Electric Violins - Features To Consider Before Buying One



by Bob Randalph


Electric violins have come down in price, at least a little. Without mortgaging the house, you can get one of your own. Once the toy of rich professional musicians, the new wave of electrified strings is ready for prime time. Lots of colors and styles are available. There is likely one for you.

Once considered a toy, just like personal computers, now the electrified stringed instrument is used more often. It travels well, amplifies for outdoor venues and the sound can be tweaked with just like the electric guitar.

The shapes of these violins might be similar to the wooden variety or something much more surreal. Because they can be formed from Lucite and high tech composites, they are more akin to modern sculpture than musical instruments.

Since violins have moved into the world of jazz and bluegrass as well as world music, they have had greater acceptance than in the past. The classical orchestra is slow to incorporate them, but soloists have made inroads in that direction.

Parents of new string players everywhere will appreciate one particular feature of electric strings. They can be silent. Plug the output into the headphones and junior hears his every note and you hear nothing at all. True bliss.

The durability and mass production of the future may make better quality instruments available for amateur enthusiasts. And while not everyone is willing to jettison the acoustic for the electric, it is much more readily accepted now.

And while the cost and perhaps lack of snob appeal are certainly drawbacks, the rest of us can see the day that junior heads toward the amplifier to practice the electric violin instead of the electric guitar.




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