I showed my new violin to Teacher at my lesson yesterday.  She played it for me (I have no ability to test an instrument), and it sounded great.  The 87 year old violin has a couple of things that need repaired, in addition to having the bow re-haired.   I’m also contemplating replacing the very old strings.  The G string in particular shows signs of age – not sure if it’s rust on the string or what, but it’s not uniform in color like the rest.  I have to think that tiny metal strings wound with tiny metal string are probably just not meant to last 60 years, even if they have been sitting new in their packages.  At the same time, there is no denying that they are capable of being tuned and of producing sound!

I’m not going to play it until I get these repairs done.  Teacher uses a guy in a near suburb, so I will probably go see him before too long.  I’m anxious to train myself on the new instrument, to make it mine, but there’s no need to be in a hurry.  I sure don’t want to further damage the instrument.

Meanwhile, back on my student rental in my lesson yesterday and for the first time, we skipped over Twinkle Twinkle and its rhythmic variations.  I still practice them, I told Teacher, but we’ve moved on to more complicated things in my lesson.  It felt like a graduation of sorts – out of preschool and into kindergarten, perhaps.  Or perhaps just off of crawling and onto wobbly baby steps.  I’m still having a blast, regardless of what I’m playing really.

Thanks for reading.

Ryan