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Violin   Listen
noun
Violin  n.  (Mus.) A small instrument with four strings, played with a bow; a fiddle. Note: The violin is distinguished for the brilliancy and gayety, as well as the power and variety, of its tones, and in the orchestra it is the leading and most important instrument.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Violin" Quotes from Famous Books



... interpretation of grace notes, "appoggiaturas" and others. In these cases there is an unfortunate habit in players of conforming to their own taste, which may guide a little, but cannot suffice in every instance. One can be convinced of this in studying The Method of Violin by the father of Mozart. We find there things which one would ...
— On the Execution of Music, and Principally of Ancient Music • Camille Saint-Saens

... "where are my choice books, my editions de luxe? There were some splendid volumes here, rare, you understand, worth money. She must have sold them also. I recollect when she begged me to let her take them out of my room. And a violin—of the most superb—that is gone! You know ...
— Ringfield - A Novel • Susie Frances Harrison

... Lewis, "can make a man!" Then mould' his form with most artistic ease— But all aeolian strains Blind Tom could scan, And play as softly as the South Sea breeze Upon his major and his minor keys! Good Douglas gently wakes the violin's song, And White leads home the zephyrs from the seas; While Coleridge-Taylor with an art more strong Full finds the key-note ...
— The Sylvan Cabin - A Centenary Ode on the Birth of Lincoln and Other Verse • Edward Smyth Jones

... word music, the sound of Arcadian pipes heard faintly for a moment above the harsh roar of London. For her the dead poet's voice rose clearly through the clamour of the living; it was like the silver wailing of a violin in a blaring discord ...
— Olive in Italy • Moray Dalton

... her savagely, but nevertheless communicated the order to the orchestra, and as the music waned to a mere wailing of the violin, the little dancer, rosy, hot, tired, whirled slower, slower,—then sank on her bed of green, and like her companions feigned sleep with the cunning pretence ...
— The Angel of the Tenement • George Madden Martin

... the same department is in some ways an accomplished fellow. He has read widely and remembers what he has read; he plays the violin; he is an excellent pianist, and he is a member of the college male quartet, which is to spend the summer in the North, endeavoring to raise money for new buildings greatly needed at Talladega. After this summer campaign he also hopes to begin ...
— The American Missionary — Volume 54, No. 3, July, 1900 • Various

... a winch to the tail-piece of a violin, substantially as and for the purpose herein ...
— Scientific American, Vol. 17, No. 26 December 28, 1867 • Various

... away from work, listening to her singing. She had been taught by a good master and her voice was pure and pliant, although as yet only half developed. The little concerts they gave their friends were really charming — with Clifford's banjo, Gethryn's guitar, Thaxton's violin, Yvonne's voice and piano. Clifford made the programs. They were profusely illustrated, and he spent a great deal of time rehearsing, writing verses, and rehashing familiar airs (he called it "composing") which would have been as ...
— In the Quarter • Robert W. Chambers

... difficulty, I prevailed upon four or five of them to venture on board. As soon as they entered the ship I made them several, presents, and in a very little time they appeared to be perfectly at ease. As I was very desirous to entertain them, one of the midshipmen played upon the violin, and some of my people danced; at this they were so much delighted, and so impatient to show their gratitude, that one of them went over the ship's side into the canoe, and fetched up a seal-skin bag of red paint, and immediately smeared the fiddler's face all over with ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr

... his violin from the corner, and as I stretched myself out he began to play some low, dreamy, melodious air,—his own, no doubt, for he had a remarkable gift for improvisation. I have a vague remembrance of his gaunt limbs, his earnest ...
— The Sign of the Four • Arthur Conan Doyle

... darting up and up, crossing, dipping, dancing in the smoky sunshine that flooded thinly the noisy squalor of the Yards. Blair, looking at them, said, under his breath, in pure delight, "Yes, just like the high notes. A flight of violin notes!" ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland

... a piece of good advice; he was himself the instance that pointed and adorned his various talk. Nor could a young man have found elsewhere a place so set apart from envy, fear, discontent, or any of the passions that debase; a life so honest and composed; a soul like an ancient violin, so subdued to harmony, responding to a touch in music—as in that dining-room, with Mr. Hunter chatting at the eleventh hour, under the shadow of ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson

... rhetoric to speak of the statue as existing in the block of marble before the sculptor touches it. How easy to fall into such false analogies! Can we say that the music existed in the flute or in the violin before the musician touches them? The statue in the form of an idea or a conception exists in the mind of the sculptor, and he fashions the marble accordingly. Does the book exist in the pot of printer's ink? Living things exist in the germ, the oak in the acorn, the chick in the ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs

... the strains of music floating up the wide staircase. There was the soft sound of whispered words from bed to bed like the sleepy twitterings of birdlings in their nests, and then silence. Cherry and Lorene were fast asleep. Downstairs the carols ceased, the wail of violin and guitar died away, and the murmur of voices was again borne to the straining ears of the ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown

... beautifully. My daughter loves music. She plays the violin better than anybody you ever heard in ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore

... exchange the noisy, wholesome family life of the Martels for the silent, somber grandeur of the Bartletts. His affections had taken root in the shabby little brown house that always seemed to be humming gaily to itself. When the piano was not being played, the violin or guitar was. There were bursts of laughter, snatches of song, and young people going and coming through doors that never ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice

... although curiously enough it may seem to him excellent at the time of writing. The perception of the fingers, as well as the perception of the mind, seems blunted by the use of alcohol. Dr. Alfred Carpenter relates that a celebrated violin player, as he was about to go on the platform, was asked if he would take a glass of wine before he appeared, "Oh, no, thank you," he replied, "I shall have it when I come off." This answer excited Mr. Carpenter's curiosity, and he inquired of the violinist why ...
— Study and Stimulants • A. Arthur Reade

... it. Just listen. 'Margaret, the high-collared head with a white ribbon; she rides on a bike, plays a violin, and talks in broken English,—I am glad to see you.'" Natural history appears ...
— Botchan (Master Darling) • Mr. Kin-nosuke Natsume, trans. by Yasotaro Morri

... well-to-do residents chose to give an entertainment in the schoolroom, and admitted the poor into the cheaper seats. Everybody knows the nature of these functions. There were readings and recitations; young ladies sang drawing-room songs or played the violin; tableaux were displayed or a polite farce was performed; a complimentary speech wound up the entertainment; and then the performers withdrew again for several months into the aloofness of their residences, while the poor got through ...
— Change in the Village • (AKA George Bourne) George Sturt

... with language. Language is merely a medium for thoughts, emotions, the intelligence of a finely wrought brain, and a good mind will make far more out of a bad medium than a poor mind will make out of the best. A great violinist will draw such music from the cheapest violin that the world is astonished. However is that any reason why the great violinist should choose to play on a poor violin; or should one say nothing of the smoke nuisance in Chicago because more light and heat penetrate its murky atmosphere than are ...
— The Art Of Writing & Speaking The English Language - Word-Study and Composition & Rhetoric • Sherwin Cody

... gazed unseeingly before him, as though black Fate hovered in the air—before women, whose lives are steeped in the lowest intrigue—before men, whose faces are as bearded masks, covering the wolf's snarl,—yes!—I played before these,—played with all the chords of my heart vibrating to the violin, till at last a human sigh quivered from the lips of the statuesque Empress,—till a frown crossed the brooding brow of her spouse—till the intriguing women shook off the spell with a laugh, and the men did the same with an oath—and I was ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli

... of the 21st; I used to hear the bell ring for the servant, more than once; he occupied the whole of the upper part of the house, I and my husband had the two parlours. I heard him also occasionally playing the violin and trumpet, and he used to walk about; he then wore whiskers. I generally heard his bell; I did not see him come home on the Monday; I saw him in the evening, about half past five; I had heard him in the afternoon. He quitted my house ...
— The Trial of Charles Random de Berenger, Sir Thomas Cochrane, • William Brodie Gurney

... with conventional Italian scenes, were built round a court. The orchestra was playing as we entered and selected our table. It was not a bad orchestra, and we were no sooner seated than the first violin began to speak, to assert itself, as if it were suddenly done ...
— Youth and the Bright Medusa • Willa Cather

... country in the world is the practice of music more universally extended and at the same time the science so little understood as in America. Almost every house included between the Delaware and Schuylkill has its piano or harpsichord, its violin, its flute, or its clarinet. Almost every young lady and gentleman from the children of the Judge, the banker, and the general, down to those of the constable, the huckster, and the drummer, can make a noise ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor, Vol. I, No. 5, May 1810 • Various

... turn grew stiff, as every muscle fell into play. The shoulders pushed forward and down. The forearms, revealed by the short sleeves, showed a bewildering tangle of corded muscle, and, at the wrists, the tendons sprang out as distinct and white as the new strings of a violin. ...
— Bull Hunter • Max Brand

... between Frohman and Stoddart, who, in a way, was a character. He played the violin, and when business was bad and the company got in the dumps Stoddart added to their misfortunes by playing doleful tunes on his fiddle. But that fiddle had a virtue not to be despised, because it was Stoddart's bank. In its hollow box he secreted his ...
— Charles Frohman: Manager and Man • Isaac Frederick Marcosson and Daniel Frohman

... there's Gladys Alden who plays the violin beautifully, and Jean Ratcliffe who can recite like a professional and—oh, dear, there's no end to the talent. And we'll——" she paused dramatically and surveyed them with ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Army Service - Doing Their Bit for the Soldier Boys • Laura Lee Hope

... against the conquering Turks, which, however little they may have conduced to bar the progress of the invaders, sound remarkably well in verse. Sometimes, as in the present case, the voice is accompanied by the guesla, a kind of violin ...
— Herzegovina - Or, Omer Pacha and the Christian Rebels • George Arbuthnot

... naval officer about the adventures of three sailing ships which had bested two submarines three days before in the Mediterranean; some Moroccan sailors were flirting across two tables with some pretty Piedmontese girls, and inside the cafe, the harp, the flute and the violin were doing what they could to make all our hearts beat young! A picture show across the street sprayed its gay crowd over the sidewalks and a vaudeville house down stairs gathered up rivulets of humanity from the spray. Somewhere near ...
— The Martial Adventures of Henry and Me • William Allen White

... confidential valet, was a tall, slender man, with gray hair, rather bald, and with a sly, cool, discreet, and reserved expression; he used very choice language, had polite, easy manners, rather literary, political opinions of the Conservative stamp, and could creditably play his part of first violin in a quartet of amateurs; at short intervals he took, with the best grace in the world, a pinch of snuff from a golden box mounted with fine pearls, after which he brushed negligently, with the back of his hand, the folds of his fine linen shirt, quite as fine as ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue

... "with my music, perhaps. You talk nonsense, when you talk of her falling in love with me, of her marrying a poor musician. What then? To have one instrument more in her palace! Let her marry her piano-forte,—or her violin, if ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... whitewash"; but I happen to have a long critique of this particular picture written in the year 1845, and I see no change in it since then. Mr. Murray's critic also tells you to observe in it that "the daughter of Herodias playing on a violin is not unlike Perugino's treatment of similar subjects." By which Mr. Murray's critic means that the male musician playing on a violin, whom, without looking either at his dress, or at the rest of the fresco, he took for the daughter of Herodias, has a broad face. Allowing ...
— Mornings in Florence • John Ruskin

... were received with generous applause. Once or twice, a recitation, very spiritedly rendered in a powerful Scottish accent, varied the proceedings; and once we sought in vain to dance a quadrille, eight men of us together, to the music of the violin. The performers were all humorous, frisky fellows, who loved to cut capers in private life; but as soon as they were arranged for the dance, they conducted themselves like so many mutes at a funeral. I have never seen decorum pushed so far; and as this was ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... finished their feast, and betook themselves to dancing in an alley smoothed for a croquet-ground, and to the sound of a violin played by the old grandfather of one of the party. While Mrs. Braefield was busying herself with forming the dance, Kenelm seized the occasion to escape from a young nymph of the age of twelve who had sat next him at the banquet, and ...
— Kenelm Chillingly, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... Not upon her sister Lucia and Paolo Tosti whom she had been assigned to chaperon by reading a book to herself in the adjoining room—no, they were safely busy with piano and violin, and she was heartily bored, anyway, with their inanities. Voices from another direction had pricked her ...
— The Innocent Adventuress • Mary Hastings Bradley

... her all the way to No. 260, Ladbroke Grove Road, where she was going to a music-lesson, or rather music-practice, with a friend who played the violin; for Sally was ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan

... feverish hands, haggard faces and hawk-like eyes, pursuing their race after excitement. A silence had come over the party. The play was high and the gamesters too absorbed to note anything but the game. From the ball-room came the sound of violin, flute and harpsichord, shrieks of shrill laughter, oaths from drunken wranglers and the continual thump ...
— Madame Flirt - A Romance of 'The Beggar's Opera' • Charles E. Pearce

... if she is naturally musical some kind of help and sympathy must be given her in her attempt to master the piano or violin or to manage her own voice. But while she should be allowed to learn as much as her unurged energies permit her to learn, she should not be required to practice more than a very small amount, say half an hour a day. The bulk of her musical education should be acquired ...
— Study of Child Life • Marion Foster Washburne

... Jordan, in "Sigfridsage." Henrietta Sontag and the coming Paganini. Wagner's Volker-Wilhelmj at Bayreuth. Magic fiddles and wonderworking fiddlers. Grimm's Fairy Tales. Norse folk-lore. English nursery rhymes. Crickets as fiddlers. Progenitors of violin. The violin of Queen Elizabeth and her age. Shakespeare in Twelfth Night. Household of Charles II. Butler, in Hudibras. Viola d'amore in Milwaukee, Wis. Brescian and Cremonese violin-makers. Early violinists. Value and history of some ...
— For Every Music Lover - A Series of Practical Essays on Music • Aubertine Woodward Moore

... was also an orchestra. Behold then, one layer of great photoplay, one layer of bad melodrama, one layer of explanation, and a final cement of music. It is as though in an art museum there should be a man at the door selling would-be masterly short-stories about the paintings, and a man with a violin playing the catalogue. But for further discourse on the ...
— The Art Of The Moving Picture • Vachel Lindsay

... be simply his violin playing. They say he was a pupil of a master of the dark art in Germany, and can practise on us to make us think his commonest utterances extraordinarily acute and precious. Lord Fleetwood runs round quoting him to everybody, quite ridiculously. But the man's influence is sufficient ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith

... the picture did not convince her. She was his severest censor. Not one of the professional critics could put their fingers on Van Kuyp's weak spots—"his sore music," as he jestingly called it—so surely as his wife. She had studied; she had even played the violin in public; but she gave up her virtuosa ambitions for the man she had married during their student years in Germany. Now the old doubts came to life as the chivalric tones of Weber rose to her sharpened senses. ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker

... the same class. 5. He thinks you yourself and I me myself should bring the books. 6. Our friends and we us ourselves are going out to-night. 7. Herself she and her husband have been sick. 8. They themselves and their children have gone abroad. 9. You play the violin better than he himself. 10. The machine failed to work well, because it itself and the engine were not properly adjusted to each other. 11. Let them do it theirselves themselves. 12. He came by hisself himself. 13. The teacher hisself himself could not have done better. 14. I'll bring ...
— Practical Grammar and Composition • Thomas Wood

... Tuesday for another day, but in caring for my coming at all; for my coming and being told at the door that you were engaged, and I might call another time! And you are NOT, NOT my 'other friend,' any more than this head of mine is my other head, seeing that I have got a violin which has a head too! All which, beware lest you get fully told in the letter I will write this evening, when I have done with my Romans—who are, it so happens, here at this minute; that is, have left the house for a few minutes with my sister—but are not 'with me,' as you seem to understand ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett

... magnificent costumes, officers in uniforms flashing with gold, the show of wealth and power, the perfume of flowers and the music of violin and flutes gave Margaret the impression of a dream, so sharp was the contrast with her own life and people in ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon

... forget" She, I, and They Near Lanivet, 1872 Joys of Memory To the Moon Copying Architecture in an Old Minster To Shakespeare Quid hic agis? On a Midsummer Eve Timing Her Before Knowledge The Blinded Bird "The wind blew words" The Faded Face The Riddle The Duel At Mayfair Lodgings To my Father's Violin The Statue of Liberty The Background and the Figure The Change Sitting on the Bridge The Young Churchwarden "I travel as a phantom now" Lines to a Movement in Mozart's E-flat Symphony "In the seventies" The Pedigree This Heart. A Woman's Dream Where they lived The Occultation Life laughs ...
— Moments of Vision • Thomas Hardy

... there with his violin tucked under one arm and a volume of his memoirs under the other. He evinced a strong preference for the society of "Joan of Arc," while "Sarah Crewe," "Little Lord Fauntleroy," and "Rebecca of Sunnybrook" traveled about ...
— Grace Harlowe's Fourth Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower

... the old songs, Stuart" Druce would say to her father, who not only sang, but played the violin. ...
— The Portland Peerage Romance • Charles J. Archard

... containing the musicians' instruments, followed this tilted wagon. Some members of the orchestra would not part with theirs, and behind the saddle of many a mounted virtuoso or attendant was fastened a violin case or a shapeless bag which concealed some ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... it was Parnassus, as Watteau would have painted it. Here we had a rural syllabub, and part of the company returned to town; but were replaced by Giardini and Onofrio, who with Nivernois on the violin, and Lord Pembroke on the bass, accompanied Miss Pelham, Lady Rockingham, and the Duchess of Grafton, who sang. This little concert lasted till past ten; then there were minuets, and as we had seven couple left, it concluded with a country dance. ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole - Volume I • Horace Walpole

... concerning the weird music that had drawn him to that place had been partially satisfied by the discovery of a violin on the floor beside the sick man's bed. Now, as he flung himself wearily down on the lounge for a bit of rest, he became conscious of the muffled b-r-r-r of a dynamo. That accounted in a measure for the electric ...
— Under the Great Bear • Kirk Munroe

... C is the lowest note of the tenor voice or the tenor violin (viola). It is one octave from the bottom note of a modern organ keyboard, which is called CC. The lowest note of the pedal-board is CCC. Counting from the bottom upwards on the manual we have, therefore, CC (double C), C (tenor C), c ...
— The Recent Revolution in Organ Building - Being an Account of Modern Developments • George Laing Miller

... properly, we must base it completely upon modern psycho physical fundamentals. Whoever expects unaided to find the right thing at the right moment is in the position of the individual who didn't know whether he could play the violin because he had not yet tried. We must gather wisdom while we are not required to use it; when the time for use arrives, the time for harvest ...
— Robin Hood • J. Walker McSpadden

... sang and danced and this was what they called a "frolic." As a general rule this same thing was permitted after the crops had been gathered. Music for these occasions was furnished by violin, banjo and a clapping of hands. Mr. Bland says that he used to help furnish this music as Mr. Coxton ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration

... is dear above all instruments," replied she; "it alone has tones that respond to those of the human heart." [Footnote: The infanta, who played on several instruments, excelled on the violin. Wraxall, vol. ...
— Joseph II. and His Court • L. Muhlbach

... close upon daybreak. The great wall of pines and hemlocks that keep off the west wind from Stillwater stretches black and indeterminate against the sky. At intervals a dull, metallic sound, like the guttural twang of a violin string, rises form the frog-invested swamp skirting the highway. Suddenly the birds stir in their nests over there in the woodland, and break into that wild jargoning chorus with which they herald the advent of a new day. In the apple-orchards and among the plum-trees of the few gardens ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich

... health demanding a change of occupation, he became agent for the publishing house of Matthew Carey of Philadelphia, and was very successful, being "equally ready for a stump, a fair, or a pulpit." He played the violin, read, recited, and was humorous and interesting ...
— Southern Literature From 1579-1895 • Louise Manly

... was hanging low over the western hills as we approached the barracks, and out of the open windows came the merry, mad sounds of violin, guitar, and flageolet, the tinkle of a triangle now and then, the shouts of laughter, the shuffle of many feet over the puncheons. Within the door, smiling and benignant, unmindful of the stifling atmosphere, ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... a thing to be ashamed of, and, much to Miss Chester's annoyance, always pretended ignorance which did not exist. What she was proud of, and thrust foremost in her conversation, were the accomplishments of two highly-educated daughters, who painted on china, and played the violin, and on this subject she received no encouragement from ...
— Black, White and Gray - A Story of Three Homes • Amy Walton

... minuet with a plump Faenza jar; a tall Dutch clock was going through a gavotte with a spindle-legged ancient chair; a very droll porcelain figure of Littenhausen was bowing to a very stiff soldier in terre cuite of Ulm; an old violin of Cremona was playing itself, and a queer little shrill plaintive music that thought itself merry came from a painted spinet covered with faded roses; some gilt Spanish leather had got up on the wall and laughed; a Dresden mirror was tripping about, crowned with flowers, and a Japanese bonze ...
— The Nuernberg Stove • Louisa de la Rame (AKA Ouida)

... covered with elaborate carvings. Groups of musical instruments, standing out almost detached from the background, occupy the panels. Ancient and modern, clustered with careless grace and quaint variety, from the violin down to a string of sleigh-bells, they call up all the echoes of forgotten music, such as the thousand-tongued organ blends ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various

... store door the place was empty; but from the rear came the quavering notes of a violin. Being drawn from the wailing strings was a new harmony—new, that is, for Hopewell Drugg. He was fond of the old tunes; but for the most part his musical tastes ran to ...
— The Mission of Janice Day • Helen Beecher Long

... to a little gray hut. Candles were burning inside, the windows being too small to let in much light. They caught the sound of violin music and the clatter of dancing feet. Still the girls paused, wonderingly. "Is it here?" they questioned. "Can any one dance here? The place looks too small ...
— Jerusalem • Selma Lagerlof

... Hebrew. He had a projecting under lip, with which he continually smiled, or rather smirked. Mrs. Kelmar was a singularly kind woman; and the oldest son had quite a dark and romantic bearing, and might be heard on summer evenings playing sentimental airs on the violin. ...
— The Silverado Squatters • Robert Louis Stevenson

... yet my eyes have not closed themselves to sleep: Alexis and Brilliard give me hopes of a kind return to this, and have brought their flute and violin to charm me into a slumber: if Sylvia love, as I am sure she does, she will wake me with a dear consent to see me; if not, I only ...
— Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister • Aphra Behn

... class hours in the vaulted Gothic school-rooms he applied himself mostly to tasting the sensations of such bits of insight to the lees, and thinking them out in their entirety. This occupation afforded the same kind of satisfaction as when he would walk up and down his room with his violin (for he played the violin), letting the soft tones, as soft as he could produce them, mingle with the plashing of the fountain which rose in a flickering jet under the branches of the old ...
— The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries - Masterpieces of German Literature Vol. 19 • Various

... the Spanish Gitanos, we shall have subsequently more to say: thus they live in filth, in rags, in nakedness, and in merriness of heart, for nowhere is there more of song and dance than in an Hungarian Gypsy village. They are very fond of music, and some of them are heard to touch the violin in a manner wild, but of peculiar excellence. Parties of them have been known to exhibit even ...
— The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow

... by playing slow piano or quick forte compositions. She clearly and conclusively indicated that loud, quick music was disagreeable to her. Professor C. Reclain of Leipsic, once, during a concert, saw a spider descend from one of the chandeliers and hang suspended above the orchestra during a violin solo; as soon, however, as the full orchestra joined in, it quickly ascended to its web.[59] This fact of musical discrimination in a creature so low in the scale of animal life is truly wonderful; it indicates that these ...
— The Dawn of Reason - or, Mental Traits in the Lower Animals • James Weir

... provided for her; it is twilight, and she is in the garden, looking down upon all this"—he waved his hand comprehensively—"it is her moment—the triumph and climax of love. Try to think what she is saying!" He paused, and they stood breathless and enchained, while the violin trembled under the hand of its master, ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston

... old instruments, but in the end he seemed to think it might show a want of respect to Madame his late wife (now dead two years), so the accompanying never came off. For the same reason his daughter, who he said "in the times" had played the violin well, had never touched her instrument since ...
— Fanny Goes to War • Pat Beauchamp

... was over, the room was cleared of the tables, and swept; the music, consisting of a guitar, flute, and violin, called in; and the ball was opened. At first the forest belles were rather shy in the presence of strangers; but they soon warmed up, and began to dance with more animation. They were all dressed in calico or muslin skirts, with loose white cotton ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various

... dim recollection of their early days, or merely the love of a show of any kind that is inherent in all the Latin race, but they seemed much impressed. While the collection was being made there was music—very good local talent—two violin soli played by a young fellow, from one of the small neighbouring chateaux, whom we all knew well, and the "Panus Angelicus" of Cesar Franck, very well sung by the wife of the druggist. The cure of La Ferte, a ...
— Chateau and Country Life in France • Mary King Waddington

... Goodfellow. Carpenter and House-Decorator, &c. Repairs Neatly Executed. Instruction in the Violin. Funerals at the ...
— Poison Island • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)

... this boy. Let us follow him into the story land of childhood. In Germany every child passes through fairyland, but there was no such land in Josiah Franklin's tallow shop, except when the busy man sometimes played the violin in the inner room and sang psalms to the music, usually ...
— True to His Home - A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin • Hezekiah Butterworth

... them soon, she thought, and their ugly faces. She shivered slightly as she recalled the face of "Le Boss" as it was last bent upon her, frowning and dark, and as ugly as a hundred devils, she was quite sure. Ah, he would take away her violin—Le Boss! he would give it to his own girl, whom she, Marie, had taught till she could play a very little, enough to keep the birds from flying away when they saw her, as they otherwise might; she was to have the violin, the Lady, one's own heart and life, and Marie was ...
— Marie • Laura E. Richards

... the affectionate greetings of the women of Utah, and Mrs. Chapman Catt referred to the loving testimonials which had been sent by the Idaho women.[133] Then after an exquisite violin solo by Mr. Douglass, she said: "The liberties of the citizens of the future will be still more an outgrowth of this movement than those of the present," and to the delighted surprise of the audience the following scene occurred, as described ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV • Various

... President was pale with fright at my coming, though I had with me a woman whom she knew very well. After she had recovered from the shock, we had a very agreeable time. She called in some of her family; one daughter played well on the piano, a large grand, and another played upon the violin. In the meantime refreshments were served in lavish profusion. They offered me very handsome cloths and embroideries, which I declined with thanks. It is a ...
— An Ohio Woman in the Philippines • Emily Bronson Conger

... came into the world dancing. It is related that Gritry, when he was scarcely four years of age, had an idea of musical tunes. Mademoiselle de Camargo danced at a much earlier age. She was still in arms when the combined airs of a violin and a hautboy caught her ear. She jumped about full of life, and during the whole time that the music was playing, she danced, there is no other word for it, keeping time with great delight. It must be stated that ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various

... music, At his violin's sound they grew, Through the moonlit eves of summer, Making ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... desirable that the master should add instrumental to vocal music. He should be able to play on the violin, flute, or clarionet, but, as he must speak much, the former is to be preferred. Such is the influence of the weather, that children are almost always dull on dull days, and then a little music is of great advantage. On wet days, when they cannot go into the play-ground, ...
— The Infant System - For Developing the Intellectual and Moral Powers of all Children, - from One to Seven years of Age • Samuel Wilderspin

... in the road and listened. The constituents of the concert resolved themselves to his ear. There was a wonderful soprano, a tenor, a bass, one sweet boy's voice, a bass-viol, and a violin. They were practising a fugue. The soprano rang out like ...
— Madelon - A Novel • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... middle ages were reformed. The rebeck, to whose loud and harsh strains the medieval rustic had danced, [Footnote: The rebeck probably had been borrowed from the Mohammedans.] by the addition of a fourth string and a few changes in form, became the sweet-toned violin, the most important and expressive instrument of the modern orchestra. As immediate forerunner of our present-day pianoforte, the harpsichord was invented with a keyboard carried to four octaves and the chords of each note doubled or ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes

... all the time with a metrical fluency, he scraped a little jig on the violin, while Dummer led off a procession which solemnly capered round the room in sundry stages of conscious awkwardness. Mr. Bultitude shuffled along somehow after the rest, with rebellion at his heart and ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey

... entertain me. They came on as thick as spatter. One played a few things on the violin. Another set up her easel and painted a picture for us. A third wrote a poem and read it to us. And a few sophomores hung about in the background. It was all rather too much. I found myself preferring those hours together in dear ...
— Bertram Cope's Year • Henry Blake Fuller

... up the idea of ever seeing Portland," answered Dora, staring with all her blue eyes at the display of musical instruments about the room, and longing to stop her ears, for several of the children were playing on the violin, flute, horn or harp. They were street musicians, and even the baby seemed to be getting ready to take part in the concert, for he sat on the floor beside an immense bass horn taller than himself, with his rosy lips at the mouth piece ...
— Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag VI - An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving, Etc. • Louisa M. Alcott

... I like the violin best and I've taken lessons on it since I was eight years old. I am all out of practice now," she added soberly, "for I've done hardly anything at it since mamma died. She was so fond of it that everything I play reminds me of her, and ...
— Glenloch Girls • Grace M. Remick

... was first composed, followed by opera in 1594. During this period, instrumental music began to be used in the churches; and the violin was brought by the celebrated Amati family to a beauty of form, and sweetness of ...
— Music and Some Highly Musical People • James M. Trotter

... skilled performer to glide from one to the other without interruption. This instrument is, therefore, within its limited range, as capable of adjusting itself to any succession of intervals as is the trombone or the violin. I do not imagine, however, that the aboriginal performer made any systematic use of this power or that the instrument was purposely so constructed. It will be seen by reference to the scale that stopping the orifice ...
— Ancient art of the province of Chiriqui, Colombia • William Henry Holmes

... understand Beethoven, that Beethoven he so bitterly, so unjustly assailed in The Kreutzer Sonata. (Poor Beethoven. Why did not Tolstoy select Tristan and Isolde if he wished some fleshly music, some sensualistic caterwauling, as Huxley phrased it? But a melodious violin and piano sonata!) Tolstoy may go barefoot, dig for potatoes, wear his blouse hanging outside, but the peasantry will never accept him as one of their own. He has written volumes about "going to the people," and the people do not want him, do not comprehend him. And that is Tolstoy's ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker

... come at it this way and now that. He never got it quite right, though he fumbled about it for ten minutes or a quarter of an hour. And then two girls went, and one punished the piano while the other, with a wrist rather than an ear for music, drowned its cries with a violin. So it went on all the evening, and when I moved they all looked at me; I had been put on a nervous wicker chair, and I knew my shoes squeaked like a carnival of swine, and so I could not get away. And all the things that kept coming ...
— Select Conversations with an Uncle • H. G. Wells

... Weiskirch, to Drahotusch, five miles. Early in the morning we found a violin and case on the road; the innkeeper in Weiskirch gave us two florins for it, on condition that he should return it to the owner on proving his right, it ...
— The Life and Adventures of Baron Trenck - Vol. 1 (of 2) • Baron Trenck

... of glass or brass, fixed at its centre so that it can vibrate freely at its edges, is required. It is evenly and not too thickly covered with fine sand or lycopodium powder and then caused to vibrate acoustically by the repeated drawing of a violin-bow with some pressure across the edge of the plate until a steady note becomes audible. Through the vibrations thus caused within the plate, the particles of sand or powder are set in movement and ...
— Man or Matter • Ernst Lehrs

... away from home, leaving his parents to die of grief. For being kind to a sick "old woman" he was given a magic violin. Soon after, he was arrested for climbing into a house at night. When he was about to be hanged for a thief, he was granted a last request. He asked to be allowed to play his favorite piece on his violin. As soon as he began, every one commenced to dance. He ...
— Filipino Popular Tales • Dean S. Fansler

... a series of chances. His father failed to succeed and disappeared back to Africa leaving the support of the child to the poor working mother. The child showed evidences of musical talent and a friendly workingman gave him a little violin. A musician glancing from his window saw a little dark boy playing marbles on the street with a tiny violin in one hand; he gave him lessons. He happened to gain entrance into a charity school with ...
— Darkwater - Voices From Within The Veil • W. E. B. Du Bois

... you say," answered Charles, "modern music did not come into existence till after the powers of the violin became known. Corelli himself, who wrote not two hundred years ago, hardly ventures on the shift. The piano, again, I have heard, has almost given ...
— Loss and Gain - The Story of a Convert • John Henry Newman

... and small notions of various kinds not easy to be classified. He had stopped to look at three penknives fastened to a card, which was propped up in the little show-window, supported on one side by a chess-board with "History of Asia" in gilt letters on the back, and on the other by a small violin labelled "1 dollar." And as he gazed past these articles into the interior of the shop, which was now lighted up, it gradually dawned upon him that it was something like his ideal of an attractive and interesting business place. At any rate, he would go in and look at it. He did ...
— The Magic Egg and Other Stories • Frank Stockton

... unconsciously, inevitably, recomposing, glorifying, Raphael too becomes, of course, a painter of portraits. We may foresee them already in masterly series, from Maddalena Doni, a kind of younger, more virginal sister of La Gioconda, to cardinals and popes—to that most sensitive of all portraits, the "Violin-player," if it be really his. But then, on the other hand, the influence of such portraiture will be felt also in his inventive work, in a certain reality there, a certain convincing loyalty to experience and observation. In his most elevated religious work he will still keep, for security ...
— Miscellaneous Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater

... fingers were rigid at their task of lace making, the scraping of the orchestral violin tearing the roaring noises in her ears into ribbons of alternate sound and vacuum, as if she were closing her ears and opening them, so ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst

... Mexicans appeared mysteriously until there were nearly a score, and until late into the night they danced upon the hard-packed earth of the yard. Alaire fell asleep to the sounds of feet scuffling and scraping in time to a wheezy violin. ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach

... cries horribly. The old shed rattled in every part with the thud of many heavy feet, and trembled with the shock of noise—an incessant roar of men's voices, punctuated with women's screams. Then the riot quieted somewhat; there was a clapping of hands, and a violin began to squeak measures intended to be Oriental. The next moment the listener scrambled up one of the rotting piles and stood upon the veranda. A shaft of red light through a broken shutter struck across the ...
— The Conquest of Canaan • Booth Tarkington



Words linked to "Violin" :   string, violin section, chin rest, Guarnerius, violin maker, fiddle, Amati, bowed stringed instrument



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