Rebecca Raney - The Reckless Violinist

Did you see that woman at the airport, screaming from the top of the escalator? Get up! Please! You’ve got to get on this plane! Please! Please!” That woman was me, of course. I was panicked and pleading with my child, after having tried every trick in the book to get him on an aircraft. My husband and I were taking him to a clinic to start a potentially life-altering medical treatment. He had dropped to the ground and would not move. I look back at that moment, when I panicked in the...

Good afternoon! I’m happy to report that I’m still playing the violin. But I’m definitely pursuing my playing in a way that my teachers would not have liked. Earlier this year, I abandoned plans to dissect two of the major violin concertos – the Khachaturian and the Mendelssohn. If I had pushed forward with the plan, it would have been a very “Juilliard method” thing to do. However, I’ve got more serious obligations than a 15-year-old phenom, so I’ve had to take this project off-road a...

Good morning! At this moment, it feels like we’re living in a constant state of national mourning in the United States. We mourn our lost children, we mourn our sense of progress, and we mourn the shared values that once made this nation seem undefeatable. For me, the larger losses of society are compounded by personal loss. After my son’s surgery in December, doctors discovered that his underlying medical condition is far more serious than anyone had thought. Three months after the...

During the last few weeks, I’ve been drafting, scripting, cutting clips and laying down the backing tracks for my one-year violin progress reel. The “violin progress” genre is a big deal on YouTube, so I wanted to get it right. As I pieced together a narrative, I thought about all the factors that took me from a complete loss of skills to a passable rendition of Mozart’s Third Violin Concerto. What was one the biggest factors? It’s . . . you. It’s the audience – particularly the...

January was awful. The soundtrack: Hissing and howling, broken only by the heavenly melodies of Mozart. The month started with the uncomfortable decision to send a child to school during a COVID surge, just after he had recovered from major surgery. It continued with a barrage of traumatic messages, delivered daily, about the child’s COVID exposures at school. It peaked when I went to pick up COVID tests, and my car – purchased less than a year ago – was broadsided in an intersection. I...

This time last year, I was getting ready to play the violin again. Just after the election, the local violin maker refurbished the instrument. During the weeks after that, I learned how to tune again. It took me at least a half-hour to tune, every time. My neck was not ready for the challenge. Within a couple of weeks, I couldn't turn my head. Then the glue failed on the neglected violin, and the instrument’s neck broke. The violin snapped when the neck separated from the body. It went...

Good morning! When I sat down this month to work up the overture for the Nutcracker, it felt like a big moment. This time last year, I had just gotten my violin back from the shop, and I thought I would sit down and kick out the Nutcracker after 25 years away. Well . . . it didn't work out that way. Here's the video essay where I recount what a terrible moment that was -- and how I've devoted the last year to repairing an act of vandalism on my life. If you prefer to read the piece, here's a...

Today I’m asking myself this question: Which idea came first? Was it the desire to mock all the advice I received about my attire as a competitive musician from the wrong side of town? Or was it the desire to play silly songs from Die Fledermaus? It’s hard to say, really, but both wishes came true in today's video essay from the audition coach. The video features 10 costume changes – but it’s hard to tell, because all the clothes are black. In the endeavor to fit in with the elevated...