70 Fun Facts About Violin

From lowest to highest, what are the standard notes of a violin's four strings?

The lowest string sits at G3, just below middle C, and the top E string is the one that snaps most often.

Adjacent strings on a violin are tuned what interval apart?

Guitars use fourths, but the whole violin family (except the double bass) stacks fifths, which is why one finger pattern repeats across every string.

The violin in its present form first emerged in the early 16th century in which region?

Brescia and Cremona became the first great centres, and the word itself is Italian: violino, the little viola.

Which French king ordered 24 violins from Andrea Amati in 1560?

Amati's royal set is among the earliest surviving violins anywhere; a handful of the instruments still exist in museums.

Which wood is traditionally used for the top plate (soundboard) of a violin?

The back, ribs and neck are usually maple, while ebony is saved for the fingerboard and pegs.

The small wooden dowel wedged inside a violin is also known by what evocative name?

Its position, a few millimetres one way or the other, changes the whole voice of the instrument, which is why luthiers borrowed the French word ame, soul.

Bow hair for a violin traditionally comes from the tail of which animal?

Grey male horses are preferred, and cold-climate hair from places like Mongolia grips the string best.

What do violinists rub onto their bow hair so it grips the strings?

Rosin is refined pine resin; without it a bow slides silently across the string.

The word 'violin' comes from the Italian violino, a diminutive of which word?

So a violin is literally a 'little viola', even though the viola is the one most people struggle to name.

In which Italian city did Antonio Stradivari build his instruments?

He is thought to have made around 1,116 instruments there, and roughly 650 survive, including some 500 violins.

Roughly how many Stradivari violins are estimated to survive?

Estimates run from 450 to 512 violins, plus cellos, violas and even a few guitars and harps.

Proceeds from the £10 million sale of the 1721 Lady Blunt Stradivarius went to victims of which disaster?

The Nippon Music Foundation sold it through Tarisio; the buyer has never been named.

The pristine 1716 'Messiah' Stradivarius is kept in which museum?

It is almost never played, which is exactly why it still looks close to the day it left the workshop.

The maker nicknamed 'del Gesu' earned the name because his labels always carried what?

Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesu is now rated by many as Stradivari's equal, and his instruments have a darker, stronger sound.

Paganini's beloved 'Il Cannone' was made by which family of luthiers?

A Livorno merchant lent it to the teenage Paganini and was so impressed he refused to take it back.

Niccolo Paganini was born in 1782 in which city?

His 24 Caprices remain the Everest of solo violin writing and inspired variations by Brahms, Rachmaninoff and Lutoslawski.

How many years after his 1840 death was Paganini finally interred, having been denied a Catholic burial?

Rumours of a pact with the devil and dying without last rites kept his body out of consecrated ground until 1876 in Parma.

At which Washington, D.C. Metro station did Joshua Bell busk incognito for a 2007 newspaper experiment?

He played for about 45 minutes on a Stradivarius; of 1,097 passers-by, seven stopped and one recognised him.

How much money did Joshua Bell collect from passers-by during his 45-minute subway performance?

That excludes a $20 note from the one person who recognised him; his concert tickets that week were going for around $100.

Which Washington Post writer won a Pulitzer Prize for the article about Joshua Bell's subway experiment?

'Pearls Before Breakfast' won the 2008 Pulitzer for Feature Writing.

Joshua Bell's 1713 Stradivarius was stolen twice from an earlier owner; who was that violinist?

The second thief confessed on his deathbed, and the instrument is now known as the Gibson ex Huberman.

Wallace Hartley's violin, played as the Titanic sank, sold at auction in 2013 for how much?

It was found in an attic decades later, has two large cracks and can no longer be played; it now sits in Titanic Belfast.

Which hymn is popularly said to be the last piece Titanic bandleader Wallace Hartley played?

Survivors' accounts disagree, and some remembered a waltz called 'Songe d'Automne' instead.

Vivaldi's Four Seasons were published in 1725 in which city?

They appeared as the first four of twelve concertos in Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione, each paired with a sonnet.

Unusually for the time, Vivaldi published each Four Seasons concerto together with what?

The poems, possibly Vivaldi's own, spell out the barking dogs, drunkards and icy winds that the music depicts.

Nigel Kennedy's 1989 recording of The Four Seasons sold roughly how many copies?

It made the spiky-haired Kennedy a household name in Britain and remains one of the best-selling classical records ever.

Fine violin bows have traditionally been made from which Brazilian wood?

The tree is now endangered and its export is regulated by treaty, so makers are turning to carbon fibre.

Roughly how many hairs are in a violin bow?

Turning the screw at the frog tightens the whole ribbon of hair; players loosen it again after every session.

Which French maker is credited with bringing the bow into its modern form?

Tourte's concave stick, longer and heavier at the tip, is why Romantic composers could ask for a singing sustained legato.

Who was the soloist at the unsuccessful 1806 premiere of Beethoven's Violin Concerto?

The piece languished until 1844, when the 12-year-old Joseph Joachim played it in London with Mendelssohn conducting.

Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto was first dedicated to which violinist, who declined to play it?

Adolph Brodsky finally premiered it in Vienna in 1881, where critic Eduard Hanslick wrote of music that 'stinks to the ear'.

Itzhak Perlman contracted which disease at the age of four, which is why he performs seated?

He was on The Ed Sullivan Show twice at 13 and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015.

Perlman played the violin solos on the Oscar-winning score of which 1993 film?

John Williams reportedly told Spielberg he needed a better composer for the film, and Spielberg replied that they were all dead.

Under what alias did Jascha Heifetz write a wartime hit song recorded by Bing Crosby?

'When You Make Love to Me (Don't Make Believe)' was a very long way from the Sibelius concerto he made famous.

Fiddler on the Roof is based on stories by which Yiddish writer?

Tevye the Dairyman lives in the fictional village of Anatevka around 1905, and the title nods to the paintings of Marc Chagall.

Fiddler on the Roof was the first Broadway musical to run past how many performances?

It closed after 3,242 shows and held the record until Grease overtook it.

In the Charlie Daniels Band's 'The Devil Went Down to Georgia', what prize does Johnny play for?

The 1979 single reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 1 on the country chart.

The Hardanger fiddle, with its extra sympathetic strings, is the national instrument of which country?

It carries eight or nine strings, a carved dragon or lion head, and inked 'rosing' decoration on the body.

Howard Shore made the Hardanger fiddle the voice of which people's theme in Lord of the Rings?

The horse-lords' music first appears in The Two Towers, played by Dermot Crehan.

Composer-violinist Louis Spohr invented which violin accessory around 1820?

Spohr also pioneered conducting with a baton and invented rehearsal letters in scores.

The Stroh violin, patented in 1899, replaced the wooden body with a metal horn mainly to help with what?

Ordinary violins barely registered on acoustic recording horns, so the Stroh's directional blast solved a studio problem.

Violinist Vanessa-Mae competed in alpine skiing at the 2014 Winter Olympics for which country?

She raced as Vanessa Vanakorn, using her father's surname, and finished last in the giant slalom.

Before YouTube fame, Lindsey Stirling was a 2010 quarter-finalist on which TV show?

Piers Morgan told her she was not good enough to fly through the air and play the violin at the same time; her channel now has billions of views.

In the 1998 film The Red Violin, what gives the instrument's varnish its colour?

John Corigliano's score won the Academy Award, with every solo played by Joshua Bell.

Yehudi Menuhin recorded Elgar's Violin Concerto in 1932, at 16, with whom conducting?

Menuhin later recorded with Ravi Shankar and Stephane Grappelli, and became Baron Menuhin in 1993.

Menuhin's Grammy-winning 1967 album with sitarist Ravi Shankar was called what?

It was one of the first serious East-West classical crossovers, years before that became a genre.

Tartini's Violin Sonata in G minor is better known by what nickname, after a dream he described?

Tartini said the devil played it to him in a dream in 1713, though it was probably written decades later and only published after his death.

Beginners in the Suzuki method start with variations on which tune?

Shinichi Suzuki's 'mother-tongue' approach starts children at three to five, learning by ear before reading notes.

Which instrument does the concertmaster call on to sound the A when tuning the orchestra?

The concertmaster leads the first violins from the 'first chair' at the conductor's left; in Britain the job is simply called the leader.

Mendelssohn wrote his E minor Violin Concerto for Ferdinand David, concertmaster of which orchestra?

It broke with tradition by letting the soloist enter almost immediately and running its three movements without a break.

Berg's Violin Concerto is 'To the memory of an angel'; the angel was the daughter of which couple?

Manon Gropius died at 18; Berg set aside his opera Lulu to write the piece and it turned out to be his last completed work.

Who conducted the 1905 premiere of the revised version of Sibelius's Violin Concerto?

The 1904 Helsinki premiere had been a disaster; Sibelius, a frustrated violinist himself, cut and rewrote it into his only concerto.

Traditional 'catgut' violin strings are actually made from the intestines of which animal?

The name probably comes from 'kit', an old word for a fiddle, that got confused with a kitten.

How is a viola tuned relative to a violin?

Its strings are C, G, D, A, its body is up to 10 cm longer, and it reads from the alto clef almost nobody else uses.

In 1935 Fritz Kreisler admitted what about pieces he had credited to Pugnani, Tartini and Vivaldi?

His response to outraged critics: 'The name changes, the value remains.'

Since violins did not exist, which instrument is Nero said to have played while Rome burned?

Tacitus places Nero at Antium when the fire began, so the whole 'fiddling' story is probably Flavian propaganda.

Stephane Grappelli co-founded the Quintette du Hot Club de France in 1934 with which guitarist?

It was one of the first all-string jazz bands, and Grappelli, largely self-taught, kept touring into his eighties.

Andre Rieu tours the world's stadiums with an orchestra named after which composer?

Rieu founded the Johann Strauss Orchestra in his home town of Maastricht in 1987 and plays a 1667 Stradivarius.

Bach's celebrated solo Chaconne is the final movement of which work?

Menuhin called it the greatest structure for solo violin that exists; Brahms arranged it for piano left hand alone.

Vaughan Williams wrote The Lark Ascending for which British violinist?

Hall, a former Elgar pupil, gave both premieres: with piano in 1920 and with orchestra at the Queen's Hall in 1921.

Jascha Heifetz preferred a 1742 del Gesu violin known by what name, now kept in a San Francisco museum?

He kept it until his death; it now lives at the Legion of Honor museum, where it is still occasionally played.

One of the earliest explicit descriptions of the violin and its tuning appeared in 1556 in which work?

Jambe de Fer published it in Lyon, a generation after the first three-stringed violins were painted in northern Italy around 1530.

Which Austrian luthier is ranked alongside the great Cremonese and Brescian families by collectors?

Mass-produced 'trade violins' later poured out of cottage industries in Saxony, Bohemia and Mirecourt.

Why do luthiers glue most violin joints with animal hide glue rather than modern white glue?

Because fresh hide glue sticks to old hide glue, repairs can be made without scraping away original wood.

Which wood is preferred for a violin's fingerboard because of its hardness and resistance to wear?

Cheaper instruments often use other woods stained or painted black, while the neck itself is usually flamed maple.

What is the smallest fractional violin size mentioned for young players?

Fractions are not literal proportions: a 3/4 violin is not three-quarters the length of a full-size one.

What nickname is given to the slightly shorter 7/8-size instrument sometimes used by small adults?

They tend to be high-quality instruments with a sound comparable to fine full-size violins.

What is generally considered the maximum practical number of strings on a bowed violin?

With more, an inner string could not be bowed on its own; extra strings are usually tuned below the G, to C, F and B-flat.

Bow hair is traditionally taken from the tail of what kind of horse?

Grey males have predominantly white hair; cheaper bows use synthetic fibre, and some modern sticks are carbon fibre.

Which showpiece by Vittorio Monti contains an entire section played in artificial harmonics?

Tchaikovsky's concerto and Paganini's first concerto also demand virtuoso harmonic passages.