My violin bow isn’t making a sound

My violin bow isn’t making a sound. I often here this from new students who have just bought their first violin. Especially when it comes to a new violin.

Yes, when you unpack a new violin, the bow isn’t going to be making any sound. Especially not if you’ve just taken the violin bow out of the plastic. The bow is new, it has not been used and not been treated. Therefore, it won’t be making a sound.

You may wonder if your violin bow isn’t making a sound because there is something wrong with the strings or the violin itself, but this is not the case either. The violin bow isn’t making a sound because it has never been rosined. It has never had any Rosin rubbed onto the bow.

For a violin bow to be making sounds, it needs to be treated with Rosin. A violinist always has to have some rosin with them. If not, this is going to be a problem later on. The violin bow needs a thorough rubbing of Rosin before any sound come from it. Especially if it’s new. If it’s brand new, you would have to put a tripple dose or even more of Rosin on for the violin bow to be making any sound at all.

Another reason that the violin bow isn’t making any sound could be because you’ve touched it with your fingers. Remember, fingers are oily and the rosin that you’ve put onto the bow could have come off onto your fingers. This means that the hair of the violin bow is no longer covered in Rosin and therefore the violin bow isn’t going to be making any sound. A new coating of Rosin is needed to correct this problem.

You need to remember that a violin bow is delicate. If it’s not been tightened to the correct tension and it does not have the right amount of Rosin on, the violin bow isn’t going to be making any sound, it doesn’t matter how hard you try.

I hope this has helped you determine what the problem could be when your violin bow isn’t making any sound. It most likely is a Rosin problem.