Box and Fiddle
Year 18 No 04
December 1994
How to Keep Your Fiddle Clean
by Leila Powrie
The demise of Ian’s ‘Matthew Hardie’ has been a bitter blow to our family. We all have a great sympathy for Ian who felt that his beloved M.H. was a part of him. However, he had just finished a video with it and hopefully, in time, will enjoy looking at the film and have a sense of thankfulness that he had 40 years of pleasure from a wonderful instrument.
(Ian and Leila had been on their way back home from Dumfries and had stopped for a break in a lay-by near Moodiesburn. While parked there a ‘white van’ also pulled in and ran straight into the back of the car reducing Ian’s wonderful M.H., which had been in the boot, to kindling - Ed)
Ian is a stickler for clean fiddles and admires the violinists in the R.S.N.O., Philharmonic etc., when the T.V. cameras have close ups of their violins. They are so well looked after. So, he was really disappointed on his own video to see rosin on the finger board. He has his excuses of course, a frozen shoulder due to an occupational hazard over the years so making bow arm drop and the bow slide down the strings over the finger board and the new cheap rosin I bought for his Christmas stocking last year, first used during the video.
Keeping one’s violin clean should be a habit. I write this from years of listening to Ian telling others. Also tips picked up some years ago from a Yehudi Menuhin article. Rosin powder, so necessary for connection of bow to strings, destroys the varnish and sound of the violin and makes any cracks very difficult to repair. It is important to clean all rosin from violin wood after playing for any length of time. Ian uses his hankie, snot an’ all. In fact a wee bit of spit does no harm. If a hankie or rag is kept for this purpose, it must be washed frequently.
Depending on how much playing is done a six monthly good clean is advisable. Start with a soft cloth dampened with water 20 parts to vinegar 1 part. Keep pressure light at all times. Buff, then a first class light oil, not linseed, good quality olive or almond oil sparingly used gives the best shine when properly rubbed in lightly and polish up. If it does not polish immediately, there is probably too much oil on it, wait for a couple of hours and try again. Do small sections of the belly at a time keeping away from any small cracks. If a crack looks on the verge of causing trouble have it repaired first, the glue will be less effective when there is oil in the crack.
If your violin is valuable have it professionally cleaned. Do keep oil away from strings. String cleaning is another system altogether. Sweaty fingers and rosin powder make for very dirty strings creating a muffled sound. Use a clean, fluffless cotton cloth dabbed in lighted fluid and allow to evaporate for a couple of minutes. Meanwhile make a cardboard plate to go under the strings and holding the fiddle upside down slide the cloth back and forth along the strings three or four times, taking care not to touch the varnish.
If you want to clean as much dust as possible from the inside, a handful of dried rice in the over or microwave, then ‘rouchle aboot’ inside the fiddle. This will collect a lot of the dust and sometimes clean the label.
The finger board and the neck only need a polish with a silk hankie or a small silk scarf well worth buying for the purpose.
Do read all labels on oil containers to make sure there are no addictives.
Do buy the best rosin and strings you can afford and go one better.
Don’t use handcream before playing.
Don’t wear long earrings or rough tweed jackets when playing. This may sound funny but can cause untold damage to the varnish.
Old James Ogilvie, Ian’s teacher of the 20s/30s, always used a heated, halved Brazil nut to polish his fiddle. Only occasionally when Ian wanted his fiddle to look bonny he used Johnson’s Furniture Cream with beeswax. Never a spray.
by Leila Powrie
The demise of Ian’s ‘Matthew Hardie’ has been a bitter blow to our family. We all have a great sympathy for Ian who felt that his beloved M.H. was a part of him. However, he had just finished a video with it and hopefully, in time, will enjoy looking at the film and have a sense of thankfulness that he had 40 years of pleasure from a wonderful instrument.
(Ian and Leila had been on their way back home from Dumfries and had stopped for a break in a lay-by near Moodiesburn. While parked there a ‘white van’ also pulled in and ran straight into the back of the car reducing Ian’s wonderful M.H., which had been in the boot, to kindling - Ed)
Ian is a stickler for clean fiddles and admires the violinists in the R.S.N.O., Philharmonic etc., when the T.V. cameras have close ups of their violins. They are so well looked after. So, he was really disappointed on his own video to see rosin on the finger board. He has his excuses of course, a frozen shoulder due to an occupational hazard over the years so making bow arm drop and the bow slide down the strings over the finger board and the new cheap rosin I bought for his Christmas stocking last year, first used during the video.
Keeping one’s violin clean should be a habit. I write this from years of listening to Ian telling others. Also tips picked up some years ago from a Yehudi Menuhin article. Rosin powder, so necessary for connection of bow to strings, destroys the varnish and sound of the violin and makes any cracks very difficult to repair. It is important to clean all rosin from violin wood after playing for any length of time. Ian uses his hankie, snot an’ all. In fact a wee bit of spit does no harm. If a hankie or rag is kept for this purpose, it must be washed frequently.
Depending on how much playing is done a six monthly good clean is advisable. Start with a soft cloth dampened with water 20 parts to vinegar 1 part. Keep pressure light at all times. Buff, then a first class light oil, not linseed, good quality olive or almond oil sparingly used gives the best shine when properly rubbed in lightly and polish up. If it does not polish immediately, there is probably too much oil on it, wait for a couple of hours and try again. Do small sections of the belly at a time keeping away from any small cracks. If a crack looks on the verge of causing trouble have it repaired first, the glue will be less effective when there is oil in the crack.
If your violin is valuable have it professionally cleaned. Do keep oil away from strings. String cleaning is another system altogether. Sweaty fingers and rosin powder make for very dirty strings creating a muffled sound. Use a clean, fluffless cotton cloth dabbed in lighted fluid and allow to evaporate for a couple of minutes. Meanwhile make a cardboard plate to go under the strings and holding the fiddle upside down slide the cloth back and forth along the strings three or four times, taking care not to touch the varnish.
If you want to clean as much dust as possible from the inside, a handful of dried rice in the over or microwave, then ‘rouchle aboot’ inside the fiddle. This will collect a lot of the dust and sometimes clean the label.
The finger board and the neck only need a polish with a silk hankie or a small silk scarf well worth buying for the purpose.
Do read all labels on oil containers to make sure there are no addictives.
Do buy the best rosin and strings you can afford and go one better.
Don’t use handcream before playing.
Don’t wear long earrings or rough tweed jackets when playing. This may sound funny but can cause untold damage to the varnish.
Old James Ogilvie, Ian’s teacher of the 20s/30s, always used a heated, halved Brazil nut to polish his fiddle. Only occasionally when Ian wanted his fiddle to look bonny he used Johnson’s Furniture Cream with beeswax. Never a spray.