# Placement of second violins



## Andreas (Apr 27, 2012)

I understand there are two basic seating arragements of the string section of an orchestra: either, as seen from the audiences point of view,

1st violins - 2nd violins - violas - celli

or

1st violins - celli - violas - 2nd violins

(Leaving out the doublebasses here for a moment, as well as variations of these two setups.) Now, I was surprised to learn that, according to Wikipedia, the second arrangement was apparently the standard one until the early 20th century.

I would have thought, that the first arrangement comes more naturally. After all, it follows an order: from highest to lowest register, like a keyboard. It also corresponds to the order of the string quartets. (Although I'm sure there are/were quartets that play in a different order, even though I haven't seen it yet. And I don't know in which order the string quartets of Mozart's and Haydn's time were sitting.)

I must say I prefer the order 1st-2nd-violas-celli. One loses the sterophonic effects of 1st-2nd interplay. But one is compensated by a strong violins-celli antagonism. With celli in the middle and violins both to the left and to the right, the entire string sound melts together a little too easily, especially with large orchestras. Of course, whether that's a bad thing or a good thing is a matter of taste.

It's only been recently that I've become aware of how much this influences my own taste in recordings. It shouldn't really make that much of a difference, but I feel that for me, it does. I like the clean seperation of, say, 60's Karajan recordings, with the violins way off to the left and the celli way of to the right (headphone listener speaking here).

Does this matter to you as well?


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## dgee (Sep 26, 2013)

There's also 1, 2, Vc, Vla which is the way I often see strings seated at the moment - it seems to be getting more popular. Quartets frequently sit this way also in my experience. Celli in the middle helps build the sound from the bottom up and can also assist with tuning. 

I've only played 1, Vc, Vla, 2 a few times, mainly with elderly German conductors. Not being a string player I don't have a strong feeling about how they work or not


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## Muse Wanderer (Feb 16, 2014)

Klemperer's antiphonal arrangement of the orchestra with violins 1 on the left and violins 2 on the right is thrilling to hear. His Mahler 2nd was a revelation especially when I listened to it on a good sound system or headphones. Having the violins seated on opposite sides was the standard arrangement in the 19th century.

It is a shame that the modern seating has become the standard from a listener's point of view. I understand that a conductor may find it more practical but the sound should be the prime objective especially in a studio recording. I assume it would be amazing to hear it live too, although I never had the pleasure to hear an antiphonal live orchestra.


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## waldvogel (Jul 10, 2011)

Our local symphony has experimented with seating, particularly when playing Haydn and Mozart. The usual seating is 1, 2, Vla, VC. This changes to 1, Vla, VC, 2 when the orchestra size drops from 50+ to 30 or so. If you have a seat close to the front of the audience, you really get to hear the counterpoint between the two violin groups. As our former conductor said - Haydn went through all the trouble of writing two great lines for the two violins, and it would be nice if we could hear them playing against each other.


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## Andreas (Apr 27, 2012)

waldvogel said:


> Our local symphony has experimented with seating, particularly when playing Haydn and Mozart. The usual seating is 1, 2, Vla, VC. This changes to 1, Vla, VC, 2 when the orchestra size drops from 50+ to 30 or so. If you have a seat close to the front of the audience, you really get to hear the counterpoint between the two violin groups. As our former conductor said - Haydn went through all the trouble of writing two great lines for the two violins, and it would be nice if we could hear them playing against each other.


That is a very good argument in favour of opposing violins. If the composers intended certain effects, the best thing is to recreate accordingly. Unless, perhaps, one assumes that great composers, being the visionary artists they are, anticipated that no order or arrangement is forever, and therefore nothing in their music should entirely depend upon the fashions and conventions of their time, knowing that they are likely change, eventually.


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

Andreas said:


> I would have thought, that the first arrangement comes more naturally. After all, it follows an order: from highest to lowest register, like a keyboard.


What is perhaps peculiar is that it reverses the order of the keyboard: high notes on the left rather than the right.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

waldvogel said:


> Our local symphony has experimented with seating, particularly when playing Haydn and Mozart. The usual seating is 1, 2, Vla, VC. This changes to 1, Vla, VC, 2 when the orchestra size drops from 50+ to 30 or so. If you have a seat close to the front of the audience, you really get to hear the counterpoint between the two violin groups. As our former conductor said - Haydn went through all the trouble of writing two great lines for the two violins, and it would be nice if we could hear them playing against each other.





Andreas said:


> That is a very good argument in favour of opposing violins. If the composers intended certain effects, the best thing is to recreate accordingly. Unless, perhaps, one assumes that great composers, being the visionary artists they are, anticipated that no order or arrangement is forever, and therefore nothing in their music should entirely depend upon the fashions and conventions of their time, knowing that they are likely change, eventually.


Of course, when the first violins are seated at Stage Right (the audience's left) and the second violins are seated at SL (the audience's right), not only is the "stereo-like separation" an effect to deal with, the very sound of the instruments must contend in some manner, and I often wonder if composers had this in mind as they wrote for first and second violins in the abovementioned seating arrangement. Because, in that left/right positioning, the first violins are facing the audience, and thus the sound comes directly towards the listener, while the second violins are held in such a way that they are actually facing away from the audience, and their sound is thrown towards the back of the orchestra, thus muting that sound somewhat. If a classical composer such as Haydn was aware of such an effect (and it would be difficult for him not to have noticed it), it seems he would voice parts for first and second strings differently. Thus, to put Haydn's first and second strings together on only one side is to do an injustice to the sound Haydn himself heard and wrote for.


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## david.allsopp (Jan 18, 2010)

If you check out the last movement of Tchaikovsky 6 you will see that each note in the tune is played alternately by 1st and 2nd violins. It's an effect that is lost if they sit together. Bloomstedt insisted on Leipzig sitting that way and Chailly has continued it.

Cheers,
David


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## SeptimalTritone (Jul 7, 2014)

I'm still a bit confused on why 1-2-vlc-vla is more common than 1-2-vla-vlc. I mean, I understand that it's good for the audience to have the cello f-holes facing towards them to give a strong bass, but I've always felt when playing viola in amateur string quartet that I'm so disconnected from the 2nd violin, when often the inner voices have similar roles.


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## GraemeG (Jun 30, 2009)

david.allsopp said:


> If you check out the last movement of Tchaikovsky 6 you will see that each note in the tune is played alternately by 1st and 2nd violins. It's an effect that is lost if they sit together. Bloomstedt insisted on Leipzig sitting that way and Chailly has continued it.
> 
> Cheers,
> David


Yes. It's usually obvious from the score where the composer expected the violins to be, and I think conductors should respect that. For virtually all of the 19thC Viennese repertoire, there's no point in sitting the violins together; it destroys so many musical effects within the composition. I played Tchaik 6 back in March in the seconds, sitting opposite the firsts, and it just made so much more sense that way.
cheers,
GG


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## Dustin (Mar 30, 2012)

I could be wrong here but the best I remember the Houston Symphony is 1, Viola, Cello, 2.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I believe the reason why stereophonic violins stopped becoming normal practise was with the advent of multi-microphone/stereo recording methods....


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## Andreas (Apr 27, 2012)

david.allsopp said:


> If you check out the last movement of Tchaikovsky 6 you will see that each note in the tune is played alternately by 1st and 2nd violins. It's an effect that is lost if they sit together. Bloomstedt insisted on Leipzig sitting that way and Chailly has continued it.


Personally, I think the reason he split up the theme between 1st and 2nd violins was to prevent the players from playing it too sentimentally.


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