Hi,

I have had two lessons now and I am working through the Abracadabra book.

To be fair, I don't sound great and it is hit and miss whether I get the right note or not but when I play, it doesn't sound as terrible as I though it would. If I had known this, I would have learnt earlier!

Do you think violin gets a lot of bad press?


LearnerFlute xx

Yes! Your reaction is common both among adult learners and parents of children. I suspect the reputation is partly due to the violin-shaped objects previous generations tended to experience: I'm sure the clunky thing built somewhere behind the Iron Curtain which I started off with, plus its cheesewire strings, must have sounded terrible compared to a modern Stentor.

Well done sounds like youre making good progress
Yes the learner violin player image is over exaggerated... i think especially as an adult you can be more aware of what is a good sound and to find out how you may go about making that, whereas most kids scrape away and dont care/think to actively make a change to it
Also I think if youre working on it and listening for how to get better you hear it in a different light
I teach some kids, and my kid brother always complains about how terrible they sound, but because im listening in detail at what theyre doing i just see positives and improvements and dont at any point think 'ouch this sounds bad'

Well done! Sounds like you've made a positive start. Keep going, it's so worth it!

Adult learners have the benefit of starting on a full size violin too, which helps!

I'm helping out a friend who is a complete novice on the violin (but is experienced on guitar). They are having lessons, but not able to be regular at the moment. They're making a fine sound. I needed to demonstrate something about bow hold and using the full bow - I played it - never played a violin in my life (OK I am a cellist and viol player) and got a decent sound out of it straight away (E string took a couple of attempts to get pressure right).

Keep going and good luck

It may help that I have a good violin but even so, when I mentioned to people at work I wanted to learn violin they made a lot of jokes about cats being strangled. I was worried about it but I don't think it's that bad as what people say. I also learn the flute and that can sound bad if you don't blow right. But people don't associate flutes with high squeaky shrill noises!

My third lesson is next week. I have only learnt tunes using the D and A strings so far. I am making quicker progress on the violin because when I first got my flute I couldn't make any sound - good or bad! It took a while before I could do it.


I would say after lesson 2 an out of tune twinkle twinkle is better than no sound at all!