Warmup — constant base + daily ramp
The same gentle warmup every day — quick, simple, never skipped. What changes is the short ramp right before the day's hardest excerpt, so cold hands never land straight on the most demanding passage. It protects your back, too.
First: body before violin
Before the instrument comes out: log your AM back-check → do your physio set → 2 minutes of postural reset and slow breathing. Never warm up your hands on a cold back.
General warmup (CONSTANT — ~18–20 min, every session)
A real pro-level maintenance base, not a token scale. Same routine every day, low friction, never skipped.
- Open strings + long tones — slow full bows across all 4 strings; sustain the sound, even from heel to tip, right arm and shoulder relaxed and back-aware. ~6 min.
- Scales & arpeggios — 3 octaves in the day's key, with a rhythm/bowing variant (don't just run it slow once); then slow double-stops — thirds, sixths, octaves — for intonation. This is what actually keeps the left hand in shape. ~8 min.
- Left-hand drill — Schradieck or Ševčík op.1, a few patterns, even and relaxed. ~4 min.
Étude thread (CONSTANT — ~8 min, tied to the day's demand)
One short, rotating maintenance étude, matched to the day's hardest excerpt so the technique feeds straight in:
| Day's main demand | Étude |
|---|---|
| Don Juan (bravura, leaps, crossings) | A string-crossing / bravura study — Kreutzer 13, or a Rode caprice. |
| Schumann 2 (perpetual motion) | A moto-perpetuo / bowing study — Paganini Moto Perpetuo, or Ševčík op.3 bowings — in short bursts for the sixteenth stamina. |
| Scheherazade / Brahms (lyrical) | A sustained-tone / shifting study — Kreutzer 11, or sons filés. |
| Concerto day | A Rode caprice in the concerto's key — register and shifting. |
| Mock-recording day | None — don't tire the hands before takes (light warm-up only). |
These étude picks are sound defaults for each demand — yours to swap. Want them harder? Dont op.35, Gaviniès, Wieniawski Études-Caprices, or the Paganini caprices all fit the same slots. You direct your own program here, so trust your ear over any "should". The étude and the double-stops are the first things to drop when the back or the clock is tight; the open-string/long-tone base is the part you never skip.
Keep the base slow and unhurried — it is bringing your hands and back online. The étude is real work, but short.
Why a fuller warm-up now: the back trouble seems to flare mostly from sitting in the orchestra, not from practising at home, so these home days carry pro-level technical work additively. The AM + post-practice back-checks are the test — if home practice doesn't move the numbers, we load more; if it does, the back gate wins as always.
Specific ramp (VARIES by the day's hardest demand)
Right before you start the main excerpt, do the matching ramp below. It bridges the gap so there is no intensity cliff from the warmup into the real work.
| Day's main demand | Do this right before it |
|---|---|
| Don Juan (bravura, leaps, fast string crossings) | Slow arpeggios across strings; the opening leap at half tempo ×3; a string-crossing étude fragment; then start building from a comfortable BPM. |
| Schumann 2 (perpetual-motion stamina) | Détaché and sautillé on open strings, then a scale building in speed; short bursts only (4–8 bars) with rests — protect your back, build endurance gradually. |
| Scheherazade / Brahms (lyrical, high position) | Slow shifts into upper positions; sustained vibrato tone; one expressive scale in the key. |
| Mock recording / run-through | A light technical pass of each piece's opening at half tempo. Do not tire yourself before a take. |
Back rule: if your AM back-check is a bit sore or worse, shorten the ramp or do it seated. If it is genuinely sore (7+), skip fast ramps entirely — see the back & fitness guide.