There are people who are anxious or who have imposter syndrome or make defensive excuses in every field, but this sounds like the situation in violin-playing is far beyond not just classical music but any other field I can think of. What makes violin this extreme?
(To be fair, I would make anything sound this extreme, if I was writing about it while in the mood I was in when I wrote this. I love a rant.)
I guess any classical instrument is a device for torturing perfectionists, but violin has a particularly brutal drop-off in sound quality as you reduce your daily focused practice time. Between 'lapsed professional piano' and 'lapsed professional violin' I know which one I'd pick to listen to. You just can't do a few hours of practice a week and play the violin very nicely in tune, or at least I've never met anyone who can.
There's also the fact we're pack animals. There are normally 8-12 violinists in each section of the orchestra, playing in unison, consciously blending our sound together. We're so wired to watching the others' bows, listening to their vibrato and articulation, and keeping as much focus on the leader of the section as on the conductor, that I swear we develop a hive mind. I guess this exacerbates the social pressures we feel, since we're always so aware of each others' playing.
If orchestral jobs for violinists are so scarce, what do you think about the options of branching out? Playing with a band, going into pop violin, etc.
There are definitely some opportunities like that, but being a classical violinist with an orchestra is the first preference by far because it's so much more enjoyable to play the orchestral repertoire, and because having a full-time seat in an orchestra also puts you at the top of every booking agent's list for casual gigs too. Aim high, fail high, seems to be a good approach.
"you're only funky as [the moving average of] your last [few] cut[s]"
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Perfectionism and 'skill dysphoria' as obstacles to healthy contact with reality.
I'm currently in a phase of my violin career best described as "aspiring professional."
With me are the best few (several thousand) violin players in my country, competing for 5-10 full-time orchestral jobs that open up each year. We're regularly getting casual work performing, but not enough to make a living. Almost all of us will eventually give up on that goal and take up teaching full-time, play occasional wedding gigs and with pop orchestras, get a day job, and/or marry up[1]. This typically means spending less time practising and playing, which leads to our skills declining in a vicious spiral.
Avoiding concrete measures of skill
If you ever want to see real fear, compliment a violinist on their playing.
Some violinists, particularly as their skill begins to decline after they stop practising 3-6 hours per day, become allergic to public performances.
When they do perform, there is always an excuse justifying why their performance can't be held as a measure of their skill. These excuses are offered unbidden, in bulk, to anyone who will listen, both ahead of and after any performance[3].
While initially this is a pragmatic decision (if you get a reputation for being a poor player, even on one occasion, it's a career disaster as a performer), this shyness eventually morphs into something more pathological.
With skills in constant decline and deprived of feedback, the player develops a kind of 'skill dysphoria'. They become hostile to any contact with reality, thus eventually aversive to practice, and disconnected from any joy or beauty they might once have seen in their playing. The relationship with the mirror becomes pathological.
It goes one of two ways, (or both).
"Honorary Good Player" vs. "you're only funky as [the moving average of] your last [few] cut[s]"
Some players will simply coast on their previous reputation for as long as possible, believing "good player" to be a social class marker that, once earned, cannot be lost (rather than something that exists because of ongoing hard work.)
Other players fully embrace "you're only as good as your last performance", which can be a helpful existing memetic antibody to this problem.
The problem is, this antibody risks inflaming the perfectionist impulses that stalk most violinists at this level, undermining mental health and ironically becoming an obstacle to high performance. If every performance defines you, how can you ever relax enough[5] to perform well?
We need to understand that individual performances will vary, but keeping in mind our current skill level is what matters, not how well we used to play. That way, perfectionism is held in check and we strike a healthy balance.[6]
Broader Implications
This issue isn't limited to violinists.
It may seem trivial, but nonetheless it's important to reflect on:
Just joking.
I'm being slightly unfair. There's an inherent power dynamic in complimenting someone. Listen to the Zoomers on Tiktok: perceiving someone is violence. You could be implicitly putting yourself above them, which they might not like.
I once played a wedding gig where one of the players wouldn't stop saying these things about her own playing to members of the bride's family after the ceremony.
They will fake-play any hard parts.
Because we're directing a firehose of emotion through the most sensitive, finnicky interface you can imagine, you can sometimes literally tell what muscles are tense in a player's arm/back just by listening.
Hahaha hahahhahahaha ahahahahahahahah