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Concentrate on sound quality.

• How? Leave your music at home.
• Why? You are trying to assess sound and listen carefully to every note. If you are concentrating on the music, your attention is not where it needs to be: learning to discriminate between instruments.

Listen for vibrancy of the box.

• How? Place any two or three violas on a table and play the open strings, each in turn. Draw the bow with equal, even pressure and speed. let the string ring so you can assess the amount of reverberation.
• Why? You are listening for two important things: the vibrancy of the box and the fundamental sound of the instrument. Truly fine instruments will ring and ring. If the instrument doesn't ring, move on. With a lively acoustical box, you will not need to work so hard to make music.
  
  An acoustically vibrant viola is not a guarantee that you will like the timbre or type of sound, but without the lively sound, the instrument will be a dud from beginning to end. However, if it's a brand new instrument, the varnish may not yet be totally dry. Wet varnish has the potential to artificially dampen the sound of an otherwise lively box. Find out exactly when a new instrument was completed.
  
  Next, analyze the fundamental sound quality. Is the sound clean at the core? Is there any pithiness or fuzz when notes are played in tune? if the core sound is not clean, the instrument will not project beautiful music.

Make sure the sound starts the instant the bow touches the string.

• How? Stroke the string with the bow over and over.
• Why? You want to ascertain if the sound starts the instant the bow touches the string. If the initial response is slow, any rapid articulation will come out sounding like mush. You also need to figure out, with each instrument, how to adjust your bow speed so the viola plays to its best advantage. Often, you will need to use more bow speed with a new instrument than an older one.

Is the sound color quality multi-dimensional?

• How? Play some different sorts of passages—dark and minor, rapid and light, soft and floating.
• Why? You want to determine the flexibility of the sound. Is the color quality of the sound multi-dimensional, or is there a sameness to the sound no matter what you do? Can you get into the core of the sound of the instrument, or does the sound stay on the surface? Flexibility in the sound determines the instrument's ability to produce colors and nuances without which music becomes merely notes. A great player, it is true, can produce coloration on anything, even a cigar box, but the player is doing all the work and getting no help from the instrument.
  
  Is the sound very dark, or nasal? If a viola sounds too dark, it will, in nearly all cases, have a projection problem. What starts out dark beneath your ear will be heard as darker yet by the audience. Dark sound becomes perilous for the viola, which has to cut through the penetrating sound of the violin, as well as the large sound of the cello. If you are playing in an orchestra, you may be competing with the brass section and losing your own sound under your ear if the timbre is too dark.
  
  Violas that are nasal often appear to inexperienced players as warm sounding. A nasal sound, however, is usually a bit fuzzy at the core, and when a core sound is not clean, your ability to manipulate and shape the tone is compromised.

Is the sound consistent the entire length of each string?

• How? Play scales—at least one octave—up and down on each string. Play slowly and evenly, with no vibrato.
• Why? You need to assess whether the instrument's sound is consistent the entire length of each string, or if its power and clarity fade away as you ascend the scale. Without this evenness, the instrument, and not you, will dictate how and where you can play, therefore reducing you fingering options, causing technical difficulties.