Electric Violins
The electric violin has become a very popular instrument in recent years as it has been featured highly in the media. Electric instruments have increased in popularity since the creation of talent shows such as Britain’s Got Talent and America’s Got Talent. The string quartet Escala who featured on Britain’s Got Talent a few years ago started out on acoustic instruments and swapped to electric instruments when they went on the television.
Electric violins often look different to acoustic violins, an acoustic violin has a whole body but electric violins don’t need a body in which the sound will resonate because they’re electric and the sound is created by electricity. Because of this electric violins can have lots of different shapes. They also come in lots of different colours. Many electric violins have a lot of the body cut away and only the essential parts remaining like the scroll, fingerboard, chin rest and tailpiece.
Electric violins also have to be plugged into an amplifier to make a decent sound. Some electric violins have batteries as well. Electric violins can be bought from only a few hundred dollars to many hundreds of dollars. Ebay is a good place to buy a first time electric violin as you can get them fairly cheaply, even if they aren’t very good quality, they are a good starting point. These violins however are hard to amplify and often have a grainy tone.
MIDI violins are also increasing in popularity, they have the same concept as MIDI keyboards. They can be plugged into a computer and when played the notes come up on the computer programme you are using. Useful music software to use with MIDI violins includes Sibelius and Cubase.
A brief history of the electric violin
People started making and playing electrically amplified violins as early as 1920 in jazz music. The blues musician Stuff Smith was the first musician to put an amplifier on a violin and to adapt pickups to fit onto it. In the 1930s and 1940s a company called The Electro Strings Instrument Corporation started to sell electric violins and the popular electric instrument supplier Fender started to make electric violins in the later 1950s. Fender are now one of the best selling electric violin suppliers in the world. Another popular brand of electric violins are Stagg who have also made drum kits in the past. Yamaha, who also make acoustic violins make electric violins too.