How to make violin sound "fuller"?

[Marty Kasprzyk]

1 hour ago, Andreas Preuss said:

What is ‘RR’?

RR=c/p     where c is the wood's speed of sound and p is its density. 

[Don Noon]

Yes, RR=radiation ratio = speed of sound / density.  The RR lines on the graph are not mathematically rigorous, but I made an approximation.  You really can't tell for sure what the RR of the wood is, just based on weight and M5 taptone, as size, arching, crossgrain stiffness, and graduation pattern are all factors too (my smaller model plates show super-high RR).

[LCF]

2 hours ago, Andreas Preuss said:

What is ‘RR’?

The 2006 paper by Curtin that Marty linked earlier has some detail about this. 

[Marty Kasprzyk]

On 2/10/2025 at 8:53 AM, Don Noon said:

Oh... I just remembered that I had a spreadsheet and graph of M5 and weight that shows this.  The one I am tinkering with now falls well within the range of all of the other cheap student violins.  The red squares are my builds, black diamonds from other makers (except those in the red zone).  Green diamonds are old Cremonese.

Are your plates bare wood or are they varnished?

[Don Noon]

3 hours ago, Marty Kasprzyk said:

Are your plates bare wood or are they varnished?

Mine are unvarnished prior to assembly.  Presumably most of the data from other makers is similar, but I don't really know.  And certainly the old fiddle reworks and old Cremonese have some degree of finish on them.

[Don Noon]

Here's how to make a student brick sound fuller:  take 20 grams of wood out of the top (94->74 grams) and a bass bar .5g lighter (4.6->4.1 g).  This before/after recording was with the same equipment and settings, same distance to microphone, strings, bridge, etc.  The only difference is that the soundpost was moved closer to the bridge, which you'd expect with a thinner top.  The back was left as-is, very thick.

 

Here's before/after impact spectra, and a plot of the amplitude difference.  As expected, the lower frequencies show solid gains, but there are significant gains above 1 kHz as well.

[Marty Kasprzyk]

30 minutes ago, Don Noon said:

Here's how to make a student brick sound fuller:  take 20 grams of wood out of the top (94->74 grams) and a bass bar .5g lighter (4.6->4.1 g).  This before/after recording was with the same equipment and settings, same distance to microphone, strings, bridge, etc.  The only difference is that the soundpost was moved closer to the bridge, which you'd expect with a thinner top.  The back was left as-is, very thick.

 

 

 

Why stop a 74g. ?

[Don Noon]

3 hours ago, Marty Kasprzyk said:

Why stop a 74g. ?

M5 dropped below 290 Hz, indicating poor stiffness/weight.  And on the chart I showed previously, that's an area that looked like a reasonable stopping point.  Plus, I didn't want to spend too much time finessing this thing.  Based on the results, I probably could have gone a few grams lighter without getting too tubby, perhaps the very thick back would allow it.  But in any case, I don't think there was too much more to be gained in performance.

[Tim M]

Don, those re-graduated student instruments sound great! Thanks for sharing your experience and results.

[Dr. Mark]

11 hours ago, Don Noon said:

Here's how to make a student brick sound fuller:...

Getting back to a discussion we had a month or so ago, a consequence of your study is that regraduating del Gesu's instruments may have significantly changed their character.

 

[Michael Darnton]

It's probably similar thinking, that thinner is better, that caused so many del Gesus to be regraduated and "lost", where usually the more desirable ones now are the thick ones. For reasons.

[Don Noon]

 

1 hour ago, Dr. Mark said:

... a consequence of your study is that regraduating del Gesu's instruments may have significantly changed their character.

4 minutes ago, Michael Darnton said:

It's probably similar thinking, that thinner is better, that caused so many del Gesus to be regraduated and "lost", where usually the more desirable ones now are the thick ones. For reasons.

del Gesu "thick" is not the same as Seidel "thick".  And del Gesu wood I don't think is the same as Seidel wood.

"Thinner is better" if you start with a top plate weighing close to 100 grams.  I dare anyone to listen to the before/after comparison of the Seidel and claim that the regrad made it worse.  

Things get less clear as you get closer to reasonable.  Personal preference comes in.  My guess is that thick del Gesus are more desirable than thinner ones because they are different from Strads.  Do Strad players also hanker for thick del Gesus?  

In any case, I think there's the zone of too thick for anybody, the zone of good depending on preference, and the zone of too thin and tubby... which can still be desired by some fiddle players.  And then the zone where it collapses.  I have experimented with everything.

 

[Michael Darnton]

Yes, I just didn't want anyone to think thinner is always better. Of course it's all about the violin, and the player. 

Something I've mentioned before is how historically when players could afford it they'd first get a Strad, then as they matured, a del Gesu. There's a good reason for that, and part of it is that the thicker del Gesu requires more work but offers more. So it's a mistake to think that what an immature player wants is what makes a good violin.

That said, my current experience is that just grossly taking off thickness is an inefficient way to deal with the problem posed by cheaper violins. And I don't mean tuning: there are places that matter, locations helped by more movement, and places that don't matter at all when taking off wood because their vibration contributes nothing, and in that respect I've found that thinning the whole top is really a waste of effort.  Commenting on your lack of interest in graduating backs under the board, in my experience that's one of those places that really don't give effect for energy expended.

[Victor Roman]

19 hours ago, Don Noon said:

Here's how to make a student brick sound fuller:  take 20 grams of wood out of the top (94->74 grams) and a bass bar .5g lighter (4.6->4.1 g).  This before/after recording was with the same equipment and settings, same distance to microphone, strings, bridge, etc.  The only difference is that the soundpost was moved closer to the bridge, which you'd expect with a thinner top.  The back was left as-is, very thick.

I hear more promise in the first violin if with stiffer strings and competent bowing than with the second one with normal strings and ... not that competent bowing. A thick violin with the right strings and played well has more meat in the tone than a thin one, reminder absent. In your sample the player is simply not capable of pulling any tone out of either instrument. 

[Victor Roman]

6 hours ago, Michael Darnton said:

Yes, I just didn't want anyone to think thinner is always better. Of course it's all about the violin, and the player. 

Something I've mentioned before is how historically when players could afford it they'd first get a Strad, then as they matured, a del Gesu. There's a good reason for that, and part of it is that the thicker del Gesu requires more work but offers more. So it's a mistake to think that what an immature player wants is what makes a good violin.

I agree 100%. 

[uguntde]

On 2/10/2025 at 2:53 PM, Don Noon said:

Oh... I just remembered that I had a spreadsheet and graph of M5 and weight that shows this.  The one I am tinkering with now falls well within the range of all of the other cheap student violins.  The red squares are my builds, black diamonds from other makers (except those in the red zone).  Green diamonds are old Cremonese.

Is there a book or article that explains taptones - how to measure, how to interpret etc?

[LCF]

2 hours ago, Victor Roman said:

I hear more promise in the first violin if with stiffer strings and competent bowing than with the second one with normal strings and ... not that competent bowing. A thick violin with the right strings and played well has more meat in the tone than a thin one, reminder absent. In your sample the player is simply not capable of pulling any tone out of either instrument. 

My impression of what I can gather from the tone of both is they still sound like versions of the same instrument which is surprising.  However that doesn't tell us anything about playability, projection, 'resistance' and so on. 

It is very interesting however that there seems to be a clear signal in Don's collected data that there are measurable differences in the top woods on these types of instruments versus others which are generally regarded as better. 

My general impression of these types, aside from the rough work,  relates to some things in the other current thread about fine grain. The top wood often seems to have relatively wide late growth bands versus their spacing. As HoGo suggests it probably is mostly compression wood. It would be interesting to hear what the dendro people say about this. 

 

[Marty Kasprzyk]

On 2/13/2025 at 4:55 PM, uguntde said:

Is there a book or article that explains taptones - how to measure, how to interpret etc?

I found in an Google inernet search many recent references to "violin plate tap tones".

I found tap tuning of violin plates to be a highly engrossing and challenging activity which was worse than trying to beat my computer in chess games.

[M Alpert]

On 2/13/2025 at 4:26 PM, Michael Darnton said:

I don't mean tuning: there are places that matter, locations helped by more movement, and places that don't matter at all when taking off wood because their vibration contributes nothing, and in that respect I've found that thinning the whole top is really a waste of effort.  Commenting on your lack of interest in graduating backs under the board, in my experience that's one of those places that really don't give effect for energy expended.

Is there any chance you would elaborate on your observations here? As in, thinning which part does what?

I understand this is sort of hidden gold stuff, I'm sure everyone respects your right to silence. But if you would share a few hints, I'm also sure many people would be grateful.

Or are there any literary references for this (not tap tuning)?