10 Years on Violinist.com

March 22, 2022, 2:45 PM · Today, March 22nd, 2022, marks the 10-year anniversary of my personal time blogging on this website! It has been a wild ride and I've had plenty of topics to share! From my favorite classical composers and pieces to my favorite film and game soundtracks, and various topics surrounding the violin and a musician's place in the world, I've really enjoyed writing on here and keeping a record of my love and passion for the instrument(s) we all love. I know a lot of you have been on here for much longer, maybe even since the beginning!! - but for me, this date is a special one and I wanted to do a quick post about it.

Rather than dig back through my articles on the site as a retrospective, I'd rather talk about what the site has meant to me over the years. I discovered it in late-February 2012. As a kid, I went through obsession phases where I just poured everything into a single game or project. One evening, I looked over at my violin and realized it could be that something I "obsessed" over, just like my favorite Mario games like Super Mario Galaxy 2 at that time. I uploaded a few videos on my YouTube channel of me playing random pieces on the violin, including an early composition of mine. At some point I must've Googled "violin" and this site came up, and I knew I had to create an account and use it as my "violin journal" of sorts. I was still in high school at the time, preparing for my freshman spring concert, and that was one of my first topics. From there, I just kept writing about things related to my musical life, and I suppose the rest is history.

I'd like to think my blogging style matured over the years, just as my violin-playing and composing have done. Not sure if that's true or not; but regardless, having this site as a place to read about the violin always kept me excited to play it. It's been a nice platform to share projects I've worked on, especially if there are original compositions I'm playing myself for recitals. (I am currently working up to recording an original Violin Sonata I wrote over Christmas and I will surely share more of in the future!) Most of all, of course, I've been able to join in the v.com community, with Laurie's Weekend Votes, and read other articles about playing techniques or news or new album releases to listen to. It's a site to help me connect with other musicians and for us all to share topics around something we're all passionate about, and that's the reason I absolutely love it. Thanks for everything Laurie! :)

Just because 2012 is a year I associate with the start of my passion for music, I think that's why finding this website is such a landmark for my life. I really started composing a lot more music in 2011-2012; started uploading violin videos (and continue to do so today!), and now, music is where I'm planning my career in. It's become everything to me. I can't wait to see where we all end up throughout this next decade as musicians - hopefully I'll have started some sort of music career!

So yeah! I don't know if it's been obvious or not, but I'm trying to do at least one post a month, so I can keep my blog page looking organized, haha! I can't wait to continue to post about some future projects. I've also started teaching violin - I have two students so far, and I'd like to chat a bit about my experiences and what I've learned through that. Otherwise, hope you have a lovely rest of your day!

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Laurie Niles

March 23, 2022 at 06:34 AM · Hi Joshua, I’m so happy that Violinist.com has helped fan your enthusiasm for the violin and for music in general! Congratulations on your 10-year V.com anniversary, and thank you for sharing your thoughts and ideas with us along the way. Hope to see you around here for many more years to come!

Joshua Iyer

March 23, 2022 at 09:15 PM · Thank you so much Laurie!

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10 Years on Violinist.com

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