Music Lessons in Burbank CA | Los Angeles Music Teachers

Hi, this is Manoela Wunder from Los Angeles Violin Teacher and today I’m going to talk about renting vs. buying an instrument. This is one of the first questions I get asked by students and parents. I usually recommend renting to start out with because most beginners want to try out lessons and see if they want to continue after a few months. Renting is great because if you do decide to continue, you can apply the total amount you paid for the rental towards the purchase of an instrument. Another good reason to rent is the shop will fix any problems such as a broken bridge or tight pegs without charging you for it. When you have your own instrument, you will be paying for all the maintenance costs and unfortunately most kids are not very careful with an instrument as fragile as the violin.

If you are set on owning your own violin, shops will buy back an instrument, but you may not get as much as you paid for it.

I always send my students to Thomas Metzler in Glendale or Charles Liu in Hollywood. They both have quality beginner instruments for rent and for sale for reasonable prices.
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I hope you learned something from this video, and please let me know if you have any questions. Thanks so much for watching and I hope you come back!

Hi! My name is Manoela Wunder, I'm a freelance violinist in Los Angeles. I also play and teach several other instruments. I've been teaching for over 10 years, I have a bachelor's and a master's degree in violin performance, and the reason I'm making this video is because this is the first in a series of instructional videos on how to play the violin. It's great for beginners, intermediates and even some advanced students, so please leave your comments and suggestions and questions below. If you have anything that you want answered or what you'd like to see in future videos, please let me know. Some videos I'm going to be demonstrating, some I'm going to be explaining, but again I really hope you stick around to see the videos every week. Please subscribe, so thank you so much and hope to see you soon! Thanks!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkfMI0x7eys&feature=youtu.be

Learning the violin can feel very overwhelming at first, and understandably so. It can take years for a violinist to feel confident and happy about their sound, shifting, and intonation. Then there’s vibrato and bow strokes, high positions, etc. When you’re starting out, it’s crucial to build your fundamentals so your technique continues to advance and you don’t have to go back and relearn basics, which is a very frustrating thing to do later on in life.

I’m very picky with my beginner students in Burbank and Los Angeles with posture. I make sure their left and right hands are always in the right position and they standing straight with no added tension. Once that’s mastered, I make sure they understand about arm levels. When you are playing on each of the strings, your left and right arms need to be at certain levels. If you don’t have your left arm on the right level, you will get tired fast and you will not have accurate intonation. With your right arm, you will hit other strings if it’s not positioned correctly.

I usually put tapes on the fingerboard for my Burbank and Los Angeles beginner students so they develop muscle memory for where their fingers go. With the bow hand, the next step is to teach them to practice in front of the mirror so they are watching where the bow is moving and making sure it stays parallel to the fingerboard and bridge and is always between the two. You don’t want to play too close to either of them or your sound will change drastically.

As you can tell from this blog, there are a lot of details to keep in mind when learning the violin. However, when you have a teacher who takes you step by step and teaches you how to practice, you will progress a lot quicker and it will feel so much easier to learn music. I hope this helped! If you have any questions about Los Angeles Music Teachers, please visit us at http://www.losangelesmusicteachers.com or call us at (818) 209-2620