Home is the sailor...

 We've returned to Nuova Lazio.

Though it was nice to spend a night in Wellington.

It's good to see Peter and Robert (two little known bloggers) enjoying this blog in my absence.

Yesterday I watched a couple of videos about playing the violin without a shoulder rest. The first featured Yehudi Menuhin and the other featured another much younger bloke. 

There are lots of different views on how to approach the violin. There are those who hold it up with the thumb and those who use a shoulder rest and hold it with the chin. There is also the problem of which way the violin should point. I've decided to stay with the approach I have been using - no shoulder rest and violin basically facing straight ahead.

There are also violinists who spend their lives playing music written by other people and playing it virtually note for note. The other group of violinists like to make shit up.

Of course, the people who like to make shit up often use the tunes that other people have written. These violinists might be folk musicians, or bluegrass musicians, or rock musicians, or musicians from another culture or jazz musicians. Their 'rules' for making shit up might differ considerably between different groups. A lot of folk musicians like to use what Jerry Coker called Harmonic Approximation. Jazz musicians, on the other hand, explore lots of different note combinations - for example, the #11 is a very popular note. Though obviously there is a lot more to it than that. Bluegrass musicians have developed some unique ways of playing and some neat bowing styles - Hokum bowing and the Nashville shuffle are two.

Well, that's enough for today. I'll pop across and see if The Music Curmudgeon has written anything*.

Bye.

* Spoiler Alert: I've already looked.