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For the final two days of my month of scales, I’m turning my focus to what is considered by many to be the soul of a violinist’s playing: vibrato. No two violinists’ vibratos are exactly alike, because there are so many subtle factors. But there are two main variables that every great violinist works with: vibrato speed and vibrato width. So these last two days will use scales to examine those two.

I decided to save vibrato speed for tomorrow, and looked at vibrato width today. If you want to keep things simple today, you can do a slow scale with vibrato and just examine what’s going on with the width of your vib. But I chose to connect it with crescendos and diminuendos to give more focus and purpose to the changes in width. I even did a version using only vibrato width to make the cresc/dim – no change in the bow. It’s amazing how effective it is!

Why do this one?

Vibrato is the soul of our playing. It conveys the emotion of our music better than any other single factor, and it’s a huge part of what makes our sounds unique. The more we understand about our vibrato, and the more precisely we can control it, the more purely and convincingly the emotional heart of our music-making will come across.

The Details

Do your scale or arpeggio in a slow tempo; give yourself time to observe what’s going on with each note’s vibrato. I did half-notes at about 50 bpm.

For an extra challenge, and to develop better control, try to keep the speed of your vibrato unaffected by the width.

Some possibilities for exploring vib width (from simplest to trickiest):

Start with an even pass through the scale (no intentional cresc/dim). Try to keep the dynamic even, with the same vibrato width and speed throughout. Think of this as a warmup to what comes next, or as a baseline for the experiments that follow ... or make this your simple, straightforward examination of vib width, and leave it at that.
Make a crescendo as you ascend the scale, leading the shape by increasing your vibrato width. Each note gets vibrato that’s ever so slightly wider than the note before. Then make a diminuendo as you descend, similarly leading the shape by decreasing the width of your vibrato. Support the shapes with your bow, adding or reducing bow intensity as your vib width increases or decreases.
Flip the shape: similar to 2., but make a diminuendo as you ascend and a crescendo as you descend.
Repeat 2. and 3., but make the shapes only by changing your vibrato width. Keep your bow the same throughout. (Yes, it really does work!)

⚠️ With the enhanced focus on vibrato, there’s a danger of that focus turning into increased tension, tightness, or squeezing. These are all enemies of good vibrato. Check frequently to make sure you’re using relaxed technique, and doing only as much muscular work as necessary – but no more. Or check out ”Vibrato Exercise 3: Finger Release” and this post on thumb tension for more detail.

If you’ve tried today’s scales, I’d love to know what your experience was like! Just post a comment below.

Do this in any key, with your usual fingerings.

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