Tuning My Violin from 60 Miles Away
I've Moved! The Boomer Chronicles has closed after 6 years, but you can keep up with me on my new blog at http://www.rheabecker.com
If you are an amateur violinist like me, it is sometimes difficult to learn how to tune your violin. It’s especially hard when the weather is very changeable because the strings react to big temperature swings, like we are experiencing now in Boston. Last night I was trying to get my strings tuned so I could practice and I was having a helluva time. I tried for about a half-hour to make it work, and still no dice. I was frustrated. I didn’t want to bother my teacher, but I thought, I will just text her. She usually says, “Come on over and I will help you,” since she lives just a block or two away in our neighborhood of Jamaica Plain.
My phone rang. She had received my desperate text. She was in Rhode Island rehearsing with an orchestra for a performance and had just a few minutes, but wanted to help me. I idly plucked my A string, which was the most difficult one to tune. She immediately said, “That’s a C.” I have an electronic tuner and I watched as it registered “C.” She was right! Then she listened as she told me to loosen the string, tighten the fine tune, etc., etc. “That’s a B.” “You are very close.” She gave me more instruction. “There, that’s A.” She did it all by phone. She’s a genius. I was blown away. She suggested that this scenario of tuning-by-phone could make a great commercial for AT&T, and I agreed. Then I happily got off the phone and proceeded to massacre Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto 1.
April 14th, 2011 at 11:40 am
Rhea, I don’t get it. I mean, I get the appreciation for your teacher, but if you have an electronic tuner, why did you need to call her?
(Saw this over at U-Hub, and came over to offer the suggestion that you invest in an electronic tuner, thus my puzzlement!)
April 14th, 2011 at 11:59 am
Learning when to loosen the peg and how much and how much to use the fine-tuning screw is the trick to even getting in the ballpark of the right note.
April 16th, 2011 at 7:17 pm
It does take awhile. And it’s hard if your strings have gotten loose due to weather or if you are like I was and only had a fine tuning screw on my E string (that has been changed). I also had a hard time with the pegs not wanting to stay put so the man that I bought my instrument from took out the pegs and put some sort of powder on them and restrung my instrument. This was about 2 years ago and knock on wood everything still works well.