Bariolage is a musical technique used with bowed string instruments that involves rapidly playing alternated notes on adjacent strings, one of which is generally left open, thereby exploiting the different timbres of each string. Bariolage may involve quick alternation between a static note and changing notes that form a melody either above or below the static note. The static note is usually an open string note, which creates a highly resonant sound. In bluegrass fiddling the technique is known as "cross-fingering".
The term bariolage appears to have been coined in the nineteenth century to denote an eighteenth-century violin technique requiring flexibility in the wrist and forearm, the mechanics of which are not discussed by nineteenth-century writers. Etymologically, in French, the term was taken from the noun bariolage meaning a 'disorderly mix of bright colors', which in turn derives from the verb barioler meaning 'to cover with a mix of bright colors'. The bowing technique most often used for bariolage is called ondulé in French or ondeggiando In Italian. Bariolage may also be executed with separate bow strokes.
