Bow Rehair

It's that time of the year again - bow rehairs.

As you know, after normal usage of the bow the hairs break and the hairs start thinning out. For me, this usually happens every 2-4 months, depending on what my repertoire is and how much I practice.

Bow rehairs usually cost me $50-$70 and unfortunately the best bow hair job I've ever gotten done was from a violin maker in Philadelphia (which is two hours from my place in Central Jersey). To be honest I've never seen rehairs like his - the hairs lasted me almost 5 months up once and I was practicing regularly (about 4-6 hours a day, in addition to rehearsals in chamber groups and orchestra). So it might be worth the two hour drive after all, but what made his jobs special were not only the thick(er) hairs he used but also the way it went all the way around the ferrule. It was stunning and I wish I took pictures of the bows but alas I took it for granted.

I'm still trying to figure out what kind of hairs he uses for the job, but I do know that the ones on my current bow are Mongolian horse hairs which, don't get me wrong, get the job done but they are so thin and if the batch is bad they start snapping and breaking immediately. And I mean immediately...I lost 5-10 hairs already within the first week.

So how do you know when to get a bow rehaired?
Well, for starters, when the bow starts looking like this:

I marked out the areas where the bow hair is supposed to be

Now before I go on I have to say that this is an INSANE amount of hair loss for a bow, and by all means get it done immediately. For some people, they never break any bow hairs, so when should they get the hair changed abd how do they know? Well, if the bow skids around on the strings then that's a sure sign. Also they would feel slightly brittle over the strings.

I looked on some forums and people said that they only rehaired every 4 years. FOUR YEARS? that's crazy! That is the craziest talk I've ever heard. People graduate high school in the span of four years! Or college. Or do something amazing in that time period.

No, I think it's important to get your bow hair changed every 2-4 months. Six months is the most. A year would be stretching it.

So there you have it. Hope this was some good information.

Above: Newly rehaired Brazilian Chagas bow (Mongolian horse hair)
Below: A neglected carbon fiber Encore Student bow

Review: Pirastro Gold Violin Rosin

Welcome! Thanks for visiting my blog. I hope you'll find this place interesting and informative and I'll try really hard not to bore anyone to death.

This post is a short review about the Pirastro Gold Rosin, which I have been using for about three years now and I'm currently on my second cake. 

First, a little bit about the Pirastro company name (yay history): according to their website they got their name from two of the business partners Gustav Pirazzi and Theodor Strobel who lived sometime around the 1890s. They came by the name of mashing up their last names and BAM "Pirastro" was born. 

As for the company itself, they manufacture many different lines of strings, from gut strings to synthetic to steel strings. I've only used their Evah Pirazzis and their Gold Label E String (packaged with the standard GDA Thomastik Dominant set, links to amazon.com aka the amazing webstore dot com). I'll probably write a review and some thoughts about those two sets sometime in the future.


 Men and Gentleladies, may I present to you: the boxed Pirastro in all of its boxed glory:

The rosin out of its natural habitat:

Actually the cake is supposed to be a lot taller...I forgot to mention these shots are of my rosin that are over four months old, which also explains the wear around the sides.

What I really like about this particular rosin is the way it grips the string without letting my bow feel too "stuck" as I bow along. I also find it easier to do some fancyshmancy passages when I have a fully haired bow and this rosin smothered all over it. It's quite different than the Liebenzeller Gold cake (I don't use it as much, but I'll probably cover along the way sometime in the future) and it seems to help my violin project more. In addition, the Pirastro Gold rosin stays on my bow for a long time...and by that I mean sometimes I can go for 8-20 playing hours without applying more rosin. Which is a good thing, because if I forget to rosin my bow sometimes it's still playable.
There are some cons (depending on your sound preference): the rosin can cause my bow to give a more scratchy/grating sound, and it also leaves a lot of dust behind. The flecks are fine (like powder) and can really create an ugly white blanket under the strings (as opposed to the Liebenzeller). Also! It turns the bow hairs yellow tint (surprise, now you know what the "gold" stands for).

In the end, it's a good purchase for $10-15. One cake lasted me a good two years with normal use and as I mentioned before, I'm already on my second cake. 

Links:
Amazon
Shar Music