STRADIVARIUS VIOLINS.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1745, 16 August 1905, Page 22

STRADIVARIUS VIOLINS.

The following article by “A.N.R.” taken from a recent issue of “The Sydney Daily Telegraph” will be read with interest by the music-loving public of Wellington owing to the fact that on© of the world’s greatest violinists, Hugo Heermann will make bi© first appearance in New Zealand in the Wellington Town Hall next Thursday evening. Not many, even of the musical public, recognise the debt which they owe to the labours of the great violin-makers; and it has been remarked that their obligations to. those old artists have seldom been recorded by violin-players. Ole Bull and Joachim have been prominent exceptions. Yet the violin-maker made possible the violinist, and the violinist made possinie the modern composer. The first proposition, certainly, the second, almost certainly, is true. Great music, except of an unworldly kind, is not conceivable with instruments having nothing of the devil in them (a large and ben.gnant devil, bien entendu), whether they be viols or church organ®. The means to do good deeds make© good deeds done quite as often as ill deeds by means that are evil. With no violin we might have had the inspiration of a Palestrina, but never a Beethoven Concerto. Elsewhere, it might even be no waste of time to inquire whether, if the violin had not reached occasional perfection some 300 years ago, the world of to-day would have possessed such an example of evolutionary processes as the Steinway which played its part at the Town hall on Saturday. Letting that question pass, it will be snffic p.nt here to say a few words about the most famous of all the maker© of an instrument which was invented somewhere in the early 16th century; passed through an evolutionary period common to all human inventions, during some 200 years; and seems there to have stopped dead, because a point of perfection was reached which not only ha© never since been surpassed, but has never fairly been rivalled.

What Antonio Stradivari, commonly known a© Stradivarms from the labels in his instruments, accomplished may be stated in a few word®. Yet that his success may be understood by those not practically acquainted with the violin, something should be said of the state in which he found the instrument. That state, in a few very rare cases, was f one almost of perfection; and this condition bordering upon perfection he made, for his own instrument© and for a few that followed them from other hand®, almost the rule. But what is perfection, and why were the previous instances rare? The answer is one wh.ch will explain to those who are unacquainted with them the reasons whv what are fancifully called fancy prices are paid for certain violins. The almost perfect violin (the wholly perfect, in all thing©, is unattainable) must satisfy two persons in very different position©— the player and the listener. And the player first, always. Since the listener is the person eventually to be pleased, at first sight this seem© to be a paradox. It is not so. In a really fine instrument no doubt there must be enough alike of quantity and of quality of tone to delight the hearer. But before these can reach him, accompanied by the complete expression of musical ideas, there must be an adequate sensitiveness and completeness of response to the demands of the player. Let ns take an easily intelligible illustration from the piano. Paderewski would make the schoolroom piano, which ha© served for the scale practice of two generations, do what-it never did before. He would get out of it, perhaps, all that could be got out of that piano; the hearer might well believe it to be an instrument superior to the Etard, Broadwood,, or Steinway grand which had thrilled his drawing-room under the capable hands of his musical wife or daughter; and yet, great though the performance might be, it would not be Paderewski, because, though you may bring Paderewski to the piano, you can’t make that schoolroom piano give back Paderewski. If the mirror gives us only what we bring to it, we also get back only what the mirror is able to give. Is the tone the only trouble? By no means'. A key stick© here, a hammer is slow to> answer there; there are a dozen other defects, which skill may disguise or even hide, until you have to ask the instrument to do what you want it to do—a simple, rapid shake,- let U© #ay. That illustrates, roughly enough, but truly, the trouble of the violinist. On nine ordinary violins out of ten it is quite impossible to play a satisfactory solo at all, and for anything but very simple music they are practically dumb. It is a difficulty which the violinist finds very hard to remedy. If you want to find the maker who can supply you with the violin which is almost perfect in “action” a© well as in tone, you must make sure that he has been dead about 150 years, and that he worked in Italy. It is not of much use to place an order elsewhere, although sometimes there are to be found copies of the Italians, made in France by people who have not been dead more than 80 year© or so, which, though they do not posses© the peculiar “thrill” of the Italian tone, will serve your purpose pretty creditably. In short, the beet violin is not necessarily that which sounds best, but that upon which you can do most. A violin quite useless to a great player may be made to sound magnificent in an adagio movement, but when a player comes to a presto, with some odd trifles of double harmonics, let us say—or that amazing fourth string attack (without a trace of rattle) of Mr Heermann’s —he might a© well try to play upon a strung biscuit tin. Stradivari (who died in 1737) found to exist in his da f three types of violins—(l) the grand-toned instruments of his Breecian predecessors, capable, of great quantity and colour of tone, but, with few exceptions, incapable of rapid and easy articulation; (2) viol ns of the ordinary Amati type from which you could extract anything axcept sonority, grandeur, and variety of tone colour; and (3) a few of the sort wmich combined the good qualities of tl e first two classes to a limited exteni of which the so-called grand Amatis eere among the best ex-

ample®. What he did was to carry the last type to the highest point of perfection which it is believed is possible. He combined. H© sacrificed some of the quantity of the Brescian masters to secure the brightness and responsiveness of the Amatis and their school. It is generally held that the earifice was inevitable. In hi» latest years, still progressive at 80 year© of age, he inclined to increased sonority, at the expense of the player, who must supply the needed flexibility. Of the last type (some think it the best type, and others otherwise—it is a matter of opinion) Mr Heermann’s violin presents a fine illustration, and Mr Heermann a worthy example of a great player who has met the master half-way, and has supplied what no ingenuity of the maker could give. Of these violins recent criticism has said that their vigorous and incisive sonority renders them particularly useful to the virtuoso; that they have been preferred by such celebrated player® as Baillot, Hermann, Kreutzer, Wilhelm j, and Ysaye; and that the constant practice and great skill of these players would enable them to overcome any want of ease in the articulation of the instruments, which may be noticed when they are compared with others by the same master. No doubt such a preference indicate© a fine spirit of compromise. Give me tone, says the player, in effect, but leave the possible, and I will achieve it. Perhaps it would more truly* be called co-operation; the maker and the performer each asking his best from the other; each willing to forego what i© easiest for sake of the noblest accomplishment. Mr Heermann’s fine violin is interesting from another point of view. There is no trace in it of the failure of hand or of eye, and the finish is far finer than that of most of the makers who have been considered fine workmen. Yet when Stradivari made it he was 88 years old; and a superb instrument, it is known, was made by him when he was 93! Unfortunately it is not known whether he was a total abstainer; but it is feared that, like most of his countrymen, he was 'a “moderate drinker.” There is little record of his life beyond the facts that he worked at hie ait for nearly 80 years, was twice marr ed, and left descendants who are said to passess the recipe (unused) of h : s famous varnish down to the present day.

The latest estimate of the number of stringed instruments made by him put® them at about 1100, more than half of which are believed still to exist. Rubens is ©aid to have had at least a hand in the 1800 or so of his admitted pictures. This will give an idea of the actual rarity of Stradivari violins. Besides the 1800 Ruben© picture© there are ©aid to be about 16,000 in the possession of various persons which it i© claimed are authentic. Probably there are at least 60,000 equally authentic Stradivarius violins. In a short papsr it would be impossible to deal with the characteristic© and to do justice to the exquisite beauty of the genuine instruments. It is enough to say that nobody has ever succeeded in producing a forgery which would deceive a competent expert. Stradivari finally determined the best approximate proportions of the violin, and what the majority of connoisseurs hav© agreed is the best allround qualitv of tone. No doubt he taught hi© pupils all he knew, a© his master, Amati, had taught him. It i© only the quack who believes in mystery. The only secret he kept was his method of choosing the material which has given a tone distinctive more or less of all hi© instrum°nts. It was a secret which it i© probable he could not communicate, a knowledge gained by a vast personal experience superimposed upon that handed down by maker to maker of stringed instruments during many generations. Are instruments like that of Mr Heermann, for which anything from upwards would cheerfully be paid, worth what is given for them ? Yes. Having regard to their practical usefulness and the market value of other scarce works of art, they may even be called cheap. These, the best of the few violins made by Joseph Guarnerius, and a few examples by Maggini and one or two other maker®, represent the world’s stock of the instruments with which the virtuoso of the highest class is content. With these and such as these, with scarcely an exception, the greatest artiste of more than 100 years have won their fame. They vary in timbre almost as much as voices do. but one of them the aspiring player will strive to acquire, even in those early day® when it would be much to him if he could produce equal results upon less costly terms. He plays for the-.best and most flexible voice that he can afford, and if he be not a fool he is not surprised to find that there are others who are prepared to make a financial fight for the possession of it. It is a splendid voice that Mr Heermann has brought to the Town Hall, and his treatment of it supplies a noble example _ of what may be achieved in the production of broad, brilliant, and beautiful tone.