It's amazing what new strings will do!

Tnfiddler · #1 01-03-2019, 06:59 PM

I finally broke the fiddle out again after MANY months of not playing it due to focusing on rhythm guitar and my singing. I've been playing again every day this week and yesterday I was noticing that my E and A strings in the upper positions sounded HORRIBLE, no matter which of my bows I was using. Today when I got it out to practice, I started thinking about how long my strings had been on there. Don't hate me for this, BUT this particular set of Helicore Heavy G,D and A strings and an Evah Pirrazi gold wound E string have been on my fiddle for about 6 years!!

I started digging through my string sets that I have on hand and I had to piece together a Zyex G, D and E string and a Helicore A string to have a completely new set. Even though it's two different sets of strings, my faithful fiddle that I fell in love with in 2008 when I bought it is BACK!! When I played in our band full time, I tried to switch them out every few months, but I haven't played fiddle in a group in several years and I didn't maintain it like I should've. It's time to buy some new strings if I'm going to be playing more again and NOT do this to my instrument anymore!

Paraclete · #2 01-07-2019, 10:47 AM

Ha! Yes, violin strings lose their intonation (and tone) after less than a year. I had a set of Evah Pirazzi on my violin since probably March, and I finally replaced them at the end of December. It’s amazing how dead those strings were. When I used to string up with Dominants, I’d change them out every 6 months. My luthier said I could get probably a year out of the EPs, but definitely not if I want to sound good! It’s a bit painful to think about shelling out $170/year for violin strings, but I’m kind of picky about sound.

Tnfiddler · #3 01-07-2019, 11:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paraclete

Ha! Yes, violin strings lose their intonation (and tone) after less than a year. I had a set of Evah Pirazzi on my violin since probably March, and I finally replaced them at the end of December. It’s amazing how dead those strings were. When I used to string up with Dominants, I’d change them out every 6 months. My luthier said I could get probably a year out of the EPs, but definitely not if I want to sound good! It’s a bit painful to think about shelling out $170/year for violin strings, but I’m kind of picky about sound.

I had a full set of Evah Pirazzi's on my fiddle for awhile and it didn't sound its best with them. For my bluegrass and country music playing, I've found my best combination to be the one I mentioned in my post. G, D, and A Helicore Heavy strings and a EP gold E. That combination is a winner on my fiddle and still isn't cheap(almost $60). I'm not going to do that to my poor fiddle ever again. I'm gonna make a point to play it at least 3 times a week and take better care of the strings.