Hi, classical violinist here, (good response above btw, ) but I do feel your pain! 🙂 My usual (Irish) session from a couple of years ago didn’t go at the speed of light with set after set like many of them do, so we took time to tune a lot, but most trad sessions … you are on your own! The flute player and the poor banjo guy (of course) lol deferred to me often for an A when they were out because I was using a D’Addario Micro Headstock Tuner, which is a small, black easy-to-read thing you can semi lock on the left shoulder of your fiddle and leave there. Don’t worry that the advertising may just say headstock. See if this works;
Unlike a snark, which can be a royal PIA taking on and off anywhere on the instrument – and often loses it’s rubber feet, it’s smaller and sorta locks onto an easy to see location, depending upon the thickness of your instrument. But it doesn’t need to mark my instrument either, so I like it. Noise notwithstanding I get decent readings.
Also, I strongly recommend you get fine tuners – at least add on the A for adjustments. You don’t need to be messing with pegs all the time for slight adjustments. If you don’t have any others installed (and 99.999% of classically trained violinists NEVER have tuners beyond the E) 😉 I would actually order a Wittner and replace your tailpiece. Seriously, it won’t hurt or dampen the sound. Unless you have those blessed Planetary ones installed and can remember to use them like fine tuners – fine tuners are a life saver. On one of my fiddles I do have the PP’s and still keep pushing them in; force of habit! Anyway, having that Micro tuner – and having Wittners put on violins has been great for my tuning sanity. Hope this helps. 🙂 Cheers,
