Violin colors...?

June 27, 2012 at 05:03 AM · I don't know whether the colour changes the sound at all but these violins are the worst kind of cheap VSO. I expect all the colours will sound as bad as each other including the varnished violins in the range.

For a little more money, one can directly import, a much better violin directly from China. Look up Yitamusic on this site's search engine.

Cheers Carlo

June 27, 2012 at 05:22 AM · Yes, any paint on the violin will affect the sound. I noticed that when I was playing guitar the type of finish would change the sound even on a solid body electric instrument. The changes would be even more obvious on an acoustic instrument like the violin.

As has been pointed out, these coloured violins are usually the worst violins you could possibly buy...stay away !

June 27, 2012 at 01:17 PM · THEY ARE BAD! besides the instrument being poorly made, with cheap wood, but remember with a violin that the wood vibrates. Imagine if a someone painted a drum head purple. The paint prevents the instrument to vibrate correctly.

June 27, 2012 at 11:04 PM · ALL violins have several layers of stains and varnishes on them. A blue or purple stain won't do anything to the wood that a brown, gold, or red stain wouldn't do as well. (I've never looked at one of these instruments up close, but I have little doubt that the color comes from a stain and not paint.) If the sound is awful, don't blame the color.

June 28, 2012 at 03:12 AM · I haven't seen any that uses colored varnish. They are all painted with... well... paint.

From working in a music store, and as a teacher in schools I have seen quite a few of these colored instruments. Non of them are of good quality, they are bad instruments coated in paint, and every student who had one became more discouraged playing it in the end.

June 28, 2012 at 03:56 AM · People will often call opaque finishes "paint" and transparent ones "varnish" but in fact there can be little difference between them. Any violin varnish can be made to be opaque rather easily and in any color desired. It's much more difficult to make transparent colored varnishes that will allow the wood's grain to be seen.

This is not to say that a purple ebay violin is going to be something worth playing, but that a good violinmaker could make a purple violin that would sound equal to a traditionally colored one. Cheers,

June 28, 2012 at 04:50 AM · One thing about a solid color finish; it can be used to mask bad wood, patches, filler, etc.I'll bet you could even use plywood!

June 28, 2012 at 02:16 PM · Good to know! And I was reading a description of a violin for sale online and it said it was made of "pressed wood". So I know there are probably some "violins" out there that are just eye candy and not playable. :) I'll stick to handmade.

June 28, 2012 at 03:06 PM · I used to have a painted violin. It was terrible. Its story is interesting though.

It was a day before my birthday and I was riding in a cab, heading to my violin class. My teacher had temporarily given his extremely amazing violin to me. It was made in Czech and its size was 7/8 which was quite rare. Anyway, I got out of the cab and realized that I had left the violin in it...

I told my teacher about it and since he was really pissed at me he gave me this green, sparkly violin and said: Here's your birthday present!

The violin pretty much sucked. It didn't even look like a violin... I just can't describe how terrible it was!

I just kept it for a week...

June 28, 2012 at 03:23 PM · Here's a link to a green varnish - just to look at.

I don't like it myself...but it does show off the wood grain...

http://www.fiddleheads.ca/shop/violin_photos/new/chinese/aurora/green_2011-1.htm