How important is it to follow your bowing strokes, up for up and down for down? I have only been playing for a little over a year and, as of now, I have just removed my markers off of the finger board. I can play along with you, but my bow is usually out of sync with yours.
Thanks. And, again, thanks for letting me have the “Free month introductory special”!
Hi Fred, Roland White Forum Moderator here. I will let Casey answer your question for following his bowing as I’m sure he will chime in. But I will say that bowing can be interpreted many different ways. A good general rule for fiddling is to try to use a down bow on the down beat. Down beat is on beats 1 & 3 of a 4 beat tune so if you start without any pick up notes, your first bow stroke is down. If there is a pick up note then sometimes you may start with an up bow so that you are going down on the first downbeat. As far as the rest of the tune goes, like every fiddler I know you at some point in a tune may be going up when you should be going down or down when you should be going up, but all good fiddlers I know somehow make the adjustment and get back in sync so the down bow is on the down beat. No hard and fast rule that I know of so I hope this helps. There is nothing wrong with trying to copy exactly what Casey is doing before moving on to your own interpretation as he is a mighty fine fiddler and following by example is a good way to build up a good habit. Thanks for posting on the forum and glad you like the site and hope you stay with it as it will advance your fiddling to have instruction of this quality at your stage.
Hey there, Fred. Sorry I’m just now getting around to replying. I would say that learning the notes must come first, for sure. Once you get the tune down, you should identify areas in which you are having trouble getting the groove going. Then you can check out the bowing I provide for that section and see if it helps. I will say that for breakdowns, it is a little more important…less so for waltzes. I generally try to do downbow on the downbeat, but that’s not a rule which is set in stone. Good luck, and you’re very welcome, sir!! Keep us posted on your progress.
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