Five Funny Fiddle Fails

Performances don't always go right. Things have been going wrong in performances for hundreds of years, and I am certain that there are more fails to come. With a string instrument, there are many things to go wrong, and wrong they go! Let's get failing!

1. Instruments are under a lot of tension. A viola can have 60 pounds or more stretched across it. Strings breaking is pretty common, but this more spectacular fail of the tail gut is (fortunately) rare. The tail gut--the piece of rope-like material that holds the tailpiece to the instrument--bears the totality of the string tension 24/7/365. When this critical piece breaks, it makes for a funny fail. This guy just shrugs it off!



~~~

2. Few string players really think about how they are trusting their entire performances, even careers, to the tiny pieces of wood that hold the hair in their bows. Bow tip blowout is a perennial mode of failure for string players. When it happens in front of people, it can be awkward, but the reactions are priceless. This woman took the "forge ahead no matter what" approach. I love the expression on her face after her bow blew out! In the description of this video, she said that "I uploaded this video to give people a laugh, not to try to convince the world that I'm an excellent violinist." I think she handled the failure with class, and that proves a lot about her musicianship in addition to providing a chuckle.

Click the "Watch this video on YouTube" link to see the video, as the owner of this video disabled playback outside of YouTube.

~~~

3. Here is another bow tip blowout. This one happened to a little girl who doesn't have much violin experience. It looks like a pretty low end bow in the video, and I'm surprised it blew out. The cheap bows are usually put together with some kind of goop that is hard to get out when it comes time for a rehair. I've done my share of those--not fun. The look in this girl's eyes is priceless!

~~~

4. People drop things, and if you play a string instrument, chances are you've dropped your bow at some point. This is a very dramatic example of bow dropping. That one hit the floor hard, and you can even see the cloud of white dust fly off the hair. Given the fragility of bows, I hope this one is OK!



~~~

5. Even the gratest seasoned professionals aren't immune to fails! Leonidas Kavakos, one of the best violinists living today, had his violin fail him in a performance of Mozart's Violin Concerto in G Major. When he made his entry with the main theme, he found out quickly that the friction holding his strings in tune had given way yielding a funny result.

It is only the audio here, but it's still funny.




There you have it. Some funny fiddle fails that I hope made you laugh!