Not as simple as it may seem

Just like friendships, musicians need to care for their instruments. Keeping them away from sudden temperature changes, low (and too high) humidity, keeping it clean of rosin dust to avoid damaging the varnish, and of course, minding every edge of it to avoid bruises or cracks that are much more expensive to repair than most car wrecks.

There are dozens of brands for strings, rosins, polishes, cleaning agents, and musicians become so picky and sensible choosing the right ones for them, that you would hardly find two violins with the same string choice in an orchestra. Most musicians don't even have all four strings of the same brand! The same happens with maintenance that needs to me made by experts. Bending and correcting bridges, fingerboards, tuners... And of course, bow rehairing!

A fresh bow rehair

My bow hair was way too old and I desperately needed to change rosin (we try not to mix rosins) and a friend of mine offered me a nice bow rehair. The job was nicely and properly, without any glue at all, and since I was about to change rosin I took some time to appreciate his work and take some photos!

Bows are made of horsehair (although there are some vegan alternatives I'll soon try with another bow), usually from mongolian or siberian white or black horses. After being thoroughly treated, the horsehair is ready to be weighted and applied to a bow. Which requires a lot of practice and mastery: it's not easy at all!

The frog or nut of a modern bow has a ingenious yet simple mechanism that allows us to put pressure on the bow hair. The screw goes inside the small groove on the wood and pulls the little brass eye. The nut moves towards the end of the bow and tightens the bow hair:

The archetier needs to be sure the bow hair won't come out with pressure. They place a small block of wood in both ends with the exact right size to squeeze the bow hair, holding it in it's place. This requires a lot of mastery and pacience, specially if you don't succumb to the temptation of glueing the block! Here's a picture of the top block: the bow hair goes around the block and stays there because my friend spend hours making that block not even a milimeter less than perfect.

Some lazy archetiers would simply glue the block to the bow, leaving residues and making the next bow rehair a bit more difficult. Some musicians also prefer that way since it diminishes the risk. Here's the other block, on the nut end:

The size of the bow hair is also an important matter. You want your bow to preserve a convex shape, which makes the pressure more even towards the end of the bow. Some early bows have the opposite shape, more suitable to their musical taste and use.

Finally, you need to apply rosin to the bow. A nice and clean bow hair allows rosin to sit in the scales of the hair, which will grab the string and make it vibrate! A good rosin makes no noise, no dust, and will make the playing easy and fun! I chose Andrea Rosin, which is a waaaay too expensive rosin, but since everyone says wonders of it, well... I should try, isn't it?

Did you know music bows were so complex?

Can you even guess how much can a bow cost?

Did you know some musicians are starting to use carbon fiber bows instead of wood?

Just comment below with your questions!

This is my entry for @novili's Educators Showdown. I can only reccomend visiting his blog and the other contestant's posts!

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