Real recorded violin notes on a piano keyboard: click, touch or type, and the violin answers. The violin is the highest and smallest instrument of the violin family, and the one that usually carries the melody of the orchestra. Free, nothing to install, with note names, your computer keyboard and a metronome.
Recorded notes, the violin's own range, and the keyboard you already know.
Every key plays a recording of a real violin: 15 notes from G3 to C7, each key pitched from the nearest one. The violin is bowed string instrument: four strings tuned in fifths - G, D, A and E - set vibrating by a bow strung with horsehair, or plucked with a finger (pizzicato).
The keyboard covers G3 to C7, where the recordings sound natural; a real violin plays G3 to about A7. Use the octave arrows to move, and More keys on a wide screen.
Play one note at a time and hold it: a violin sings in long, connected lines. Let one key go only as the next one goes down. The note sounds as long as you hold the key, like a bow or a breath.
Famous violin music: Vivaldi, The Four Seasons; Bach, Partita No. 2 and its Chaconne; Paganini, 24 Caprices; Mendelssohn, Violin Concerto in E minor. Pick out a melody by ear on the keyboard above.
Click or touch a key. The first note starts the sound; the violin recordings for the visible keys load in the background.
A S D F G H J K L play the white keys, W E T Y U O P the black ones (Q and Z on AZERTY). Z and X move an octave (W and X on AZERTY).
Set Labels to C D E or Do Ré Mi to see every note name, or to Keys to see your own keyboard letters.
Turn on the metronome and play along. Then try the same melody on the cello or the piano.
| Type | Sampled violin, playable on this page, free |
|---|---|
| Family | Strings - bowed string instrument |
| Samples | 15 recorded notes, G3 to C7 |
| Range here | G3 to C7 |
| Real range | G3 to about A7 |
| Notation | Treble clef |
| Controls | Labels, octave arrows, More keys and a metronome |
| Computer keyboard | Ableton layout by key position - QWERTY, AZERTY, QWERTZ |
| Credits | Violin samples from tonejs-instruments by Nicholas Brosowsky, CC BY 3.0 - see credits |
| Requirements | Any modern browser with Web Audio - Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Safari |
Most online instruments are a synthesiser with a picture on top. This one plays recordings of a real violin, so the attack, the tone and the decay are the instrument's own. The violin is the highest and smallest instrument of the violin family, and the one that usually carries the melody of the orchestra.
The violin took its modern shape in northern Italy in the 16th century. The workshops of Cremona - Amati, Guarneri and Antonio Stradivari - made the instruments that players still prize most.
A real violin is written in treble clef. The keyboard here plays the sounding notes, so a melody you find by ear is the melody you hear. To go further, the free sheet music and chord pages work with any instrument you can read music on.
Yes. Every key plays a recording of a real violin - 15 notes from G3 to C7 - pitched to the nearest key. The recordings come from the tonejs-instruments library, under a Creative Commons licence.
Yes. The middle row of letters plays the white keys and the row above it the black keys, by key position, so it works the same on QWERTY, AZERTY and QWERTZ keyboards. Set Labels to Keys to see the letters on the keys.
A violin plays G3 to about A7. On this page the keyboard goes from G3 to C7, where the recordings sound natural.
Vivaldi, The Four Seasons; Bach, Partita No. 2 and its Chaconne; Paganini, 24 Caprices; Mendelssohn, Violin Concerto in E minor.
Yes, free with no account and nothing to install. It runs in any modern browser, on a computer, a tablet or a phone.
The violin on this page is free, with no account. GOONS Studio adds a sampled piano, drum machines, synths and a sequencer in the browser - free for 7 days, no card required.
Free on this page, no account. Play the cello →