I’m thinking of starting a section of my blog dedicated to “alternatives” — lifehacks I’ve made along the way. Here’s an attempt in that series — a long post, with pictures, about a topic that has become dear to me in the past few years — CHINRESTS! Enjoy.

I was a “buy nothing” kind of kid – I had the same bow since I was 11, the same viola since I was 17, and aside from playing with or without a shoulder rest, I never considered tweaking my setup any further —

Until I started playing the fadolín — since I had no teacher and a repertoire that was brand new, everything came into question.

Intrinsic similarities notwithstanding, there are significant differences between the violin, viola and the fadolín. The fadolín has a fatter neck and less space between the strings, making string crossings, sound production, and double stops, far more nuanced.

I spent the past couple of years trying different chinrests and shoulder paddies, amassing a box of options along the way — I wanted to share with you some of these stories, and to highlight some of the options that are less commonly known than what may be available at your local violin shop.

Every player will have a different situation because every instrument and every body is different — here are some avenues I’ve explored, and I hope they’re useful to you. I do not receive a commission from any of the options below, these are just my experiences. So, with that as a general disclaimer, let’s dive in:

There are many ways to hold a fiddle – shoulder rest? chin rest? perhaps a strap? Does the instrument balance on your shoulder or on your collarbone? For me, the best way to begin was to get rid of the chinrest altogether — baroque violinists don’t use chinrests, so why should I?

For a while I played with a “Paddy” from a company called String King — a Paddy is a deluxe version of a cloth, it’s attached to the button.:

Then eventually I wanted to have a little more support for shifting — so I got a minimalist “extended peanut” chinrest from Peter Purich in Montréal.:

That worked for a while — but my face kept landing either on the tailpiece or on the side of the instrument, taking some sound away.

My fadolín maker, Alexander Tulchinsky, designed this center-mount chinrest for me to address the issue:

But it felt too tall — also, around this time, I realized that holding the fadolín on its side may be more comfortable than holding it on the center.

For the next year or so, I experimented with the Kreddle — unlike a traditional chinrest, the Kreddle comes with three heights and an infinite number of angles, rotations and possibilities. I tried it in so many ways, including backwards — here are just a couple:

But it still wasn’t working — neither the high or low posts were making me comfortable for an extended while, but I was learning from my body that I wanted something lower, and that holding it on the side made it easier to play on the lower strings.

At the recommendation of a colleague, I went to two sessions with Claire Stefani, a body mapping specialist in NYC and also a violist. I learned a lot from Claire about the body, and we also agreed to try a custom chinrest from Frisch & Denig that Claire had measured specifically for me:

This really worked well for a while —– then I spent a couple of days in Budapest, where I saw this string band, where the player switched from holding the violin “normally” to holding it like a folk viola — on the side — and back again, between phrases:

I wanted to try a variation on this — it’s so much easier to play on the lower strings when the instrument is tilted! — I asked my luthier if this was something he’d consider making on a chinrest — he came up with this design — the left side of the chinrest became a sort of “ramp” that I could couch my chin on:

For a while I played like this, and also in combination with a Paddy:

At this point I also started to experiment with different ways to use a yarmulke (or “kippah”, a Jewish skullcap) instead of a shoulder rest. I found that different models offered various levels of friction, and that repositioning the yarmulke made a big difference both in sound and comfort, giving me more opportunities to experiment:

And then… after a few months.. I decided to google for “lowest chinrest” — and found The Wave Chinrest, DaCapo model.

The Wave Chinrest is something very interesting — and the process of buying one is also unique, in that they have a “buy one try four” model — they will ship you four chinrests to try for 30 days, and you ship back the ones that didn’t work. You can set up a virtual appointment to speak with Randall Olson, the owner, to discuss your individual setup needs.

This is where I’ve landed now — Wave Chinrest, with a kids yarmulke for a shoulder rest. In many ways, this setup is reminiscent of where I started — the chinrest is so low, it’s barely there — yet, crucially, it doesn’t take away sound from the instrument, and it has a hump that is perfect support for shifting.

But perhaps one day my setup will change again. I’m not afraid to change — I’m excited to explore.

Hope that this is useful!

Feel free to comment below.

warmest,
Ljova