OLD VIOLINS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13455, 6 April 1907, Page 5 (Supplement)

OLD VIOLINS.

11 j Tmk recent announcement that a Stradi°iviirius violin purchased for upwards of £1000 e | will be offered for sale again in London e) shortly brings up once more lie old ques<it ion How is it that, notwithstanding the e {enormous advance of science, we cannot proj'ducc a violin which is in any wav as good " as those which the old Italian makers have [ I left us,' 1 ! A couple of years, as it has been said, t mav rob a violin of all its virtues. A

s French violin bought some years ago for •|BOO francs-, and then perfectly satisfactory, 1 .has since become useless for "solo" playing. '[Indeed the theory that time is the greatest <! 'maker of violins is now entirely exploded, „ since we know how much Coreli, 'iartini, »I Verucini prized their new instruments. Hut s 'alt hough time will not make a violin, it I may improve one. It may he benelicia l I i for the instrument to lie for a time forgotten . with the family skeleton in some unused . cupboard; it is- equally beneficial for it to , ipass from the hand* of the artiste who will . |force the tone out of it to the hands of . I the artiste who will coax out the tone, or „ even the unpleasant sounds drawn by the I unskilled dilettante affect iii some way the 'sonorous qualities of the instrument. 1; The family of siring inst i uiuent -• which . is now fixed to lour types-— bass. • 'cello, viola, and violin—was for a long time i in an experimental stage. liven Bach, not pleased with the instrument.'' at his disposal. devised a new one. a viola poniposa, to take its place between the 'cello and ' the modem viola. I'hilibert Jamoe-de Fer. hwriting in 1556, says:—"The violin is the - instrument commonly used in dancing, and 1 with good cause: for it is mole easily tun- ' ed and more easily carried and this is -' highly necessary at a marriage procession 1 or a masquerade." Violins, however, had s been made before then by .Jean Kerliuo, a x j Breton, and by the Tietfenbrucker family. "j(irtspar Tietfenbrucker died about the mid--sdle of the sixteenth century in Paris, when 1 » the Cremona school was only beginning its e : successful labours, so that evidently some Mother link must have existed to connect the I Cremona school to the earlier makers. At II any rate it was Nicola Amati who taught s Stiadivaritis ' the art of making violin 1 -: and the pupil brought the art to such perI feet ion that his instruments possess all the I /qualities which the others strove to achieve \! — nobility, a freedom of line, a tone which lis strong and beautiful, rich and sweet. ■ JStradivarius was not richly remunerated for ' }his labours during hi.* lifetime; his instru- ' iinents fetched four lon is d'or. It was only at the beginning of the nineteenth century that the instruments of the Italian school came into fame, and they e _ then reached the price of a hundred louis - 'd'or. Before that time they were, outside /Italy. practically unknown. This ignorance 'j is no doubt due to the enormous output of (Jennan makers. In Krigland the lute was cultivated to a great extent in Klizabcth'.-< ' j time; the wave of Puritanism which passed " lovei the country put a stop for a time to 11 j the kind of music for which lute or violin ,jwe re most likely to be employed. But in 1 'Charles 11. reign \v<! read of Pepys' pcrfor|malices and Kvelyn's sincere if uncritical * enthusiasm. •M The vogue which old instruments have \gained in the present day has created that 1 (strange being the violin collector—a man *'Jwho for the most part cares little for the ■ Itmic, so all-iinpoitant to the player: who " j prizes an instrument for the beauty'of its ' [construction or it.- historic interest. A '. I collector often does not play at all; for ;. jiiini a true Cremona is valuable for qualiities which appeal to the eye. not to the ear. ' > Owing to tlir influence of collectors, the , {prices of old violins ate for !he most pail jibeyond the reach of the artiste, for whom, after all, thev wete first meant. ic; •