Violin Alive
“Twofold Media has produced another engaging set of CDROMs, this time presenting the violin syllabus of the Australian Music Examinations Board. Volumes 1 and 2 of Violin Alive are now available, covering the technical requirements up to grade four. The remaining grades are to be released at a future date. These CDROMs are an invaluable reference for students, teachers and parents. Fintan Murphy is well qualified to present this material, as he is the String Specialist Examiner for the AMEB. His thorough understanding of violin technique ensures that each exercise is presented clearly and comprehensively. The Warm Up exercises, which include ideas for bowing and left hand set up, are clearly demonstrated and promote a relaxed and natural style of playing, emphasising flexibility and ease. Maybe these Warm Ups could have been placed at the start of the CD to make sure that they were not overlooked by students. Navigating the menus is extremely intuitive and straightforward and the demonstrations themselves are not overly wordy. Accompanying each exercise is some quite detailed text, which may be too technical for a young student, but is of definite benefit to parents and teachers looking for greater depth. The tempo chosen for the scales on the first CD is rather on the brisk side and may not encourage students to produce their optimal tonal quality. I would have liked a little more direction for students when they first play C and G major scales. How do you get those third fingers to be in tune? However these are small complaints given the benefits of having the often dreaded technical section of the exam made so engaging for young students via the means of a computer. Volume two, covering grades three and four, presents some helpful advice for the more demanding technical requirements of this level. There are many good ideas throughout, including hints for double stop preparation, bow strokes and vibrato. The attention to detail by the producers is quite amazing and makes both CDs excellent teaching aids. It would be very useful, for instance, for a teacher to be able to direct a student to explore, for example, the vibrato exercises in volume two, with a view to coming back and discussing them in the next lesson. With these CDROMs students can now view and listen to an expert demonstrating what is required, whenever they wish, rather than relying on their memory to retain visual and aural images presented to them at their weekly lesson. There are many possible applications for these CDs, and everyone involved in learning and teaching the violin would benefit from their careful and detailed approach to the demonstration of the AMEB technical requirements.”
– Julie Hewison, Head of Strings at Ivanhoe Girls Grammar. AUSTAVIC News, Journal of the Australian Strings Association (AUSTA), September 2004