Solos For Young Violinists Volume 3

Working With Solos For Young Violinists Volume 3

This is a standard intermediate repertoire book published by Carl Fischer. It targets students around grades 4 to 6, which roughly translates to players who have been at the instrument for two to four years and are comfortable in first position with some introduction to higher positions. The contents are a mix of etudes, folk song arrangements, and short classical movements compiled from various sources. It is not particularly original material — most of the pieces are arrangements or pedagogical compositions designed to fill a specific gap between beginner methods and more demanding solo literature. I have used this book for well over a decade with my own students. The reason it persists is that it does one thing consistently well: it gives young players material that sounds more advanced than their actual technique allows. A student working through a piece like the Gavotte from the appended sonatas or one of the folk song arrangements gets to perform something that feels substantial. That matters for recitals and auditions. The book is organized into sections that roughly track increasing difficulty. You will find etudes focused on specific technical challenges — slurred bowings, double stops, basic vibrato — alongside melody-driven pieces that prioritize musicality over virtuosity. That balance is deliberate and useful. A student who only practices etudes becomes mechanical. A student who only plays melodies develops rhythm problems. This book forces both.

Here is where it gets tricky though. The arrangement quality in this volume is inconsistent. Some pieces were edited carefully with sensible fingerings and bowing suggestions. Others look like they were transcribed quickly and may contain fingerings that do not match the hand size or reach of a developing player. I ran into this directly last year with a student who was assigned the arrangement of "Campanella." The editorial fingerings assumed a larger hand span than a fourteen-year-old typically has at that stage. I had to redo almost all of the position changes. If you are using the Carl Fischer edition, check every fingering against what actually feels natural for your hand. Do not assume the printed fingerings are correct just because they are on the page.

How To Use This Book Without Wasting Time

The most common mistake I see is students jumping in and trying to learn every piece in order from start to finish. That does not work well. The book is better treated as a reference menu. Pick two or three pieces that address your current technical gaps and loop them for a few weeks. Move on when the piece stops being productive. For example, if your left-hand intonation in the upper register is weak, select a piece that uses third position extensively and spend time on just that section. Do not try to perfect the entire piece before moving to the next challenge area. I usually tell my students to spend about a week on intonation stabilization, then shift focus to bow control for another week, then address musical details. Rushing through all three simultaneously tends to produce sloppy results across the board. The etudes in this volume are particularly useful for targeted practice. They isolate single techniques. An etude focusing on four-note slurs in one bow should be practiced slowly with metronome work until the transitions are clean, then gradually accelerated. The target tempo depends on the specific etude, but I generally aim for my students to reach about 92 to 108 beats per minute before considering the piece performance-ready, assuming the beat unit matches the quarter note in the time signature.

Common Problems And What To Do About Them

One issue that comes up repeatedly with this collection is the tendency of students to play everything at mezzo forte or louder. These pieces are small scale. They do not require volume. Playing them loudly tends to mask intonation problems and create tension in the right arm. I had a student who couldn't get clean string crossings on a particular folk tune because she was pressing too hard with the bow. The solution was simple: practice the piece at pp with the bow restricted to the middle third of the hair. Once the crossing became even at that dynamic, I let her gradually increase volume. The crossings stayed clean. Another recurring problem involves the vibrato pieces. Some arrangements in this book include written-out vibrato indications or require its use. Young players often add vibrato prematurely, before they have developed consistent intonation. Using vibrato on pitches that are already fluctuating just makes the tuning problems worse and more obvious. I recommend holding off on vibrato until the student can play the passage clean without it for at least three consecutive attempts at performance tempo. The book also contains a few pieces that sit awkwardly in terms of difficulty. They fall between the clearer grade 4 items and the grade 6 items, which means teachers and students sometimes struggle to place them in a progression. My approach is to use the piece's technical demands rather than its position in the book as the deciding factor. If a piece requires comfortable third position and basic double stops, it belongs in the grade 5 range regardless of where it appears in the table of contents.

Limitations Of This Collection

I want to be clear about what this book does not do. It does not cover extensive shifting. It does not address advanced bowing techniques like ricochet or explicit spiccato work beyond the basic detached stroke. It does not include any contemporary repertoire. If a student needs preparation for high school ensemble auditions or competitive festivals that require modern etudes, this book will not fill that gap. You would need something like Kyung Wha Chung's Violin Method or perhaps the Hurt violn solos series to supplement it. The printed editions vary between publishers and regional releases. Some versions include accompanying piano parts. Some do not. If your student needs accompaniment for recital purposes, verify that the edition you are using includes the piano part. I have seen students arrive at lessons with a score that turned out to be a string-only arrangement, which caused confusion during rehearsal planning. The piece selections also skew toward European folk material and classical adaptations. There is limited representation of American folk traditions or non-Western melodic sources. This is not a major flaw for most pedagogical contexts, but it is worth noting if you are looking for repertoire that reflects a broader cultural range for your students.

If you are searching for a copy of Solos For Young Violinists Volume 3, it is available through most music retailers and educational suppliers. Carl Fischer distributes it directly and through major sheet music websites. The typical retail price runs between eighteen and twenty-five dollars depending on the format. Digital versions may be available through sheet music subscription platforms, though the scanning quality on those can vary significantly. For students who have worked through the first two volumes of this series, this book is a logical next step. It extends the repertoire slightly while reinforcing the same pedagogical framework. The key is to treat it as a working resource rather than a book to be completed sequentially. Pick the pieces that match your current technical needs, practice them methodically, and move on when they stop challenging you appropriately.