String+Pedagogy+Notebook

=Michael Hopkins' [|String Pedagogy Notebook]= http://www.uvm.edu/%7Emhopkins/string/

Authority
This site is an extension of a faculty webpage at the University of Vermont and it falls appropriately within an educational domain (.edu). Dr. Michael Hopkins (Ph.D., Music Education; Associate Professor of Music, University of Vermont) is the sole author of this site, and he demonstrates a very credible [|biography].

Instructional Content
Hopkins' page is very well organized - surely a byproduct of his credited affinity for music technology. The homepage links to five possible headings: Each of the above headings also contain numerous subheadings with generally reliable information, some of which is better documented and cited than other. It generally serves as an excellent teacher resource, though certain instructional videos are linked which could also be valuable in fulfilling National Standard #2 (Playing on Instruments), and certain pedagogical information would also fulfill National Standard #8 (Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts). The site is not currently dated as to the last revision.
 * Pedagogical Information
 * The Instruments
 * Developing Musicianship
 * Books and Information
 * About this Website

Purpose of the Site
This site is a continuing project of Dr. Hopkins since the year 1995. What began as an electronic representation of his notes from a course in string pedagogy has evolved into an extremely comprehensive web resource for information regarding any and all things strings. He hopes to share as much quality information as possible with people worldwide about the playing of string instruments and he appears to have received a broad and positive response, according to the narrative at [|"About this Website"]. As stated previously, the space for this site has been afforded Dr. Hopkins from the University of Vermont, though I could imagine that the maintenance thereof is completely within his purview. There is only a slight (and natural) bias toward his own teachers, and he is obviously familiar with a broad literature of pedagogy and methodology in strings.

Reputation
A cursory search at Google came up with the most of the 58 listed references occurring directly from within this site. However there are some other string teachers who have made note of this resource and linked it from their own informational sites or blogs.

Summary
While it remains difficult to truly ascertain how well known, frequently visited, and frequently updated the site is, there is a tremendous wealth of free information to be found here for anyone interested in developing their knowledge of string instruments. There is a degree to which some of this information could be better cited, and there is a slight lack of transparency as far as the affiliation and dating of the material presented. Nonetheless I am very impressed with this resource and I plan to take advantage of it as often as I can.

Rating: Excellent (++++)

-Daniel Heim, 4/1/2007