No rosin for me thanks.

What a coincidence. Whenever I take a bowed solo, I get that same suggestion from at least four or five people.

 

In the last year I've come to like the sound this gets:
Less rosin.
Slightly looser bow hair, to get a bit more contact with the strings.
Oliv strings.
It's warmer. I hate to "hear the rosin".
This demands accurate bow angles. I'm the king of unintended double stops.

 

well, you can play without rosin, and you can playin _without_ rosin.

i think what you are trying it not applying rosin anymore (correct me if im wrong)

which is completely different from using a bow with clean hair (you wont even get a sound there)

Chad

 

Try bowing an EUB! Ive been fighting with my NS for a year now (you can hear it on www.myspace.com/piano1 in both tracks) and wow it doesnt like mistakes

Permanent right angles with just the right lean oor it squeals at me! Youd have thought a bodyless bass would have been more caring past the octave too....dont get me wrong, i love it but yeesh I miss the days when slightly off bow angles didnt sound like blackboard and chalk!

Rosin! as much as my hairs can physically handle!

 

You dudes are such jazzers... (no disrespect, more envy)

I've had this problem with lower-end bows. If you get a well-made bow with good hair on it, all you hear is gold.

 

Trust me on this: a Sue Lipkins bow is not low-end.
My observation still holds.

 

I haven't put rosin on my bow for about a month now, still going strong.

 

Just curious. Have you been using a rosinless approach in orchestra?

 

I've been thinking about taking it a step further and playing without the hair as well. Just rubbing the stick on the string.

 

wow.yeah but the airbow is the way to go.

 

I have a fantastic Bultitude with old black hair. Sounds like 'white' gold. I have an Eibert Bow with old hair and maybe 80% of the strands.. Sounds great as well. It's the Stick that makes the Bow and not the Hair. Good hair will bring out the best in any bow but bad hair cannot kill a great bow by any means.

By the way, I have a Sue Lipkins Bow here that i am looking at and it's first one I actually have played. WHAT a SOUND it has. Gives my Bultitude 'stiff' competition. I have a Lipkins Bow on order now for a year. If I end up buying this other one in my hands now, I will have two (2) of them because I will NOT cancel my order. These bows are just TOO good to pass on. The Hair on the Lipkins Bow is amongst the best I have ever seen. Rather, I have never seen a better 'hair job' before.

 

I trust you on that sir, but keep in mind the stamp on the bow doesn't make it an excellent stick. There will always be good and bad ones...

 

I disagree. When you are dealing with high end single worker production where the goal is to be timeless and outstanding, quality control is at it's highest potential. I don't know her, (and thus could be wrong) but like others working to that standard, my guess is that things that don't make the grade never cross the shop threshold and see the light of day.

 

I'm pretty sure this depends on what strings you use - look in the EUB forum for a discussion of this...the NS stock strings are very poor for Arco.

 

I know what I have.

 

I've tried this a few times with my old cheap bow, sounds eery and thin.

 

The thing I've realized is that rehairs need to happen more frequently. I was always told that you need to do it when most of the hairs have popped off, but really it's when they've died of overrosinization.

Less is more. When you get a rehair, only put three or four strokes on to get it going. Then every time you need more rosin, only put a couple swipes on. You don't have to use half a cake in one sitting.

 

I use a lot of rosin and only get my bow rehaired when it loses too much hair. I get exactly the tone that I want everytime.