Product Description

This text presents beginning violin technique and basic music-reading fundamentals, with an emphasis on the use of melodies and classical pieces to teach each new concept. The 28 lessons include basic technique and reading skills, scales in the keys of A, D, G, and C as well as bowing techniques such as dynamic contrast, slurs, accents, and staccato bowing. There are 47 melodies presented including works by Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Handel, Mozart and other classical composers. The companion CD features all of the exercises and pieces recorded with solo violin and piano accompaniment.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #92181 in Books
• Published on: 2002-01-23
• Released on: 2002-01-23
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 32 pages

About the Author
Craig Duncan is an active Nashville musician fluid in both country and classical styles. He began his study of the violin when he was eight and went on to garner a Bachelor of Music degree from Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina. Craig's performance experience includes the Grand Ole Opry, the Porter Wagoner Show, and TV specials with various country and bluegrass artists. Craig has been the featured instrumentalist on over fifty record albums, with sales in excess of three million. He is a member of the National Fiddler's Hall of Fame and Who's Who in Music and Musicians and is recognized internationally for his numerous books and arrangements of fiddle music published by Mel Bay Publications, Inc. He has produced numerous recordings for the gift shop market in a variety of musical styles. As a hammered dulcimer player, he is known for his work on Green Hill's Country Mountain series as well as Brentwood Music's Smoky Mountain series. He is active in the Nashville music industry as an instrumentalist, contractor, producer and arranger. In addition to his performance activities, he is also Adjunct Professor of Fiddle at the Belmont School of Music in Nashville, Tennessee. He is actively involved in carrying on the tradition of American fiddling and is engaged in research, writing, and teaching in this field.

Customer Reviews

First lessons, it shows you how!
I'm 36 and recieved a Violin for my 5th wedding anniversary. (5th = wood traditionaly) I've wanted to play for a long long time, however I know nothing about music. Before this book, I had absolute ZERO music knowledge. This book showed the finger positions before each lesson. This was key for me, because when I was reading through "Step one: Teach yourself Violin", which I got at the same time and looked into first, I didn't understand how you can make a B note on G, D, A, & E strings. It just didn't click. This book has a diagram showing for example on the E string it's Open string = E, then first finger position = F#, then G# and then A. Each lesson is laid out with a note diagram of the strings involved and which position on the fingerboard makes which note. This is what got me started, as I said I was somewhat lost with the other book. There is not much on holding the violin or bow, but enough to get started. It also has a brief description on music notation. Through the progression of lessons the music is a bit more complicated in that new things like dynamics are introduced. for $... this is a must if you are like me and starting from scratch. I also like "Step one: Teach yourself Violin", because it has a video cassette, but I suggest First Lessons first!

Not FIRST lessons
This review assumes you're using this book to teach yourself violin (i.e. you have no instructor). If you already know how to prepare your violin for play (tune it, rosin the bow, etc.) and read sheet music well you can get a lot out of this book. I'd give the book/CD 5 stars on the quality of the exercises but knock off a star each on lack of info on violin care/tuning/etc. and lack of instruction on reading sheet music.

These are excellent first "exercises" but not first "lessons". Also, the ability to read standard sheet music well (5-line staff) is a must for this book (there's no real teaching of how to read it and no tablature at all): this book is almost entirely sheet music exercises.

The book does not go into care or preparation of the violin at all - not even tuning it (with tricky pegs!) or how much rosin to use. I resorted to internet violin lesson sites - and there are several good ones if you search - to fill in the gaps.

In the "look inside" feature, you'll find an "excerpt" of lesson 1 - it's the only page in the entire book with pictures. And what you see is almost ALL of lesson 1 except for a sheet music exercise.
You can see that the author doesn't expect the student to have previous knowledge of how to hold the violin or the bow. Yet the author apparently expects the student to know whether to use the all of the bow or the edge or how to tell if the bow is poorly rosined. I'm left wondering what other important things are not discussed at all!

If you don't want to get bogged down in reading theory, etc. you'll like the other lessons. They all have very brief descriptions (usually about 4 sentences) and often a diagram showing the fingering for each string (for example, where B, C# and D are on the A-string, and similar indications for the other strings in the upcoming exercise). Each then jumps into a sheet music exercise. There's an accompanying CD so you can hear if you're making the right sounds.

I've had a few years of piano lessons and can read sheet music fairly well. I'm also 54 years old, patient, and play guitar (poorly). Consequently I enjoyed the exercises in the book.

If you can read sheet music and prepare your violin on your own, the exercises appear to be good ones - both in terms of what one can learn from them and what they cover.
The lessons begin with just a few positions on a couple of strings, played slowly, then expand to more positions, faster play, dynamic accents (and 3 ways to change the violin's volume), staccato (but not pizzicato-fingers instead of bow), and more.

Sprinkled into the lessons are a few folk tunes like "Camptown Races" and "Dixie", but they include mostly an excellent selection of classical excerpts (the "Look Inside" feature's "Contents" shows the complete list). While completing this book you will learn a little Bach, Handel, Mozart, Beethoven, etc.

After this book, I was able to learn an intermediate level version of Jay Ungar's "Ashokan Farewell" (PBS's "Civil War" themesong) and a solo intro to Bach's Concerto for Violin in E (BWV 1042) without too much difficulty.

I've seen better!
Whenever anyone criticizes the Suzuki method, I always raise a red flag (review previous to this one). It's been around forever and has done a world of good!! The Suzuki method books include very mature pieces.

As a teacher, First Lessons, just doesn't have enough warm-ups. The ABCs of Violin is better--it's a longer book and includes more material--great selections of pieces, excellent warm-ups. The Suzuki books have minimal warm-ups, mainly pieces, but excellent selection of pieces.

First Lessons is an ok book as a supplement just in the beginning, but the Suzuki books and the ABCs of Violin have books you can move on to. Suzuki, Books 1 through 10 and the ABCs of Violin, Books 1 through 5.