Planning the bow
You have one bow-length of hair. A phrase might be four notes or fifteen. Deciding in advance how much bow each note gets — so you arrive at the end of the phrase and the end of the bow at the same time — is a real skill with a real name: bow distribution. It's the answer to "why did I run out of bow halfway through that line?"
The idea: divide the bow to match the notes
If four equal notes are slurred into one bow, each note gets a quarter of the bow. Simple. It stops being simple the moment the notes aren't equal — a long note needs more bow, the peak of the phrase wants more, the quiet tail wants less — and the moment there are enough notes that "just play it" runs you off the end.
How to play it
One down-bow, whole bow. Frog to middle on the G, middle to three-quarters on the A, three-quarters to the tip on the B. Land exactly at the tip on the last note.
How to work it out — stop first, then smooth
The method every teacher uses:
- Look at the hair and divide it by eye into as many equal parts as the phrase has beats. (A strip of tape on the stick helps at first.)
- Play the phrase as separate stops — actually halt the bow at each division point, so you hear and feel the equal portions. It's basically a rhythm exercise, and rhythm is your strength.
- Smooth it out — take away the stops, keep the portions identical. Now it flows.
- Then bend it on purpose — give the important note more bow, the throwaway note less.
When you'll run out anyway — the retake
Sometimes a phrase ends at the tip and the next one needs to start down-bow with lots of bow.
You fix that with a retake: during the breath between phrases, lift the bow and quietly
reset it back toward the frog. A silent moment, "filled only with resonance" — you met the
symbol for it in Stage 3 (down-bow-up-bow-and-the-retake); here you actually make the move.
Try it
Try
Take the first line of Ode to Joy (the notes you already know). Before you play it, decide: whole bows or halves? Where does the bow need to be when you reach the long note at the end of the phrase? Play it once your way, then play it deliberately wasting bow (tiny strokes) and notice you have loads left over, then deliberately running out (huge strokes early) and notice you're stuck at the tip. Somewhere between is the plan.
The usual mistake
Playing the first few notes with generous, satisfying bow and then discovering the phrase isn't over — so the last notes get crushed into the last inch at the tip, weak and scratchy. Plan backwards from the end: "I need to still have a third of the bow left when I reach that note." Then the whole phrase fits.