There appears to be a lot of interest here in electric violins. I have to admit that while a guitar player, being fretted and tuned like a guitar, the wood viper has caught my eye. With all due respect to the Moog guitar, if you really want sustain from a guitar, why not bow it? Many people playing more experimental forms of music have bowed many things.
A Moog fretted violin with built in fooger electronics might be nice!
here here..
I know there are several people taking the wood 6 string viper, and stringing it like a guitar… so a guitarist is really only learning the bow, rather than new finger patterns.
the bow really has the control to get sharp attacks, sustains, rises, etc.. i do’nt see hacing self excited strings as doign much for the violin, given it’s bow…
but, for myself, at least- having filters and envelope options of each string.. (well triggers and envelope filtes) would be a start… these could be mixed and fed to something like lowpass filters, or murfish items.
I’ve been using an Ebow on guitars for 20 years. If only it worked on bass.
I can sustain until the batteries go dead. But it is only one string at a time. (Kinda monophonic bowing!)
A Moog Violin would indeed be an awesome thing to behold! Put 4 ladder filters in, one per string, and you’d have the world’s most expensive electric violin that sounds like no other! 
I’ve used ebow on bass before. It is definitely tougher to do (harder to place and it takes longer to drive the string), but it can be done.
Bryan
I don’t know, you start really deviating from the instrument when you put frets on it and start adding strings and changing the tuning. It will sound excellent, but with all the guitar players in the world thinking that they can function well on the bass because they already know the first 4 strings…hearing washed up guitar leads on bass is not bass playing. Its a whole differnt job and franly Id be turned off to hear the same guitar technique on a violin.
Id have to propose legislation to ban “The Devil Wen’t Down to Georgia”.
Having said that I can appreciate an extended range violin, fretted or fretless.
And a violin would sound insane through Foogers.
I like that idea. If you added some type of pressure pads for cuttoff frequency it would be incredible. Probaby outside my reach financially like the Moog guitar, but incredible.
EricK, ever seen those 11-string bass vids on YouTube? 
Pressure pads are an awesome idea, Lux_Seeker! Perhaps they could do something with the bow itself? Just a thought. I’m not sure how it would work.
there are existing pickups that can be wired with one output per string… mine (a barbera) has that option.. i just decided to keep it as one output.
I already have 2 MF101s that i do use in stereo… which is nice… but I have to think if I would want the added weight.
but.. think of Bass murfing the lower register, and having the top be normal… having the bass notes trigger the steps of the murf…
or LPF envelopes that are staggered inverse, normal, inverse, normal per string…
that said, i don’t think having ALL the electronics on board would be the best… as we want to cut down on weight .. 90% of electrics are too heavy anyways… (did I say that already?)
let me also get this out.. many classical violinists that crossover to electric frustrate me.. they don’t normally care about quality of tone, or the ways to voice an electric with different musical effects.. they just want to hit a button and have it sound different, dropped an octave, etc. and don’t care much deeper than that… as they are still classical violinists…
there would have to be a change in the mentality overall for there to be a market for the moog violin…
yuck.
I have been thinking about that. I am a bit financially drained from foogers (although happy) so I dont’ think I will be buying an Viper’s soon but I did want to experiment with a violin bow on the guitar (which has been done before). You can only bow the lower string but it’s still possible to get some interesting tones.
If you have about $4 you can also get a Guitarviol (see latest EM):
http://www.togamanguitars.com/guitarviols/electricguitarviol2009.pdf
As for the bow, it already has worked. The only one out now is called the K-bow but I am sure there will be more:
http://emusician.com/elecinstruments/mcmillen_k-bow_1113/
http://www.keithmcmillen.com/kbow/index.html#ordernow
Although be ready to fork out $4K.
Great idea and its amazing to have a controller with several degrees of freedom that I presume can be connected to a number of parameters. What is nice about it is that its very natural based on the movement of the bow.
However, if you are a DIY type and would rather use moog products, get an electric violin of your choice. Accelerometer and gyros are available from Eowave and I-CubeX or if you want, I am sure you can find these from direct electronics outsets. A bit of solder and shielded cable and you have something to plug into your fooger (although you may need to add pot or resistor to adjust resistance as needed)
Here is a 5 axis gryo from Eowave.
http://www.eowave.com/products.php?prod=49
Accerometers are also available:
Here is a 2D one:
http://www.eowave.com/products.php?prod=6
Distance is easy. “Reachclose” from I-CubeX does the trick for $40 or perhaps there are other direct electronics distributors:
http://infusionsystems.com/catalog/info_pages.php/pages_id/132
The only aspect I can find an easy way to duplicate is bow lengh and tenion. There are tension sensors out there but I have yet to find a basic component that could be added to a bow. I am convinced that something could be made that could be used with foogers for a lot less money that the K-Bow. the K-Bow is also digital. No need for a computer interface with foogers which is what makes them so fun.
I would love to find a low cost tension sensor that is either a resistances source or CV source. I have looked a bit. All I have found so far is a lot of industrial stuff. There has to be someone who sells more delicate sensors for tension.
As for changing the classical mindset, perhaps you don’t have to. Consider Mark Wood of Wood Violins and the Trans Siberian Orchestra:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHaN-qzWNMU&feature=related
Crossover bands can bring genres together. Certainly this was done with jazz and rock in fusion/electric jazz.
The roots of electronic music are also in classical music not pop. Pop comes from the early classical tradition of electronic music that came from avant guarde. So I am not convinced there would not be a market. There must be one for Vipers or they would not sell them.
I, too, was thinking along the lines of tension sensors. I’m just not sure how well they’d work with a violin bow. I guess if you could attenuate the sensitivity…hmmm. 
Lucia Micarelli would also be a prime candidate for spokesperson regarding a Moog Violin. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHsxmjpkeFI She’s beyond contemporary.
For a guitar you would probably be further ahead to get a cello or Bass bow because In my experience a violin Bow really didn’t do that great on the strings.
funny you mention that.. I just booked him for a gig in 2010 to help change my community’s mindset of music- influence the next geneation, and other goodness…, I will hopefully get to play a few more shows with him this coming december 
This guy is very open to electric analog goodness. 
some one else that should be moogified
Original founder of Turtle Island String Quartet…
Tracy Silverman
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ep01mictCms
he plays on short bows to not get in the way of his singing.. but was one of the innovators that brought the “chop” to it’s modern level.
… and of corse he is a fellow 6 string electric fretted violinist
Erik, yes- a cello bow- Coda just released the carbon fiber “joule” aimed at 5 string violins.. it is quite nice… though a German Bass bow could be used with the guitar in standard position more easily…
really to pull out the full bowing guitar potential, you need a curved fingerboard, and bridge/ nut..
A lot of electric violinists I know use Bass rosin on their bows too.. extra thick and sticky.
I’ve used an ebow successfully on bass. It is a lot hard to keep consistancy since you don’t have anything to rest the ebow on. Sounds pretty wicked actually, almost cello-ish
Michael Manring kills it on bass with an Ebow. Here’s a video of him using two ebows!
off topic (again)
but wow seeing him makes me miss Michael Hedges .. those two did tons of things together…
= good musicians dying early in freak car wrecks
A few comments:
First, thanks for the recomendation of a bass bow. I would love to have a fretter electric violin and I am sure at some point in time I will buy one. For now, I will have to be satisfied with bowing a guitar and experimenting with controllers. As what I do is more experimental in nature, I am more intrested in pushing the sonic envelope so even if its a limited range, I am sure I can get some interesting sounds.
As for E-bows, I had one at one point and I don’t even know where it is now. I found it hard to work with and I know that some have perfected a technique with it. I think this is why Moog made the Moog guitar to get the same effect with a lot less effort. I would love to have one but the price tag is way outside my range. I would love to have a Korg Oasys to but price is why I have an M3. Not that the M3 is bad, I love it, but I am just not in that price range.
Bowing is something very different again. The acoustics ar different. E-Bows and Moog guitars produces vibrations by a stable magnetic waveform that is translated to the strings. Bowing creates a tension on the string which is the relased and repeated causing what I suspect would be sympathetic oscillatiions of the string. I don’t know all the physical details on this but I know there are places you can read about this. Point being bowing is a very different animal than the E-bow or Moog guitar.
There are also many things that can be bowed so its something that opens itself up to experimenation and thereforre, peaks my interest.