STRINGS
INTRODUCTION TO STRING ARRANGING | Jared Haschek
Back in the November issue of WM, I went for these players, either for a one-off event, or VIOLIN
through on a regular basis. These are the sopranos and the altos of our
one
of
my
arrangements
from
Hillsong’s Christmas album The Peace Project,
string section, because their range essentially
looking at a few different techniques that I used I am assuming that you already have some covers two voices. We usually write two violin
in developing the string arrangement. While this grasp of written music notation and how it parts and call them - you guessed it - violin 1
was inspiring for some, there’s a good chance I works. If a page of sheet music looks more and violin 2.
was teaching people how to make a home run like a spider and an ink pot did a dance across while a lot of readers were just wondering how the page, then you’ll need to dive into the VIOLA
to get to first base. fundamentals of music theory before you try How do you stop your violin from getting
putting down some musical ideas in traditional stolen? Put it in a viola case! As you can tell
Given that I’ve never played or even watched notation. There are plenty of resources online from that poor attempt at humor, violas do tend
baseball in my entire life and am still confused that can help you with this, and with a focused to be the least popular string instrument when
about how the World Series only encompasses effort, it doesn’t take too long to get your head it comes to choosing an instrument to learn,
one country, perhaps I should leave the around. and as a result can often be the hardest to find
sporting metaphors alone and stick to music! In
when you’re putting together a string ensemble.
any case, this article is for musicians that work SOME INTRODUCTIONS However, pitched a 5th below the violin, it has
with a music team that has some string players, First of all, let’s meet the most likely members of a rich, warm tone and is a valuable part of the
and you’d love to know how to arrange music your string section: string family. To hear an example of solo viola
62 March 2020
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