Viola bow question: should I upgrade?

Question

Hi. Another of my seemingly endless viola questions! How much does upgrading the bow matter? I recently purchased a bottom of the line viola - the postage cost nearly as much as the instrument - but it is playable. I'm changing strings and the tailpiece, but the bow that came with it is junk. I have a decent bow I purchased for my electric viola (from Amazon, so not expensive, obviously) but it works fine on both my violas.

My question is, would upgrading to a better bow, most likely a 50.00-75.00 carbon fiber, be worth the expense given how cheap my viola is, plus the fact that I'm doing this on my own, no instructors involved? I suspect the biggest part of the sound problems I experience are 'pilot error,' not equipment. Would I be wasting my money with a bow in that price range?

DLashof · Answer

A $50-75 bow is not much of an upgrade but compared to the awful things that come with those really cheap instruments you get on line, it might be at least useable. If you have a decent bow already that you use on your electric, why can't you use that for your acoustic? I would probably wait until you could spend around $150 on a bow or maybe wait until you could get a much better entire outfit in the $600-1000 range.

? · Answer

Thanks for the answer. Yes, I'm sharing my 'good' bow between both instruments, now, and would do the same with any better bow I pick up, especially as I still use my electric for the majority of my playing/practicing.

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Viola bow question: should I upgrade?

2 Answers