Violin

a well known stringed musical instrument. It consists of a resonant box or body, a neck, a bridge, pegs, four catgut strings, and a bow. The largest string is wound with fine silver-coated copper wire. The origin of the violin is credited to India, where mendicant monks still beg from house to house with an exceedingly primitive instrument regarded as the ancestor of the Italian violin. The violin of India is reputed to be several thousand years old. The Italian violin was brought to perfection by Stradivarius, a violin maker of Cremona, who lived 1644-1737. The utmost that can be done today is to imitate a Stradivarius. The violin bow was originally a slender piece of bamboo bent after the fashion of an archer's bow. The spring of the bamboo kept the hair taut, hence the name bow. Tourte, a Frenchman (1747-1835), is credited with bringing the modern bow to perfection. He decided that Brazil wood gives the greatest degree of lightness, spring, and flexibility. He decided upon the exact length of the bow, seventy-five centimeters, and the curve to be desired. He contrived the method now in use for holding the hairs flat.

The Chinese use an odd instrument which has all the parts of the violin save the resonant box. A cut of the affair looks something like a smoker's corncob pipe on a large scale. A section of bamboo supplies the part corresponding to the bowl of the pipe, and a wooden stick takes the place of the stem. Two strings are stretched from the bowl-like head to two pegs in the far end of the stem. The hair of the bow is carried between the two strings instead of above both. This Chinese instrument is "sometimes atrocious, but not discordant."

The merely scientific principles of the violin are easily stated. The violin is played in accordance with the laws of vibrating strings. The four strings vary in weight. The right tension is secured by twisting the pegs. The bow, rubbed with rosin, grips the string with either an up or a down movement and sets it in vibration. The four strings at full length give four fixed tones and no others, but by using the fingers of the left hand to press down the strings upon the neck of the instrument any string may be shortened and its tone raised, the number and nature of the variations being limited only by the capacity of the performer. Harmonics may be produced by touching, not pressing, the strings at natural nodes. The violin is unquestionably the most human of all instruments. It can be made to sing, to laugh, to weep, or to scream--to express any emotion not absolutely requiring articulate speech.