(1) Can you do something of the sort artificially? For instance, by letting the violin rest out of its case in a room where other music is being played, or by playing music with headphones through its f-holes?
(2) If that's true, would putting a violin under different kind of frequencies make it develop different sound characteristics? (Would putting it under cello music make it darker than doing so with brilliant violin music?)
(3) And again, if #1 is true, would those 'changes' be permanent or would they be reversed some time after the sound stimuli cease?
Thank you!
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Give a violin to 10 players, and half will say it's responsive and half will say it's hard to play. Half will call it bright, and half will call it dark. It will depend on what they're used to.
Even luthiers are not immune to their own expectation bias: I'd estimate that just about every time a luthier adjusted my soundpost, they said "now it sounds better" even when it sounded the same or worse to me.
It's not just hard to be scientific about violin tone...it's practically impossible.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CH0A-TRdjM
I find that after an initial break in period, it's probably the player getting to know the instrument that makes it sound better.
I read somewhere that subjecting a violin to variable humidity can improve its tone (i.e., keep it in the bathroom while you take a hot shower). I actually tried this too. I don't know if it helped, but it didn't hurt.
Try bridges of different mass. Heavier will suppress higher frequencies, lighter will pass them to the violin body and everyone's ears.
Moving the soundpost further from the bridge and/or in the direction away from the edge will decrease high frequencies and emphasize the low.
Different strings can make a big difference. So can different rosin. So can a different bow.
If everything fails, get your ears examined and learn what you do hear in different frequency ranges. With this hearing test ( https://hearingtest.online/ ) and an over-the-ears headset you can do it yourself.
Get a hearing aid. The prices are coming down.
I have done all of these things. But the story is too long and involved to tell - and not worth a book.
So I had my more mellow violin.
A very few years later I heard that violin on a video local TV had made of our performance of Schubert's Trout Quintet and I did not like it - just too weak. By this time I had established a relationship with the maker of violin#2, who had appraised all my instruments and bows. I visited him and asked him about changing the tone of violin#1 so it would not be so bright. He said he could regraduate it so I left it with him. I saw him again about 6 months later and he had not done any work on it and told me to just keep playing it and in another couple of hundred years it would be just right (something about the vibrations eating away the wood between the nodes). But, before I took it home he handed me a François-Louis Pique violin he was trying to sell for $5,000 (recent auction prices have gone almost as high as $90,000) and it was just a bright as mine (not the one he had made). So I took mine back home, unchanged. (He said Heifetz's assistant at the time, Claire Hodgkins, had expressed interest in it.)
About 10 years later a friend of mine had taken up violin making as a hobby and about 7 years later I bought one of his violins. I asked him about regraduating my violin#1 and he did. It did take some of the penetrating sound from it. After checking all my instruments about 20 years ago and installing new bridges and soundposts on most, Jay Ifshin said violin#1 was my best violin.
I don't know (it is certainly my prettiest) but that's the story and possibly the hardest way to change a violin's sound.
It's my experience that violins definitely change with playing, sometimes dramatically, sometimes not so much, and it doesn't stick if an instrument isn't exercised. There are a number of artificial "activators", and I have tried several, but haven't been impressed. Not only does the instrument have to move a lot--more than most of the devices I've seen cause, but it has to be consistent input in the desired direction--just randomly shaking the violin doesn't do it the same.
If the OP is looking for his violin to sound better, the quickest path is a great setup and adjustment, and a good set of strings.
Although I was able to detect daily changes due to temperature swings between night and day, I did NOT detect any changes due to any vibrations. So for me, the answer to the original question is NO. Play-in remains in the subjective camp, and thus far has resisted any objective means to detect it... so you can decide for yourself what that means.
I don't think there's any question that violins change, but I continue to question whether playing or vibration are involved in these changes.
Here's one "playing in" study:
https://newt.phys.unsw.edu.au/jw/powerhousetwins.html
I'm trying to tame a pretty "piercing" and loud violin. It's almost painful to play under the ear. I'm shopping for instruments as well but I do love something about this violin, I just wish it was a little more "chill".
Andrew Victor: Thank you for your suggestions and for taking the time and sharing your story. I enjoyed reading through it. And I agree that there are easier (and faster) methods for changing the sound of a violin.
And a complete, necessary, job may well cost beyond what a player is willing to risk without knowing whether the results will be something they themselves like. That's the advantage of being a dealer who can fix the instruments and then look for a home for them. But the improvements are real.
Its sound improved a LOT over the years. It can be the break in, or my change in set up. I have replaced all of its original boxwood (looks like it) fittings to ebony, and remove all The fine tuners including the E after I installed Wittner fine Tuning pegs. Now it’s really good : very responsive, powerful, very rich in overtone. Sounds like some 20,000 dollars Italian (I’m serious!) I had a chance to show the violin to its staff, by comparison and they all agree that their stocks are nothing like this. I think that Chinese workshop don’t make good violin anymore.
The limiting factor has always been my skill.
Horace: I own a Yamaha V5 violin made in China. I've thought of getting rid of two or three fine tuners. It's slightly harsh. But maybe I'll try to change its fittings to see how does the sound change. I'm curious now.
Thank you everyone.
Sometime last year I began missing the original Stuber chinrests I had used previously for 40 years so (considering the design of the Resonation Chinrests) I tried replacing the cork on my old (original) chinrests with 2mm thick rubber "tape" (with adhesive on the chinrest side) and got the same improvement. I had reasoned that replacing the cork with rubber provided more isolation of the chinrest mass from the violin corpus allowing it to vibrate more freely. It was just as effective as switching to the "Resonation" had been.
Also (for those who don't know) using 4 (add-on) fine tuners on the tailpiece is a sure tone changer (usually negative). However, tailpieces with built-in fine tuners can help produce the same tone as bare wooden tailpieces (other factors - such as total mass - being the same). I replaced all my bare tailpieces with Bois d'Harmonie tailpieces 15 years ago with no negative sonic effects - but I would have just switched to internally geared pegs at the time if I had known they existed (if they did).
These are two things one can do to change change the sound of a violin.
One other thing is to try a differently-mounted chinrest. If you have a center-mounted chinrest, try testing a left-mounted one - and vice versa. I certainly noticed differences when I was testing for them about 35 years ago.
As far as what your instrument "really" sounds like - you never really know. If you only hear it under your chin you only know how it sounds under your chin when you play it. If someone else plays it for you you know what it sounds like not under you chin when that person plays it. If you can learn to play it in "cello position" you can learn a little more about its sound, especially if you are testing modifications you are making.
For me, I have almost always been most concerned about what my instruments sound like to me and I want to be able to hear myself when playing in an orchestra - no matter how loud the noise around me. But when I had to play a solo I really did care about what other people heard and I doubt that you ever really can know without very expensive audio equipment.
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I tried one of these once. I did a before and after with some violins. It was hard to say but I think it took the edge off a newer violin slightly. A lot of that is perception, mood and placement of microphones! Hard to be scientific about it.