 Hi, this is instruction on finger pattern exercises for the Viola. These exercises can be used to really get comfortable playing in upper positions and are a great primer for learning to play your one, two, and three octave major scales. So let's go ahead and get started. There are really only four different patterns that your fingers will find themselves in when you're playing the Viola. We have the three-four finger pattern where third and fourth finger are the half step. We have the two-three finger pattern where second and third finger are the half step. The one-two finger pattern, half steps between first and second finger. And then occasionally, but not very often, we use the open pattern where there are no half steps between your fingers. So the idea of these exercises is to get comfortable in all three of the finger patterns in third position. Once you get them in third position, we can go on to the other positions. But here we will focus primarily on the third position. So let's go ahead and get started with the three-four finger pattern exercise. Now I like to begin by just figuring out how to get to third position. And that can be done quite easily by playing the open string and then your third finger in first position. It ends up sounding like the first two notes of Here Comes the Bride, G string, D string, and A string. Now if we move to third position, first finger is at that same place. Here comes the bride. From there you can begin playing your finger pattern exercises. Now the way they work is this. We find our first finger in third position. From there we will play four quarter notes on each tone or each finger. Now this will be the three-four finger pattern exercise and we'll play four tones on first finger, four on second, four on third, and then third and fourth finger will be the half step. They'll be close and we'll play four on the fourth finger and then return third finger, second finger, first. Let me demonstrate. When we've effectively done the finger pattern exercise on the C string, we'll then go to the next string and so on. We'll go on to each of the four strings. When we've finished four strings playing four strokes per tone, we'll start over and do three strokes per tone, then two and we'll finish up with one and by then you'll really have these finger patterns locked in. So let's go ahead and do the three-four finger pattern exercise starting with four tones or four strokes on each tone and play together. So I'd encourage you to play your viola right along with me and match your pitches to mine.