The Violin is my Singing Voice
Welcome to my first Blog ever! I’m not sure yet what I’m doing with this blog stuff, so bear with me as I learn how to do this!
For those of you who love violin music, or who are simply fans of my recordings, I thought I’d give you a brief version of my philosopy of violin playing.
For me, the violin is an extension of the singing voice. Indeed, the violin seems to be planted in, and grow right out of, the players throat when he plays. (The “butt” of the violin rests against the player’s neck.)
The vibrating violin strings, which are stretched and suspended over the top of the instrument, are like vocal chords. The main body of the instrument, with it’s lovely feminine curves, functions as a voice box. The violin bow, which is drawn across the strings to make them vibrate and sing a tone, is like a column of air that a singer sends across his/her vocal chords when warbling some lovely note.
When I’m not playing a lot of fast notes, or fiddle-like effects, I’m basically singing a melody with my instrument, and basically “speaking” to the listener and attempting to evoke emotion or mood, or engage the listener into a psychic “dialogue” with the melody. If you heard me actually sing, you would be appalled! However, when I play the violin, I can really speak to you, both to your head and heart.
On most of my CD’s, the violin is playing the kind of romantic standards and “torch” songs that are usually sung by a singer with lyrics (words). Indeed, they were written to be sung. The wonderful thing about hearing them played (beautifully) on a violin is that you can focus purely upon the beauty of the melody, and thrill to the purely vibratory nuances of the melody that lie beyond words.
Even when playing classical instrumental pieces such as “Pachelbel’s Canon in D” (from my CD’s “A Classic Christmas” and “I Do”), I still approach them as beautiful, lyrical songs and aspire to that throaty quality of an expressive singer.
OK, that’s all for now, until I think of something else to write!