Customer Reviews

Essential Elements 2000 for Strings Plus DVD: Violin Book 1

5 star:		(28)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Once I got my hands on this book, I discarded all the other "beginner" books I'd purchased. No more having to play juvenile ditties like Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.

I'm an adult beginner violinist and Essential Elements 2000 for Strings with its accompanying CD & DVD has enabled me to teach myself how to play my violin while thoroughly enjoying the effort and without experiencing the boredom and humiliation of having to learn tunes better geared toward much younger students.

I've only been playing since July and I'm already about to graduate to the second book in the series. The curriculum is interesting, playing along with the orchestra on the CD is exciting, and realizing how fast I'm progressing is a dream come true for this 54 year old beginner.

I highly recommend this book as well as Alfred's Essentials of Music Theory Complete to anyone seriously interested in learning violin.

"For a real violin study, go with Suzuki." While that might work for a child that is ages 3-4 in a one-on-one or small group setting (which is what the Suzuki Method was intended for), it does not work well in large group learning situation for kids who are twice that age, beginning instruments in fourth and fifth grade. And to be honest, almost everything in the Suzuki method *IS* an arrangement of an original work (like the Bach Bouree from the cello suites set for violin), chosen because even in their simplified form they help teach the fundamental concepts.

This is my third year using EE2000 in my school program. I usually have between 30-40 students at each grade level in the orchestra. The books and their accompanying CD/DVD work really well and are of the appropriate complexity for the students ages nine through eleven. As a private instructor myself, I recommend to all my students to seek outside instruction, but EE2000 provides a good balance of technical development with ensemble skills for the beginners. Students coming into my program who already play don't feel bored because I am able to append more complex tasks in bowing and fingering to them using the existing material, giving them helpful exercises to expand their current abilities, while they help in encouraging their beginning peers.

Lastly, a smart child, if they are so motivated (as some of my kids are), can look at the directives in the EE2000 book and figure out a lot of things on their own ahead of the class, and they are provided with just enough information to accomplish those tasks fairly correctly, without doing awful things to their technique. The included instruction videos are very helpful in this case as well. This is not true with most other methods (and the Suzuki books are entirely useless without a proper instructor!).

Don't get me wrong; I was a Suzuki student myself for my first few years of playing and from time to time use some of their excellent pieces in my own private teaching (although I primarily teach advanced junior high through college age players). However, it has its target audience, which is entirely different from that which EE2000 and others like it are designed for.

This is an excellent first book for the violin. I have started learning violin again after a 24 year break! This book is aesthetic, has very clear instructions and diagrams and is designed beautifully. The progression of the exercises is completely logical, allowing you to perfect each technique before moving on. Every symbol is explained clearly, no new note or technique is found in exercises that come before their explanation. There are numerous scale and arpeggio exercises that are marked with a different background color, making it easier to find them. There are many orchestra arrangements (mostly duets), and even a duet with piano accompaniment. The accompanying discs are an added attraction. I don't particularly make very much use of them, but they can make practicing more interesting for children who generally have less discipline. This is a much better series than The ABCs of Violin.

Becuase how else would you learn to read music and interpret that music properly with your violin if you already knew how the song was going to progress?

This makes it "cheat proof" for young and old alike. I like that. It forces the student to concentrate on the notes and actually read them instead of memorizing. It's the best and most organized book of its' kind.

The cd and dvd are included as is some very useful computer software. You do not have to go out and buy everything seperately. This helps on the students, or parents, pocketbook. Lessons are expensive enough without having to go out and spend a fortune on material for the lesson. Save some money and a whole lot of sight reading headaches down the road and get this book.

I bought this book because it had a DVD and CD. I had already started learning the violin, and most of the pieces in this book were far simpler than the ones I had been playing in another beginner book. The DVD shows only very basic information, and is full of admonishments to "listen to your teacher, do not do X until your teacher says to". This book is really for kids, as the very simple arrangements and 'compositiion' assignments show. I hoped that the bowing exercises would be useful, and they are, but not enough to justify buying this book for an adult.

As a violin teacher, I love Essential Elements because it is a good balance of music for playing, exercises for perfecting technique, music theory (explanations), and even music history. The explanations are short enough to read during a lesson, and the diagrams make explanations easy. I love the CD accompaniment. It is fun to play along with, gives students some confidence to see if what they're playing sounds right, and helps keep students moving along so they don't get stuck if they mess up. The music styles from song to song are different and interesting: country, funk, classical, folk, and even Christmas music. There are loads of short songs to go through, which is great for learning to read notes and sightreading. So if the student doesn't get a particular song perfectly, it's ok to keep going because they'll get it again in a different form. There are two sets of performance pieces: one in the middle and one at the end of the book. These 5-6 duets can be done in 2 groups or by 2 individuals. At the end of the book, there is a short Bach Minuet solo with piano accompaniment (which is printed in the book). It is obvious this book is intended for use with youth/children's orchestras ("share your work with orchestra friends"), but my adult students have enjoyed this book too (just skip those exercises). One of my adult students says he really likes the DVD program which shows you (as you're playing) what notes you're supposed to be on and analyzes your playing so you see which notes you played wrong.

I like how the book starts with just plucking (pizzicato). The first 12 pages help students focus on the left hand fingerings and reading music before they start bowing. That way, student's don't feel overwhelmed with both arms and fingers doing different things all at once. I also like how if there is a a song with a particularly difficult rhythm, there is a preceeding "shadow bowing" song that lets you practice "playing" on the rosin so that you can get used to the way the bow goes for the song. There are many exercises for the bow hold and bow arm as well as for the left hand that are helpful. The book ends with a violin fingering chart which is helpful for those trying to figure out how to read music... although this would be more helpful if it was located earlier in the book.

There are just a couple of things in the book I don't feel are very helpful: the early bow hold (why not just go for it?), the practice record in the inside cover (is it for checking off if you practiced regardless of how long? there isn't enough room to write anything else) and the lines that tell you to keep holding a finger down even if you are bowing another string (that's a skill that is not important at this point). Another weird thing is that the CD only goes to song 74, and for the rest of the songs, you need to use the DVD. So you'll have to turn on a TV or computer screen to find the later songs. I also feel that the book takes too long to teach students how to read music. The first two-thirds of the book is in D major. The focus seems to be first on rhythm (different time signatures and types of notes: eighths, dotted half notes, etc) and things more important to orchestras, such as time signatures. So don't expect to pick up any other piece of music and be able to play it, especially if it's in another key. I usually just supplement with a handout about the notes. Otherwise, stick with the book, and you'll eventually get to it.

All in all, I highly recommend this book. It's fun and helpful for beginners. And it's the best all-in-one book you'll find out there.

This book is very well organized and presents the material in an orderly manner. It is being used by a family member and violin teacher. I am working through the material in parallel so I can assist the student. There is a lot of nice beginner material here, and I would recommend it to any music teacher. I am not sure how useful it is to a student without a music teacher, however. There is very little text.

The included version of Finale Notepad is from 2003. That is 9 years old! It is buggy and not updatable from Finale from what I can tell as it is not a "purchased" version from Finale's point-of-view. I can not tell if the version is the "Trial" version you can download from Finale, or if this is something else. It may time-out in 30 days. Again, I can't tell as there is no information in the book or on the DVD. I would guess the other included software is as old.

Additionally, the video will not run on my PC's DVD player. Why, I don't know. There may be codec issues.

Hal Leonard needs to update this package and clean-up the issues.

As an adult beginner, but not a beginner musician, I have found this much more helpful than many of the (fiddle) methods--which seem to be primarily a sequence of tunes. I have the patience for and appreciate the value of "graded" exercises. The salesperson at the store who sold me my fiddle told me this was a "must have" book and he was right--and it was cheap at about $6.99 or so.

As someone interested in old time fiddle, I would have liked to have seen "double-stops" in the book, but I understand that they occur very late in the ordinary (classical) string curriculum. Don't worry, they will no doubt appear in any other fiddle book you buy! :) This is a great book to start with.

The first part of the book (maybe the first fifth or so) is all about finding the notes and not using the bow, just finger-picking the notes out. After that, it starts getting into bowing techniques. There are may sections that tell you to "hold the bow the way your teacher shows you" and "do not place the bow on the strings until your teacher instructs you," and there are a few sections that are just not clear without a teacher. As with any instrument, though, there's no way to really learn the right way to do it from a book. I wish the instructions were clearer, but I'm not really sure I could articulate HOW the instructions could be made clearer in a written form.
There's a lot of basic little songs for the first half or so of the book. None of them are terribly interesting, but, again, a beginner book can only do so much. I went from squeaking horribly to playing "Michael row the boat ashore" just a bit off tune in about a week and a half. (Disclaimer: I've played the piano for over 20 years, so I have a large headstart in the reading music department). My husband picked the violin and book up to start messing with last weekend and I was impressed with the progress he was able to make in just a weekend. This book breaks things down into manageable chunks so you always feel like you're progressing but you're not taking on things that so difficult as to be intimidating.
My method with progressing in this book is to play every song/exercise until I can play it perfectly three times in a row. By perfectly, I don't mean perfect pitch - I'm going to be a little flat and sharp on notes until I get the feel for it and I accept that - but I play it until I don't squeak and until I can get my timing right and switch between strings smoothly. Using that as my baseline, and backtracking about 5 pages every day to refresh, I seem to be making good, steady progress with this book.
It certainly doesn't replace a teacher, but if you're going to teach yourself, this seems like a good way to do it.

Length:: 0:36 Mins

Great instructional almost a must for beginners.