Category: Observations and Opinion
-
What Is a Master Violin? Not a Simple Answer
Please visit the Don Rickert Musician Shop. "Master violin" is one of those phrases that can confuse rather than clarify. There is no international violin grade classification policing organization. The term is actually used very loosely, at best. Hopefully, this brief article is helpful in evaluating claims of "Master Violin" status. What is meant by…
-
The Tenor Guitar: An Odd Loner without a Real Family
Please visit the Don Rickert Musician Shop. The Tenor Guitar: An Odd Loner without a Real Family http://www.rickertmusicalinstruments.com/2015/08/the-tenor-guitar-an-odd-loner-without-a-real-family.html Prelude This article is by D. Rickert Musical Instruments and its online store, Don Rickert Musician Shop. We hope that you find this article interesting in its own right. That being said, the article is a background…
-
Helping People with Special Needs Realize Their Musical Goals: Part 1 of 2
Please visit the Don Rickert Musician Shop. Prologue This first of two articles focuses on the problems many musicians are trying to overcome. The second article will focus on a large number of solutions we have discovered over the years. Note: The author himself multi-instrumentalist, including fiddle, violin and viola, suffers from artritis, rotator cuff…
-
The White Violin Myth
Please visit the Don Rickert Musician Shop. Brought to you by the Don Rickert Musician Shop Introduction Most musically inclined people who use eBay are aware of the vast array of unfinished violins, violas and related instruments sold by Chinese lutheries. Such instruments are called “white instruments” in the lutherie trade. If properly completed, most…
-
Why Wittner Fine-Tune Planetary Pegs are a Good Idea
Please visit the Don Rickert Musician Shop. Many people have cold feet about installing internally-geared tuning pegs on their violins or fiddles. We think that it has to do with the fact that most of us envision a planetary-geared violin peg as heavy and "fake" looking. Nothing could be further from the truth. There are…
-
Solving the “how do you hold this thing” problem with historic pochettes
Please visit the Don Rickert Musician Shop. We sell an 18th type pochette (pocket fiddle) under the Neil Gow Pochette and Thomas Jefferson Pochette names, depending on the sales venue. This instrument is EXTREMELY popular, especially among our customer/friends in Japan. The original instruments on which our replica is based, as with all historic pochettes,…
-
American Civil War Re-enactor Musicians and Their Instruments
About Re-enacting Recreating every detail of the military aspects of the American Civil War (early to mid 1860s) is more than just a pastime for many thousands of dedicated people known as “Re-enactors.” Re-enactments of encampments and major Civil War battles draw thousands of enthusiastic participants and spectators in U.S. States where the major action…
D Rickert Musical Instruments 