Although all share a place in classical music, they are also used to a lesser degree in jazz, electronic music, rock, and other types of popular music, where they are often amplified, or simply created to be used as electric instruments. The instruments of the violin family are the most used bowed string instruments in the world today. The neck, bridge and ribs are maple, while the nut is often ebony. Similarly of a variable thickness, the back is most commonly crafted from maple ( poplar and willow were used for some baroque instruments). The top of the instrument, crafted from spruce, is thinner at the edges than the center. The double bass is played standing or sitting on a stool, with a range that typically reaches a minor sixth, an octave or a ninth below the cello's. The cello is played sitting down with the instrument between the knees, and its playing range reaches an octave below the viola's. The viola, being the larger of the two instruments, has a playing range that reaches a perfect fifth below the violin's. The double bass is often equipped with a mechanical extension or a fifth string that increases its lower range to either C 1 or B 0, respectively.īoth the violin and viola are played under the jaw. The ranges are as follows: violin: G 3 to E 7 (practical, notes up to A7 are possible) viola: C 3 to A 6 (conservative) violoncello: C 2 to A 5 (conservative) and double-bass: E 1 to C 5 (slightly expanded from conservative estimate). The playing ranges of the instruments in the violin family overlap each other, but the tone quality and physical size of each distinguishes them from one another. In contrast, the viol family instruments usually have five to six strings with a fretted fingerboard, are tuned in fourths and thirds, often have sloping shoulders, and do not necessarily have a sound post or bass bar.įrench (top) and German (bottom) double bass bows Characteristics Violin family instruments have four strings each, are tuned in fifths (except the double bass, which is tuned in fourths), are not fretted and have four rounded bouts while always having a sound post and bass bar inside. However, instruments in the violin family are set apart from viols by similarities in shape, tuning practice and history. Its origins aside, it has historically been used as the lowest member of the violin family.Īll string instruments share similar form, parts, construction and function, and the viols bear a particularly close resemblance to the violin family. They point to the internal construction of the double bass, which includes a sound post and bass bar like other violin family instruments as a more weighty piece of evidence than the external features. Others point out that correlation does not imply causation and say that these external similarities are either arbitrary or that they arose from causes other than a relationship to the viol family. The double bass is sometimes taken to be part of the viol family, due to its sloping shoulders, its tuning, the practice of some basses being made with more than four strings and its sometimes flat back. While the cello (which developed from the bass violin), the viola and the violin are indisputable members of the ancestral violin or viola da braccio family, the double bass's origins are sometimes called into question. The instruments of the violin family may be descended in part from the lira da braccio and the medieval Byzantine lira. (The violone is not part of the modern violin family its place is taken by the modern double bass, an instrument with a mix of violin and viol characteristics.)īackground Violin, viola, and cello bow frogs (top to bottom) A violin is a "little viola", a violone is a "big viola" or a bass violin, and a violoncello (often abbreviated cello) is a "small violone" (or literally, a "small big viola"). Instrument names in the violin family are all derived from the root viola, which is a derivative of the Medieval Latin word vitula (meaning "stringed instrument"). The standard modern violin family consists of the violin, viola, cello, and (possibly) double bass. At the time the name of this family of instruments was viole da braccio which was used to distinguish them from the viol family (viole da gamba). The violin family of musical instruments was developed in Italy in the 16th century.
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