How to Play Violin with Small Hands

Small hands or shorter fingers don’t need to stop you from learning the violin. There are steps you can take to make playing violin with small hands a bit easier and help prevent overuse injuries.

First, make sure you are playing the right sized violin. Violins are available in a variety of smaller sizes, ranging from 1/4 to 7/8, allowing you to find an instrument that fits with the dimensions of your arms, hands, and fingers just right. Your violin teacher or professional at your local string instrument shop can help you determine the size that works best for you.

Once you have been properly fitted, it's time to work on playing posture, instrument position and finger dexterity. You may need to spend time on techniques that help safely extend the reaching ability of the fourth finger (pinky).

Practice Hard

Proper posture and position are both important areas of focus for any burgeoning musician. Those learning to play violin with small hands should pay special attention to their violin position, especially their left hand.

Whether a novice or accomplished musician, warming up is extremely important. String musicians need to practice finger exercises before a lesson, practice session or performance. Warming up and limbering the fingers, particularly the pinky, by running through scales and arpeggios is an excellent way to maintain finger dexterity.

But Don't Practice Too Hard

Although it's true that practice makes perfect, practicing too much or with bad posture can lead to stiffness and pain in your muscles and tendons, or even injuries. The key to avoiding violin overuse injuries is recognizing the signs of a problem before it becomes something serious.

Johnson String Instrument carries a wide variety of violin sizes, and our knowledgeable staff can assist you in finding one that fits your needs. We offer quality instruments, including violins for smaller hands, and our website is full of informational articles that cover a wide variety of interesting topics.

Check out our site today and feel free to contact us with any questions about string instruments.