Firstly, since these strange things use guitar tuning, 5 steps between strings instead of the violin families traditional 7 steps between strings, are they really to be considered as being in the violin family at all or are they simply exotic guitars, meant to be bowed instead of picked it?
And these Vipers have frets. With violins, which are fretless of course, the violin player warms up for a few minutes and then knows where all the strings are and can land his notes with absolute precision. Besides, the strings don’t change from day to day, and the Notes are always in the same place as they were before. There should be no trouble finding them again after one has done just a little bit of violin practice. So why would anybody need frets? Well, frets are for guitar players who have never learned to listen to what they are doing. They play the chords that they have learned – chords they find in books, or chords their friends teach them. So without frets – designated places to preposition their fingers – well, they’re completely lost on the violin.
So the Vipers are NOT violins at all – they are guitars sold with bows instead of picks. The Guitar Players who buy them can hope to simply do their usual chording and try to get away with it, along with co-opting the credit for having learned to play the violin, which they haven’t done at all… they’re still just memorizing chords and applying the same old fingering charts. These transplanted Guitar Players don’t deserve to use a Bow. A bow is for Violin Players… that is, musicians who hear what they play and can play what they hear… without having to consult some chart or other.
Oh, and the practical problem arises of what the heck do you do when you break a string on one of these Vipers. These Exotic ‘Violins’ have no support and infrastructure behind them. Even on the Websites that sell these monstrosities, there is no a mention at all of Strings – brand names, types, costs, venders… nothing. I guess if you ever break a sting you need to buy a whole new Viper.
Oh, and there is the Number of Strings thing. You know, more strings is not necessarily better. On the traditional violins, violas, cellos, etc. with their four strings, there is plenty of arc on the bridge between strings, meaning that with just a bit of bow control, the violinist, can easily play on just a single string at a time… to feel out a new song and work out a melody. But if you add strings to the limited curve of the bridge, then the degree of arc between the strings is greatly reduced – flattened – meaning that it is extremely difficult for the bow not to scrub more than one string at a time. In real world playing sometimes single notes need to be struck and held, or used in melodic transitions and riffs. But with the overcrowded bridge of the Viper, with six and seven strings, instead of the optimum four, well, with any pressure on the bow, no single string between any two others can be rung without accidentally buzzing the one or the other on either side. These Vipers must sound sloppy as hell, when they are played like real violins.
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2 comments:
Having held one I see a lot of problems in your inquiry of the instrument. First off the viper is designed for both standard violin tuning and can handle standard guitar tuning as well. Second the arc on the bridge is the same of that on a cello making the string separation suitable for walk downs that previously weren't possible. Third the frets aren't your standard guitar frets that stick out of the finger board so traditional finger play still happens like on the violin. Finally the issue of string replacement is you must buy the strings from the company for the six and seven string model which is a bit of a down side but with the five and four string models you can buy the strings for a violin and or viola as need be from any preferred string maker as desired. A plus to the viper is the fact it was designed for violinist who have sustained neck injuries that prevent playing of the traditional violin, which believe it or not is something of a possibility that struck Mark several years back and drove him to design the instrument. The only real down side to the instrument is that it's a purely electric instrument and you must use an amplifier to hear it. It's an interesting instrument to play and one must at the least try it before commenting about it.
Having held one I see a lot of problems in your inquiry of the instrument. First off the viper is designed for both standard violin tuning and can handle standard guitar tuning as well. Second the arc on the bridge is the same of that on a cello making the string separation suitable for walk downs that previously weren't possible. Third the frets aren't your standard guitar frets that stick out of the finger board so traditional finger play still happens like on the violin. Finally the issue of string replacement is you must buy the strings from the company for the six and seven string model which is a bit of a down side but with the five and four string models you can buy the strings for a violin and or viola as need be from any preferred string maker as desired. A plus to the viper is the fact it was designed for violinist who have sustained neck injuries that prevent playing of the traditional violin, which believe it or not is something of a possibility that struck Mark several years back and drove him to design the instrument. The only real down side to the instrument is that it's a purely electric instrument and you must use an amplifier to hear it. It's an interesting instrument to play and one must at the least try it before commenting about it.
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