At the beginning it is complicated and it is usually the teacher who is responsible for tuning our violin, and if we lose this tuning , we must wait until the next class to properly calibrate our instrument.
This can affect violin practice and hinder learning a bit; However, learning to tune the violin is a skill that eventually every musician must develop. There are various methods and instruments to tune the violin. Next, we will talk about them.
The kinds of violin tuners that exist :
The fingerboard: the classic tuner
Tuning through the use of tuning fork is one of the oldest and most practical methods: so much so that today it is still used by a large number of musicians.
It is a small metal device that, when struck, vibrates at the frequency of La, at 440 MHz .
One of the most common methods is to hit it directly on the knee or some other part of the body and then support the metal spherical of one of the ends of the fingerboard on the violin cover: this way we will be able to perceive the sound emitted by the fretboard.
Other musicians choose to simply bring it closer to their ear or use their mouth as a sounding board, supporting the fingerboard sphere on their teeth. Using the sound of the pitch as a reference the string is tuned the violin, and from this, other.
The other type of tuners for violin are the digital tuners. These are very useful and practical instruments that vary greatly in their presentation.
- Some of these tuning devices simply detect a portion of the scale or simply a single tone, and from this, signal whether it is necessary to fine tune or not.
- There are also more complex and functional, with tuners that show the chromatic scale (or dodecaphone scale ) and allow you to calibrate different settings for tuning.
In addition, there are also web tuners : Internet portals that, through the microphone, help to tune the violin.
These are very similar to mobile applications that have gained popularity lately. However, these tuners can be somewhat inaccurate.
If you are starting to play the violin, always ask your teacher for help if you need to tune.