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Tell us where you're at.
Total beginner, school orchestra, private lessons, returning after college — a friendly three-minute placement. Just enough for us to put you in the right starting module.
Violin · Viola · Cello · Bass — lessons built for students
Learn your string instrument the way it actually clicks.
Arco is an orchestra learning platform for violin, viola, cello, and double bass students. Visual lessons, real orchestral playback, and a composition studio — all in one calm place.
The visual-first idea
One note, three places — moving together.
Every concept in Arco shows up in three views at once — the staff, a keyboard, and your instrument's fingerboard. Move one, the others answer.
Theory finally clicks when you can see its shape on the page, feel its place on a keyboard, and find it under a finger. Whether you play violin, viola, cello, or bass, this is how orchestral strings are actually taught — patiently, from multiple angles, with your own hand.
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What's in Arco
Everything an orchestra student actually needs — and nothing else.
Real orchestral sound
Hear every note on a real string instrument.
Every note in Arco is a real recorded string instrument — perfect for ear training and checking intonation before your next lesson or rehearsal. The same warm, resonant sound runs through the lessons and the composition studio.
Instrument-shaped curriculum
From open strings to shifting and vibrato — for your instrument.
Modules that match how each string instrument is actually taught — first position, bow distribution, string crossings, shifting, double stops, vibrato — with theory layered in along the way so it lands where it matters.
Composition studio
Write for any string instrument.
A proper notation editor with string-aware fingering hints and real orchestral playback. Turn in original pieces for theory class, arrange a warm-up for your section, or just jam.
Progress you can show
Streaks, quizzes, and mastery — at your own pace.
A clear record of what you practiced, when, and how it went. Easy to share with your teacher or parents. A quiet ledger that grows with you, on your schedule.
Calm, focused design
A practice room that feels like one.
A focused space made for music. Calm enough for a pre-rehearsal warm-up, deep enough for a whole weekend of writing.
Two themes, your choice
Warm manuscript by day. Deep concert hall by night.
Both fully designed — not an inverted palette. Whichever one matches your practice room.
What students say
Written by players who use it most days.
I'm first chair this year and Arco is the reason I finally understand what I'm playing.
My teacher assigns theory and I actually get it now because I can see it on the fingerboard.
I picked viola back up at 34. Arco makes it feel doable again.
How the learning flows
Three steps, most days.
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Short sessions that fit between homework and practice.
Most lessons take ten to twenty minutes. See the note, hear the note, play the note — in that order. Build fluency in time you actually have.
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Write your own music and hear it back on a real string instrument.
Once a concept is yours, the composition studio lets you use it. Write a phrase, press play, hear a real string instrument sing it. Bring it to your teacher, or keep it for yourself.
Three hours a week, a quiet room, and this rhythm. In six months you'll read fluently, play musically, and notate your own ideas.
Read the full methodBuilt on the tradition
A student should understand what he is playing, feel what he is playing, and know why every note stands where it does. Without that, practice is noise.
Arco draws from the great method-book lineages — Suzuki, Feuillard, Popper, Galamian, Simandl — and from the serious theory tradition of Piston and Aldwell. We studied these so your lessons do too. Real string pedagogy, brought thoughtfully to the screen.
Two ways to begin
Pricing, plainly.
Every feature in every plan. The difference is how you want to commit.
Student-friendly pricing. Parents can sign up and hand off the account — the same one grows with the student. A dedicated student & teacher plan is on the way.