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some examples to consider
• Professionals play the first nineteen bars of the second
movement of the Brahms Violin Sonata no. 3 entirely on
the G string, even though in first position the notes would
range over the G, D, and A strings. You want that chocolatey
richness of the G string, you want consistency of the
sound quality, and you want to stay on the same string to
make it easier to smooth out the phrase.
• The first two notes of the second movement of the Strauss
Violin Sonata (an E-flat and then a C) could be played in
first position on the D and A strings, but everyone shifts
up on the D string for that C. You can hear that desirable
little schmeer as Sarah Chang makes that e-flat just reach
up for that C.
Also, I was just looking at the second violin part for Dvorak's
"American" String Quartet [1], and just the first few measures
are perfect for illustrating some of the points above.
• Let's look at the third measure. You certainly do not want
to play that with an open A string in first position — the A
would be too bright [sound quality], and there would be
an awful lot of string crossings, which are too bumpy for
the desired texture here. So, you could play this in first position
with your fourth and second fingers (i.e. pinky and
middle finger). But many people prefer to swap out the
weaker fourth for the stronger third [comfort/physical
limitation]. So, I suspect most people play that passage
in second position. But then, you have to get there . . . Given
what comes before, this means you want to be on the
D string already. So you would shift right at the start of
the first measure, in order to have a natural shift down to
second position. (Actually, you wouldn't want to play the
first measure in first position anyway, to avoid the open A
string [sound quality].) notice that this part has a "2" at
the start — so, this person has chosen to use the second
finger and "weaker" fourth finger — but this only lasts for
two measures, so it's not too bad. The notes starting at the
third measure go on for eight measures, though, so that's
why you might chose to do a "3-1" instead.
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