FREE VIDEO LESSONS
Check out the free lessons below to get a glimpse of my teaching
Bowing Exercises
Outlining chord changes
Should Violinists learn chords?
Scale and chord warm up
Bowing for classical and folk players
Grappelli Licks
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Scale Exercise
Its super difficult to get a good swing feel with a bow, there are so many different ways of doing it and achieving a swing feel that is personal to you. One of the ways is through slurring! Its natural for us to bow ON beats 1 2 3 and 4 and it can feel unnatural to bow against this (OFF beat)
Firstly try this....
This is my favourite scale exercise and can be a vehicle to practise so many different things.
It is a way of playing through the whole of a scale starting from each scale tone. It starts on the root, goes all the way up to its octave then back down until it starts on the second note of the scale (in this instance, the A) and so on and so on...
Play it with the metronome on 2 + 4 and dont worry about "swinging" the quavers, don't try to play anything dotted just play them straight.
Things to try
Jazz Bowing Exercise
go as far up the g major scale as possible in first position using this pattern(hear that done in the clip above), then try it with the slurring pattern mentioned below.
When getting to grips with this bowing pattern, again try to keep your quavers quite straight but make sure you emphasise the notes that have accents. That is a better way to create a nice off beat swing feel, rather than over swinging the quavers. Have a listen to me having a go below...
