violins on ebay, but most of the "affordable" instruments aren't very good. i don't know alot about this, so i was wondering if someone might be able to give me some good advice.

thanks alot,
Ken

Have a look at the Elida Trading website.
Elida Trading

Liz is very helpful and can obtain true "leftie" violins, ie. built for the purpose, rather than instruments that are converted.

Good luck

i will check it out. thank you very much for the help.

Ah, thank you Amanda

Liz

I never knew you ould get lefty and righty set ups, I thought everyone just used the same.

i have borought 35 violins all different colours and a sizes and shape. if this is your first violin and your wanting to spend 300 pound then i suggest you get a german one with a tiger stripe back. they are really good quality and last forever. just be very careful with the horse hair on the bow there very very very fine

Yes ... and then pay someone as much again to convert the whole thing to a leftie ....

Liz

I don't think I've ever seen anyone in an orchestra play left handed. Do some left handed people play the violin right handed then?

The great majority of left handed players play right handed, but there are some folk fiddlers who play left handed.

Liz

How awkward would that be in an orchestra? Your bows would wack into each other!

It could be quite comical

QUOTE (Appassionata @ Feb 11 2005, 07:28 AM)

I don't think I've ever seen anyone in an orchestra play left handed. Do some left handed people play the violin right handed then?

im left handed and when i played the violin i played it the right handed way.

bows hitting each other, sounds like fun!

Hehe, I can just imagine it now...

Reminds me of a time we played in the orchestra in a school assembly, and my friend sitting next to me poked her bow right in my ear!

The headmaster found it highly amusing and pointed it out to the rest of the school.

QUOTE (uberzoldat @ Feb 13 2005, 05:28 AM)

Reminds me of a time we played in the orchestra in a school assembly, and my friend sitting next to me poked her bow right in my ear! The headmaster found it highly amusing and pointed it out to the rest of the school.

Cool........

Um, surely all you'd need to do is put the strings on the other way round, put the chinrest on the other side, and get a violin shop to move the sound-post (a little post inside the violin that alters the balance of sound) to the correct position, or one that suited you, sound-wise.

Moving a sound-post shouldn't cost much, and the person can do it with you there till he hits a sound you like when you play the violin.

The side it's one can effect the volume and tone of individual strings; with the strings the other way round, you will definitely need to move the post.

Apart from that, you can do it all yourself.

Violinia

QUOTE

Um, surely all you'd need to do is put the strings on the other way round, put the chinrest on the other side, and get a violin shop to move the sound-post (a little post inside the violin that alters the balance of sound) to the correct position, or one that suited you, sound-wise.

Not quite that simple, Violinia. You've forgotten about the 'bass bar'.

The bass bar is the piece of wood glued under the belly. It runs along underneath the G string side of the bridge.

The sound post and the bass bar need to swap sides to make a left-handed setup and since the only way to move the bass bar is to remove the belly of the violin, it will get costly.

Then there's the nut. Not that the nut is expensive but it all adds up. The the tuning pegs, if it's goijng to look like a real lefite. The existing holes would all have to be filled and new holes drilled.

Liz

and the bridge needs to be the other way around, yesno? although that's by far one of the simpler jobs! would it need to be a different sort of bridge?

Oops, OK - I obviously don't know enough about the anatomy of the violin.

Sorry.

Violinia

I never even knew a bass bar existed.. shows how much I know