I have to admit that I don't know too much about rehairing a bow. I know that I rarely plan for it...it usually gets to the point when I will be begging all shops in town to rehair my bow on short notice - unsuccessfully of course.
My last bow rehair was done on short notice. When it came back, I found the hair quite short. Gone was the little nudge between the frog and the thumb leather where my thumb rests when I play. The person who did my rehair was a well known luthier in town so I figured it was 'done right' and that it would probably stretch over time. It never stretched. Instead, my thumb kept pushing up on the thumb leather and eventually tore it....but I dealt with it.
Fast forward to last week...another rehair needed. I took it to another luthier..one who had rehaired 2 bows for me in the past. They were able to fit me in. When I saw them, I told them that the last rehair left the hair a bit too short for my tastes which was why the thumb leather was wearing out. I kinda made a big deal about it because I didn't want it to happen again. So...I paid for a rehair as well as money for the thumb leather to be replaced. I picked it up a couple of days later. Same thing! I sat down with them and asked them if that was the way it was supposed to be...and they said yes. I took it to my teacher...and he immediately said, too short. So I took it back and they corrected it.
How can they not know it's too short? Don't all these shops rehair bows all the time? I talked to a friend of mine and she has had bad experience with another shop in town. So basically, we have had bad rehairs from 3 shops now. Is it that difficult? I still consider myself a 'beginner' cellist so it's tough for me to tell the shops what I want with conviction because I'm not all that sure myself. I depend on them to tell me the 'right' way because I feel like they would know having done so many of them. However if my teacher can look at my bow and say, "Too short" but the shop is telling me it's fine...uhh...doesn't give me a warm and fuzzy feeling about who is working on my bow.
Any thoughts?
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7 comments:
Good to see a post from you! I cannot offer you any feedback whatsoever on bow hair. Hope to see more posts from you!
It's an aggravating issue to be sure! You want to know what I think happens? (just conjecture, but based on experience) If you have a bow that costs less than a bazillion dollars, they are less than careful. If you're not a famous string player, they are less than careful. If the guy is in a bad mood, he is less than careful. I have had very different experiences at the same shops locally. Sometimes it will be full and balanced, other times it seems short and punchy. One of my students fell in love with a bow that cost about $120, and when she went to rehair it, they told her to toss it because it wasn't worth rehairing for $60. She pressed on, and they did an inferior job, seemingly to punish her. I had a guy doing the best rehairs ever and then he stopped talking to me all of the sudden. Another guy who made passes at me all the time did ok jobs, never too short, at least, but he was far away and how much of that can a girl take? So it boils down to human fraiilty, because rehairs are NOT where the money's at. The job is tough and requires specific skills and pricey materials. Throw in a little je ne sais quoi and you get rough rehairs for seemingly no reason. Disappointing at best, isn't it? Very rarely do the people who take lots of our money in this endeavor live in the real world where $50 is a lot of cash and we only have one bow, so it better be done well.
Cello Muser - thanks for still reading! I am not keeping up the blog as I used to due to time but I like to inject life into it once in a while.
Emily - Glad to hear that you've had the aggravation as well. My teacher said that he gets his bow rehaired at this one shop and that it always comes back perfect...but he has that bazillion dollar bow. I've had friends go to this 'perfect shop' and had bad experiences. Yes, disappointing at best.
Generally, bow rehair is as mechanistic as piano tuning with a machine. The only thing that really affects the length of the hairs installed is the length of the hairs on the horse tail. Yes, they are horse tail hair, and yes, it comes from a real horse. The rehairer buys a whole tail at once, and they are pricey. If they get a short tail of course hair (suitable for 'cello bows) they will rehair bows with short hairs. And it's a pretty fair guess that the economies involved dictate that, if one tail is taken early, it's because someone needs to sell a tail now, so probably a lot of short tails will be sold in the same period.
So it is likely that all the shops in town (do you have any idea what having 3 rehairers _in your town_ means? We have one within 30 miles, the next is 60 miles away, then you're either doomed to NY or Boston, and even _that_ is a crap-shoot!) have short tails. They probably also have long tails, but they save them for the known pros.
There are some good reasons for this. Pros are more likely to know when they've been short-haired and complain. Pros put more stress on bowhairs, so a short job is more likely to pull out the knot and make instant-bad-hair-day... which can be bad with someone who is on stage in front of a hundred of your customers. When you complained, backed up by your teacher, they probably took the knotted hair out of your bow, put in longer hair, and saved the hair that had been in your bow for some other unfortunate.
Much of this, I learned from Harold Westover, who made cheap bows to go with his inexpensive student-model violas da gamba. He owned two tails, one white, one black. He made his bows to match the useful length of the hairs, rather more than to match specific instruments, and made no bones about it: you could always go spend hundreds of dollars (more than your instrument) if you were choosy about the bow. (Turns out, I did!) But he was very straight forward about the business.
Thanks for your comment - interesting information! I am just about due for another rehair and I will go back to the same shop since they know I will complain. From what they told me, they cut some of the knots where the hair is tied to loosen it so that it is not as short. I'm probably saying it wrongh - but it more or less worked. I have to say that I haven't been as happy with my bow since then..can't describe it but it has changed so hopefully the next rehair will make it all good again.
Holding my breath...
how long does it take to re-hair a bow...im sending it to the shop
Hi @christina - sorry I haven't been following my own blog!! Bow rehairs can take anywhere from a day to a week depending on the schedule of the shop. I usually beg and whine so they do it quickly to get me off their back ;-)
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