Baroque Viola Bow - Snakewood - Full Size

Discover the Articulation That Only a Baroque Bow Can Achieve

At the suggestion of concert violinist Rachel Barton Pine, Shar is pleased to offer players our new baroque bows. These are the same bows that are used by orchestras around the United States as part of Ms. Pine's program to bring baroque performance practices to modern symphony orchestras. The shaft and frog and made from snakewood, the traditional wood that has been used for centuries for such bows. Upon tightening, the camber (curve) of the bow is outward, which is the reverse of modern bows. Ms. Pine recommends that baroque bows require more tightening than modern bows, to bring out their desired characteristics, suggesting that they should be tightened just to the point of an outward camber. These major differences help produce the kind of "attack and release" in baroque-era music that is approached differently than in more modern performance practices.

Rachel Barton Pine, acknowledged as one of the world's expert performers and pedagogues of Bach's Sonatas and Partitas, is one of the very few artists that easily transitions from the baroque era to more modern music. Often playing baroque music on a violin with baroque setup, Ms. Pine also advocates for the use of a baroque bow even with a violin having modern setup, when playing baroque era music. The articulation and phrasing required in a more authentic baroque performance is much more easily attained with a baroque bow.

This bow is for viola. Similar bows are available for violin and cello.