If your practicing is bothering others – you live in an apartment, you live with family members who can’t deal with the noise, you spend a lot of time practicing in hotels, and so forth – you have a couple of options.
First, you can negotiate time with your neighbours or family that is designated “practice time”, during which they are willing to cope with the noise. Second, you can do something to dampen the sound of your instrument, such as use a practice mute.
Practice mutes come in two primary types – heavy rubber, and metal (usually brass or something similar). You should be extremely cautious in using metal practice mutes, because their weight can damage the bridge of the violin; they do, however, aggressively mute the sound of the instrument. Before you try metal, however, try a rubber practice mute.
The rubber mute is cheap, lightweight and shouldn’t damage the bridge, but it will significantly dampen the sound of the instrument.
Routinely playing with a mute, unfortunately, has a negative tonal impact upon your violin, which is unable to vibrate freely. It can also hamper your progress in learning correct sound production techniques, and limit your ability to play with correct dynamics and musical expression.
Practice mutes are different than standard orchestral mutes. Regular mutes only dampen the sound somewhat, but they change the character of the sound, and can thus have a beautiful musical effect. Good orchestral mutes include the Tourte, Roth and Bech.
