Several people have asked me: "Why did you choose to learn the violin?". This is an interesting question, and I have always chosen to answer this by explaining how I arrived at this choice, primarily to provide a a better appreciation of how I arrived at this decision.
Flashback to September 2009: Due to a painful episode which I was facing then, two of my friends at work (Stephanie Tham and Chua Lee Eng) advised me to take up music as a way to get my mind off that painful episode and to enrich myself in a new area. That was when I finally made up my mind to take up music. The question however was which instrument to take up? After much thought, I decided on either the clarinet, cello, piano or violin. The reason behind this is the wide repertoire in the classical music canon available for these instruments.
However, when I enquired about courses available for these instruments (my highest priority was the clarinet), there were no teachers available for the clarinet and cello. I could wait for the school to scout around for a teacher, but the fees will be almost double that of a piano or violin course.
With that, the choice was down to either the piano or violin. After thinking through it, I settled on the violin. This was due to the following reasons:
1. An upright piano requires substantial space in the house to keep it. However, with limited space at home, this meant I had to relocate my stuff to make way for a piano. An electronic piano is more compact but based on comments I received from a friend who is learning the piano using an electronic piano, it certainly cannot match the responsiveness and tonal quality of an acoustic piano.
On the other hand, the violin is compact and you can practically bring it with you anywhere.
2. An upright piano is expensive; a decent one will set you back by a few thousand ringgit. Contrast that with a violin which you can get for less than RM500 for a China-made student violin.
3. Playing a piano requires greater hand-eye coordination, as you are playing notes using both the left hand and right hand (usually the harmony and melody). Typically that also involves reading notes on the treble and bass clefs. With my characteristic lack of hand-eye coordination, I decided to stick to an instrument that plays single-notes (and not chords) most of the time.
Shortly after that, my friend Ben told me that his music school was selling violins at a discount for a limited time, so I wasted no time in getting it - RM419 for a set which includes a Palatino (China-made) violin, bow, rosin, violin case, shoulder rest and tuner.
A week after that, one of the music schools I enquired earlier called me to confirm that they have a time-slot on Saturday mornings. So with that, I eagerly signed up for a violin course at the beginner grade.
Next: how my string snapped and how I changed all four strings to Dominant strings.
