Violin Forum/Message Board

[John Cadd]

In an ebay photo of a violin the bridge was way higher than normal. The sellers grandmother had played many years ago. The bridge was still in place. If her hands were small maybe the adjustment suited her hands. Tone is one thing ,but reaching the notes to play in tune is another . So how far up the violin is it possible to put a bridge ? I had an impression in an old film from a Russian Violin School that a young player`s bridge had migrated too far north .

[John Cadd]

[quote="John Cadd"]In an ebay photo of a violin the bridge position (closer to the fingerboard )was way higher than normal. The seller`s grandmother had played many years ago. The bridge was still in place. If her hands were small maybe the adjustment suited her hands. Tone is one thing ,but reaching the notes to play in tune is another . So how far up the violin is it possible to put a bridge ? I had an impression in an old film from a Russian Violin School that a young player`s bridge had migrated too far north .[/quote]
I edited the title because it looked as if I meant the actual height of the bridge rather than the bridge position .

[Michael Darnton]

It helps if the player is deaf: moving the bridge around can affect tone quite a bit. I've seen bridges in a variety of nonconventional place, and usually the sound was better after they're put where they belong. Otherwise I guess it' a matter of whatever works. :-)
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[John Cadd]

There is a very short chat on Violinist .com where they mention moving the bridge .If the move was about one inch ,which would be useful .A new post would certainly be needed .They seemed uncertain whether the post would also have to moved at all .Pretty unlikely to work if the post was kept in position .
The bassbar (slanting inwards ) would maybe affect where the post would be exactly. Overall nobody there seemed to have tried it properly i.e by doing the correct post fitting and bridge foot work .
Volume would be reduced with less effect from soundhole cutouts to help .

[John Cadd]

Well today I decided to try the high bridge position .The feet are just shy of the upper soundhole circles . This was originally a long violin with a neck that made me stretch too far . I had already shortened the neck using the tricky joint into the pegbox . So this bridge move matched what I had done before .
The new soundpost fitted quite well .I kept to the standard gap between bridge and post . I took off some old Pirastro gut strings .They were left untouched in their packets for a long time but they sounded awful when I came to use them. The volume is lower . Still some resonance if you lift the bow off quickly .The bridge had to be cut lower as it was so near the fingerboard .
In it`s current state it suits my hand size . If I play scales from 1st position I am still in tune when I shift to third position .There is no clash there .
After my cochlear implant I have to admit the two upper strings are not sounding to me the way they used to on any violin .
I need to add that to give the report some context .But for an "ordinary" violin the bridge change is not a huge drawback . But it is possible . I had a chance to use my improvised plastic soundpost setter and that made the job much quicker .
Bow space is restricted but not impossible . I may quickly revert to the original setup after some testing .
As a builder might say; Quicker to take it apart and build it again .

[John Cadd]

One paradox about asking how high the bridge can be ; If you move the bridge so near the fingerboard it has to be substantially lowered to keep the strings playable. That must be why the volume is reduced in that position .I have not checked yet but the string angle over the bridge must be much flatter .So there is a double reason for volume reduction.Less downward pressure and less leverage onto the belly . I can`t judge what tone quality there is at present but it still plays notes and it still sounds like a violin . That was the main question .

[John Cadd]

I pinned down what is happening with my hearing today.The processor in my implant is designed for speech and if any sounds or frequencies persist for too long the processor will turn the volume right down spontaneously with me doing anything . It happens on the top two strings but not on D or G . So if I played quick Irish reels or jigs I would have no problems . Long legato notes will sound for a very short time and fade away till another note is played .How maddening is that ? The genuinely lovely people in the hospital are not familiar with musical problems with Cochlear Implants but I think I can dig through the hidden information to solve this mystery. Even the booklets and pamphlets seem to be written to contain information but not to be very clear to the actual users if they step off the beaten track.
Not particularly relevant to my bridge position but I wanted to get that info out there anyway . Non legato cochlear implants.

[John Cadd]

One of the controls for an implant is Automatic Gain Control which deals with noisy environments .One site says you can disable that ,presumably on a mobile phone.It sounds like a cure for the silent notes .
I might have mentioned this before but various violin forums with posts from about 2010 keep spouting complete garbage about what implants cannot do and how limited they are . The sad bit is these topics are then locked as if they have spoken eternal truths. Surely that needs changing .

[John Cadd]

The experiment of shifting the bridge close to the fingerboard unearthed a new fact about my cochlear implant. The sound was not (to me) anything special but the paradox was the volume through the implant was slightly more acceptable. Having tried that I moved the bridge position back (with a new bridge ) and the soundpost was again reset. The post needed no change in length. But now the volume of sound is being killed by the implant. After a few hours thought I remembered the first time I heard a violin played in the same room when I was ten years old.The volume of sound shocked me . Now looking at the implant I tnink it is being overwhelmed by the vibrations of a violin. In comparison a standard classical guitar is perfectly acceptable and normal sounding .But it`s a much quieter instrument. Strangely the implant is not affected by a piano either.
One of the implant adjustments done recently was to set high and low volume levels .The normal setting for me which probably ought to be at 5 (between 1 and 10) has worked out as 1. Most sounds over that are too loud . So a quick readjustment should help the overloaded implant.
Audiologists are generally not musicians or even technicians .Their speciality is in another level connected to speech . Maybe I can get a temporary iprovement by trying a heavy practice mute .Setting my loud /soft levels look like a promising improvement . It`s easy to get lost in all this technology and to feel abandoned . Writing out this process might help a newcomer to the chaos . Audiologist sites are pushing the idea of learning instruments to aid speech but there seems to be a gap in their understanding here .

[John Cadd]

I had a video meeting with my audiologist today and learned that my hearing is progressing quickly (3 months from switch on ) but my hearing still needs about 18 months to come back to normal . So that explains why I am not hearing the violin properly .I shifted the bridge back to it`s normal position but still had trouble hearing the sounds . I put strings back on my skeleton violin as I thought it might match what sounds I had known before . That was just as strange . The weakness of the quieter strings still was not right . The skeleton ,obviously ,was not overwhelming the implant with vibrations . So I am in a learning process . I had the feeling up till now that my hearing was just about normal . But I have a way to go yet . I also fitted a heavy metal practice mute on the violin .The sounds were thin and very pure but at least the intonation was correct . Apart from that I am becoming familiar with my plastic sound post setter .Even though it`s improvised it has a better control of the soundpost and even doubles as a post lifter if it has fallen down . To replace the traditional spike I made another tool from copper.It`s to deal with the top of the post. It has a slot to fit around the post.It can move the post inwards or outwards without losing contact. It looks a bit like a spoon with a slot cut into it sideways .
The post can be positioned very gently without any forces that would make it spring away .
For amateurs the rempval and repeated tests for a good fit become much safer (for the soundhole edges ). The post position is worked out with tape and markings on the belly surface.(felt pen on tape ).Final vertical position is checked through the end pin hole .