Importance of the Shoulder Rest of the Violin

Video Transcript

"Hi! I’m David Kaynor for expertvillage.com. I have a shoulder rest in each hand; a violin shoulder rest they’re somewhat similar but different. First of all why use one? Many of us feel that they give us the most comfort and the most stability when we play our instruments. Some violinists and some fiddlers prefer not use them, and there’s even a school of thought that says the human body contributes to the sound of the violin if no shoulder rest is used. Well I don’t know. I think comfort is so important that I’m in favor. A shoulder rest usually has some means of at least minimally adjusting, in this case it’s possible to adjust the height of the shoulder rest by changing the distance that the shaft of the legs of the shoulder rest is screwed into the—whatever this piece is called. I would say that this would make a relatively, relatively short shoulder rest, whereas if I unscrew the shaft so that the feet are farther from the rest and the rest is then farther from the violin, I’d refer it to that this is a tall shoulder rest. This one is an old somewhat worn Wolfe shoulder rest I think that Wolfe is one of the various manufactures."