Overall Comments

Clifftop 2010 Appalachian String Band Music Festival
Summary: I spent 5 days at the Clifftop, WV festival of Appalachian String Band Music in 2010. Old Time music is absolutely alive and well among the teens, college crowd and 20-somethings, much to the delight of the 50-, 60- and 70-somethings who were the other half of the crowd!


This festival has been held regularly for many years in a large state park near Beckley, WV. The focus of the festival music is the fiddle tunes and songs of pre-radio-days up to about WW II, There was very little Bluegrass or Nashville music -- heroes here are Uncle Dave Macon, Arthur Smith, Riley Puckett or Ed Haley rather than the Bluegrass greats like Bill Monroe, Earl Scruggs, Tony Rice or Kenny Baker.


This year the official schedule ran from Thursday Aug 5 to Sunday, but hundreds of folks arrived as early as Friday July 30 to camp and play music. By the opening day of the actual program there were well over 2000 campers, the vast majority of them fiddlers, clawhammer banjo, guitar or mandolin folks. The whole atmosphere was friendly, tribal, social, but loud with the sound of scores of jammer groups playing almost around the clock. Not a great scene for sleeping.


This event has a stage and program of contests and concerts, but by far the most important part of the festival is the jamming that happens continuously. People set up elaborate tents and tarps (there is a history of passing thunderstorms which was continued this year!) and then sit down to play music interrupted by communal feasts. Some folks spend the whole time in their camp greeting friends and inviting in new comers. I wandered around more than most and got to meet dozens of new friends from many parts of the country, ate lots of delicious food and played tunes in fifty or sixty different combinations. The level of musicianship in the jams was quite good - pretty much everyone who was carrying a fiddle could pull it out and play a fun tune at dance speed... and of course, there were dozens of really top level fiddlers... a fun part of the festival was, since the players were mostly campers, you could go by a tent and chat with the musicians, ask them to show you a lick or a bowing, play a few tunes and pick up pointers. Most everyone, even the very best, most famous players, were friendly and inviting, and you could sit and listen to hot playing by the hour.


I played 'Soldier's Joy', 'Liberty', 'Nancy Rowland, ' Cumberland Gap' with several groups, no problem. Some Southern players had never heard "St Anne's Reel' and the only Irish tune they knew was "Wind that Shakes the Barley" but there were some players who had learned a series of Irish and Scottish jigs. 'Shove the Pig's Foot' was all over, as was 'Blackberry Blossom', 'Sally Gooden', 'Ebenezer', and several tunes from Art Stampfer, JP Fraley, Buddy Thomas and Rayna Gellert's 'Winders Slide' and 'Booth Shot Lincoln'. Many fiddlers were playing in 'cross-A' (AEAE) or other cross tunings, but definitely not all of the fiddlers were cross tuned. It was pretty much C, D, G and A, though. Not much fooling around with Bb or F or any of that stuff :) The key aspect to all the playing was the groove of the fiddler's bows and the steady banjo chunk of the clawhammer guys. This was not primarily about lovely tone, precision intonation or arpeggio runs... it was about the pulse of the tune -- you could pretty much stand on the hill and look down to see the tents and trees and parked cars of the whole campground expanding and contracting rhythmically like a scene from an old cartoon. It was pretty common for the jammers to sit in a small circle, repeating a tune for the 50th or 100th time, zoned out.


Clifftop is obviously not for everyone... it was a pretty good place for the kids who, at 3:45 AM Friday morning were in the center of our camping area, singing full voice, with great harmony, a series of parodies of country music and excellent imitations of Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, etc. It was an excellent place for an intermediate player like me who is pretty fair at picking up tunes on the fly. If you are ready for it, talk to your friends about it -- maybe you should check it out next year....

Overall Rating

9

Overall Comments

The Linnd shoulder rest (http://www.linnd.co.uk/) may be too modern looking for some traditional fiddlers but if they reject it for that reason they’re missing a great product. An interesting part of the design is a transverse bar between the fiddle and the section that fits on your shoulder, the bar takes a lot of stress off the fiddle compared to the death grip that most other rests have.
The Linnd rest seems to have become part of my fiddle because of its lightness, fit and spare design. For me it gives support in all the right places and none of the "why is it poking me there" ones. My fiddle seems to sound better too, can't tell if it's because it likes the rest, I like the rest or we both do.

Overall Rating

10

Sound

Excellent tone and volume for Old Time music. I am extremely satisfied with its tone and volume as compared with three other fiddles/violins I have. It's the best of the bunch, and one of the others I'm using is an Eastman VL200, clearly an intermediate model, and this Luger exceeds that instrument both in terms of richness of tone (absent the brash, overly bright tone one usually finds on beginner models) and volume; it can be very loud. The lower-level Luger brazilwood bow that came with the outfit is superior to any other bow I own -- much better than the ones, even a carbon-fiber, that came with my other fiddles. Those fiddles sound better and louder when played with the Luger bow as well. Typical soft case with well supported sides, back, and top.

Sound Rating

10

Appearance

Beautiful, smooth matte / satin finish, very much unlike the cheap glossy finishes one often finds on beginner student or lower-level intermediate violins.

Appearance Rating

10

Customer Service

The store where it was purchased -- Barr's Fiddle Shop -- has always been extremely helpful and friendly toward me when I have talked with them. I am confident that if there ever were a problem I was having with the instrument, Barr's would take all necessary steps to insure my complete satisfaction.

Customer Service

10

Overall Comments

I seriously will probably buy a second CV300 (one to keep in standard, another for cross tuning), even though I've been considering a a CV500 as well. I actually prefer the matte / finish. In addition, I now use this violin / fiddle as the standard I'm using to measure the quality of tone of any of my other fiddles or others I may look at in the future.

Overall Rating

10

Sound

Good tone and volume, mellow and responsive.

Sound Rating

9

Appearance

Attractive, antiqued oil finish, no finish on the neck, just slight amount of stain there. The scrolls are very well carved. The neck sets at the right angle to the body.

Appearance Rating

9

Customer Service

Fast shipping, no direct communication attempted. 1 year warranty.

Customer Service

9

Overall Comments

Seems to be a great value for the money. Hand carved, solid, seasoned woods are used. Well constructed and good attention to detail. These violins sound very good, with a mellow, even tone.

Overall Rating

9

Sound

Bright - just right sound

Sound Rating

10

Appearance

Perfect condition for 100 years old violin

Appearance Rating

10

Customer Service

Perfect - nothing to complain about

Customer Service

10

Overall Comments

As I wrote in my previous review :”Now we are looking for a full size one which we are sure we will find with "Corilon Violins" help soon.” Weel -we just received full size German 100 years old violin with beautiful sound from “Corilon Violins” – thank you very much Dr. Annette Roeben.

Overall Rating

10

Sound

Warm, clear, strong, mature sounds. The sounds are very clear! For instance if I play a wrong D note on A string, I won't get a good, strong sound, I will get a bad sound (the richness of the sound won't come out) and I'll directly know that it's wrong, without any doubt!

Sound Rating

8

Appearance

Elegant and delicately cut soundholes and the transparent, honey-colored varnish covering the two-part and very regular spruce top as well as the one-piece back of maple feature the attractive optical appearance. the wood is in good quality, there are few traces here and there, but it's obvious for an antique violins like the one I've purchased.

Appearance Rating

8

Customer Service

They are very friendly and helpful so far.

Customer Service

8

Overall Comments

Excellent violin, helpful luthier, delivered in a good condition

Overall Rating

8

Sound

Rich/Full/Loud and Bright sound

Sound Rating

10

Appearance

There are no any appearance flaws

Appearance Rating

9

Customer Service

Corilon violins were very helphull - answering any of ours queries

Customer Service

10

Overall Comments

We were having some difficulties finding ¾ quality violin down here – so we started looking on the Internet and stumbled upon on "Corilon Violins" web-site – that provided plenty of choice to choose from alongside with sound samples for each instruments and very good descriptions. We asked few questions which were answered very quickly and professionally and few weeks later we got our violin. Now we are looking for a full size one which we are sure we will find with "Corilon Violins" help soon.

Overall Rating

10

Overall Comments

Sincerely I'm ready to recommend "Corilon Violins" to all violin lovers.
Many people at forums belive that, US service is best in the world.
I think so.But I also think, "Corilon" service is at the same level too:
if you need to reserve some instrument, "Corilon violins" do that kindly.
Questions would quicly answered. You could be quiet about shipping:
instruments are very carefully packed.
Everything answered to the descriptions.
If you see, you would agree with me,that descriptions not only very
precise but talented. Because it's difficult thing to describe sound
by words and not everyone can do that.

I'm fully satisfied with my experience with "Corilon Violins".

You I wish the same too!



Albina Zayni.

Overall Rating

10

Sound

The sound is rich and clear. The violin is easy to make a variety of tunes.

Sound Rating

8

Appearance

The out fit was beautiful. The wood is very appealing and the ebony pegs are nice. The violin is very well made.

Appearance Rating

9

Customer Service

Marie was very helpful. She answered any questions I had. All of Kennedy's violins come with a life time warranty.

Customer Service

10

Overall Comments

I would recommend Kennedy Violins to everyone and will purchase my next violin from this company.

Overall Rating

9

Overall Comments

As I'm a student and I reside in a city where there aren't many options at the time of getting a new instrument, I was searching for online stores that sell violins/bows and offered a reasonable trial period to get it tested, this way I could use the instrument as if its mine and also show it to friends and my teacher. After reading some reviews, I was directed to Corilon Violins.

The website is very friendly, and in case you have any trouble and send an email you'll get a response fairly quickly.
After checking all the violins in my price range and some helpful mail exchanges with Dr. Annette, I've decided to go for a French violin from Mirecourt. The prices are all very clear and there are no surprises, the pictures are of good resolution and all details are covered in the description, additionally there is a sound sample of each instrument so you can get an idea of how it sounds.

It's been 5 months already since I bought this violin, and as an amateur student my progress is noticeable and I enjoy playing a lot more.

The experience with this store was so good that now I'm in process of testing some new bows I've got from them too!

Greetings,
Sebastian Piu

Overall Rating

10

Sound

As a newbie to fiddling, I was looking for a violin in my price range that still sounded great. I realize that shopping online is not always the best idea, I found the website to be really informative and what impressed me was the ability to compare the sound of several violins online. Although there were more expensive violins available, I thought the Carpini had just the sound I wanted for fiddling bluegrass, country or cajun music.

Sound Rating

8

Appearance

The fiddle is even more beautiful than the pictures or videos showed. It has solid maple back and sides and a solid spruce top. It's trimmed in African ebony. The fiddle is flawless.

Appearance Rating

10

Customer Service

The violin arrived in perfect shape and the Kennedy Violins people gave me a call to make sure I was satisfied with my purchase. Warranty is 45 days, money back if not completely satisfied.

Customer Service

10

Overall Comments

Overall Rating

10

Overall Comments

I can nothing but recommend Corilon violins for any violin enthusiast who has trouble finding a violin for him/herself locally, or simply has not enough time to look for it carefully.

I was skeptical about buying an instrument online, granted having a violin is such an personal experience. However, after reading many positive reviews about Corilon Violins on the web, I thought: I can't lose anything!

The website is an example of how a violin shop website should look like. Detailed, high resolution pictures, accurate descriptions with thorough information about age and provenance as well as sound clips that show violin characteristics clearly - unlike many shops, where a simple scale is recorded with a poor recording setup.

I looked mostly through German fiddles and settled up on trying a violin from Julius Heinrich Zimmermann workshops in Leipzig from around 1920. I loved the looks as well as the sound that seemed to fit Bach's music very well, and the violin was in my price range.

After exchanging a few e-mails with Dr. Annette Roeben who was very helpful, I decided to buy the violin from Corilon. They have a generous 30-day trial period, so if I didn't like the violin I could return it. But I won't, the violin is magnificent and performs just like I imagined it would. Also, the photos were really accurate - it looks exactly like on the pictures.

To sum up, I can only recommend buying from Corilon violins. Whether I understand it is not an option for many, who prefer more traditional means of shopping for a violin, I can see many who could benefit from buying online.

Now... I'm off to play my new old violin, which I'm getting to love more and more.

Best regards to everyone,
Mateusz Papiernik

Overall Rating

10

Overall Comments

I want to share my experience dealing with Corilon violins. I’m very satisfied for the professional service. I have now a very fine French violin labeled Antonio Lorenzi.

I purchased a German violin from Corilon violins web shop. It was very good instrument but after a trial period ( which is extended 30 days!) I wasn’t fully satisfied with the sound of this instrument. I informed them and they offered to send me five more test violins from the same price range without any costs. I’m very pleased for their expertise choosing those five violins according to my wishes. I found this French beautifully sounding violin among those five.

I shure can recommend Corilon violins to anyone who is buying older high quality violins. Corilon violins is reliable and very professional.

Corilon violins
Dr. Annette Roeben
Hussenstrasse 30
78462 Konstanz
Germany
mail@corilon.com
www.corilon.com

Overall Rating

10

Sound

My Silver Creek has a very deep, rich sound. Excellent sustain, though not a lot of projection. It has kind of an old-timey sound to it. Reminds me of my grandfathers fiddle.

Sound Rating

8

Appearance

The violin has a flamed maple neck/sides and flamed back. Nicely carved scroll. Top is medium grain spruce (not tightly grained). Finish is satin. Not much shine here.

Appearance Rating

8

Customer Service

I bought this used and it was on consignment. There was no mention of a warranty. If it needed a repair in the future, I would do it myself.

Customer Service

8

Overall Comments

This violin was a great deal for the money. It doesn't appear to have been played much if at all. I love the sound of it, though it wouldn't be suitable for a large concert hall unless amplified. It has just enough volume for my church (typical large barn type building from the late 1800's)
I bought it as a backup/practice fiddle and it's great for that purpose. Money well spent.

Overall Rating

9

Overall Comments

Violinist, Singer, Songwriter Halle Ford has released the title track "Pretty Girl" from her upcoming debut album (also entitled Pretty Girl).

The teaser track unexpectedly combines Norwegian-inspired fiddling with an infectious pop song chorus and a romping beat. You can listen to and purchase this track directly from Halle's store, iTunes, Amazon Mp3, or nearly anywhere else world-wide digital music is sold.

Overall Rating

10

Overall Comments

This tuner was given to me as a gift recently. I really needed one for my fiddle case and this one fits the bill well.

It is a digital instrument but displays the image of a needle that sweeps like an analog instrument would – from a scale that has a -50 to 0 to +50 range, plus it uses red and green LEDs to display sharp (red) and flat (red) and spot on (green).

It comes with a clamp on sensor with about a 30” cord that can be plugged in to the tuner. Or you can use the built in mic. Or it can be used with a tone generator for tuning to an audible signal.

The tone generator is also used with the metronome and has a volume control. Or it can be set to pulse/vibrate on beat. So you can have it in your pocket and “fell” the beat. It has 9 preset rhythms to chose from with a tempo adjustment from 30 to 250 bpm.

Pitch set point can be flattened a half step or whole step and still have an adjustment range between 410 and 450 hz.

A peculiar feature that I find a bit curious is that they include the ability for this to be set to vibrate continuously. They suggest that it could be use by a singer to relax their facial muscles or a musician can use it to relax their “fingers”.

OK. I don’t see me using that feature… nevertherless.

It is about the size of an iPhone, uses 3 – AAA batteries. It shuts off after no input for 2 minutes. It has a blet clip that folds out and doubles as leg to stand the tuner up.

Mine is similar to the one shown, but with a different display screen.

http://www.music-filibe.com/webshop/print_product_info.php/products_id/5306

I don’t know where my friend bought it or how much it cost. A Google search doesn’t turn up an American distributor. But I’m certain they didn’t order it from China.

I’m offering this review because – I really like this tuner. I would look for another if it were lost.

Overall Rating

9

Overall Comments

Overall Rating

10

Overall Comments

The first was from "Harry and Jeannie West" mail order. Simple hard shell. Non- suspension. Fairly light weight. It lasted 30 years. It took a major hit when it was about 15 years old and an airline forcibly gate checked it; one hinge was damaged (I repaired that) and the top scraped. The fiddles were intact so it performed it's job. I used it for several years after.

I bought a "Guardian" case from Elderly for my wife in May. She liked it at first. Suspension style, fiddles are locked in place tightly which makes it slow and awkward to insert and remove them but I think they are better protected. Then, after some use she complained about the weight and the difficulty of closing the case. The metal latch on the front does not always self align requiring some fidgeting to latch it.

Recently, I bought her a "Protec' case (From Musicians Friend) and inherited her Guardian. The Protec is also a suspension type and is over a pound lighter. The violins fit more easily and loosely into the Protec. The Protec does not have a latching metal latch but closes with a Velcro flap. To me it seems as secure; if someone is going to break into the case that metal latch won't stop them. I do think the metal latch keeps the structure more rigid. The Protec zipper has much larger teeth, seems sturdier and is easier and smoother to operate.

Both have an excess of external pockets in the nylon overwrap and pencil (!) holders. Can a model with cup holders be far away?

Bottom line- Guardian is slightly sturdier and more protective. The Protec is lighter and easier to use. Cost wasn't much different and the Guardian and Protec have similar dimensions.

Overall Rating

5

Sound

This fiddle is easy to play and is quite loud, with a bright, sweet tone with many over tones. Its an impressive intermediate level fiddle suitable for fiddle competions and local/regional performances.

Sound Rating

not rated

Appearance

This fiddle was antiqued and hand rubbed with sprit varnish to give it an aged and well used look. The double purfling is beautiful. The finish is thin and some what unsmooth and the fiddle appears as though to have spent its last 50 years in the Appalachia Mountains playing Bluegrass.

Appearance Rating

9

Customer Service

Customer Service provided by Cavallo's was SUPERB! I spoke personally with Alex Ross (Owner) and he helped me plan the set-up. The fiddle came exactly set-up as requested. The instrument was shipped UPS ground and was prepared and boxed perfectly and arrived on time and without any problems. I might also add, Cavallo's has a written policy which allows their customers who have purchased a violin from them, a 100% trade-in allowance towards a furture violin upgrade. A GREAT SERVICE FEATURE!

Customer Service

10

Overall Comments

A wonderful instrument well built by an old world violin maker and set up using the best available fittings at no additional cost. Craftmanship is superb and the sound is exactly what I was looking for in an intermediate level fiddle. Dealing with Cavallo's was a joy and I will use them for all of my future fiddle needs.

Overall Rating

10

Overall Comments

I'M A AMATEUR FIDDLE PLAYER, BUT THESE ARE MY THOUGHTS.BETTER THAN THE BRAZILWOOD I HAD.EASIER TO BOW WITH.BOWING TWO STRINGS IS EASIER.I LIVE IN A VERY LOW HUMIDITY IN SUMMER TO VERY HIGH HUMIDITY IN WINTER. ONE LESS THING TO WORRY AMOUNT.IT PLAYS THE SAME ALL THE TIME.

Overall Rating

8