How and Where to Bow

Here are the few techniques to prefect bowing:

1) Have a flexible and relaxed bow hold

Bow holds can look very different. The most important thing is that you keep your fingers slightly curved and relaxed. In this way you can move along with the bow strokes to make smooth and almost silent bow changes and maintain resonance.

A good way to practice this is to simulate the movement without the bow.

2) Move your wrist and fingers while bowing

If you move your arm, you make a circle. We must compensate this circle to the straight line of the bow by moving our wrist and fingers during the bow stroke. This is one of the most difficult things about a good bowing technique: you must maintain a good bow hold and have stability in your technique, but at the same time you should move in a very relaxed way. This takes quite some practice and patience, but a gorgeous tone is a beautiful reward for all your hard work.

3) Bow absolutely straight

Lots of violinists know this, but many of them don’t bow straight even after years of playing. This can cause a lot of problems in creating a beautiful sound. They struggle through advanced bowing techniques, while the solution in their problem lies in this basic thing.