Cremona has more than 140 workshops where lutes are created. the world capital of the instrument made famous by Antonio Stradivari, is also a beautiful City in its own right, with a timeless square sitting in the centre, an ideal spot to take in the surroundings, without mentioning the cakes and the food…Its narrow, cobbled streets ambling amiably across a nondescript corner of Lombardy’s fertile plains about an hour’s pelt down the autostrada south east of Milan, the city of Cremona could be easily overlooked by the inattentive traveller. But this, if there’s any music in your soul whatsoever, would be a mistake. For Cremona’s vertiginous, 113 metre high cathedral bell tower, the torrazzo, the highest brick-built structure in Italy, stands sentinel over a community entrusted with safeguarding the knowledge, skill and craftsmanship of the world’s finest violin makers – luthiers – for over 450 years.
To the cognoscenti, Cremona’s role in the development of the violin is every bit as significant as Modena’s relationship with the motor car. Since the middle of the 16th century, when Andrea Amati first created an instrument in the form that we still recognise today, the city’s great violin making families have handed down their skills from father to son, and on to grandchildren and great grandchildren. After Amati and his descendants came the Bergonzi, Guarneri, Ruggeri and Stradivari families; dynasties divided by varying degrees of fame, but bonded by a burgeoning tradition of the very finest classical construction techniques.
The Cremona luthiers’ reputation spread throughout Europe.
And, much like the acquisition of a Ferrari, owning a violin made in their workshops became, for European royal courts and the great musicians, not merely a mark of distinction, but also a guarantee of the excellence of the quality of the instrument. Ironic then, that the world should actually owe such a lavish bequest to one of the darkest periods in the history of European artistic endeavour: the Spanish Inquisition. This, at least, is the theory of one of Cremona’s current generation of luthiers, Gaspar Borchardt. He believes the origins of the violin to be Spanish, via the introduction of a lute-like instrument played by the Moors.
‘Spain was once a fabulous melting pot of art and culture,’ considers Gaspar. ‘But by the turn of the 16th century the Inquisition had turned its back on the enjoyment of pretty much anything, so anyone who knew how to make nice things had to escape. They fled to France, Germany and, via Venice, Italy. Venice, of course, embraced those able to make the lute with open arms, on the basis that good music enhanced the glory of what was then an independent Republic.’ Gaspar is also convinced that the development of the violin owes a great deal to the ship-building abilities of the Venetians, who were renowned for their skills in all aspects of wood working; most specifically in lightweight, ribbed construction, gluing and steaming techniques, and the treatment and preservation of wood against moisture.
Allied to this, the honing of steelmaking techniques imported from Toledo was also significant, allowing for the fabrication of tools sharp enough to carve wood with the precision required of a violin’s unique constructional complexities. Thus armed, a new generation of luthiers moved inland from Venice to Brescia and Cremona, the latter city attracting one Giovanni Leonardo di Martinengo, of whom the legendary Andrea Amati is presumed to have been a pupil. Little is known of Amati’s early life, although he is believed to have been born in 1505. By the middle of the century, however, he had become wealthy and successful, his greatest commercial success a commission to produce the instruments of a complete orchestra for Charles IX of France. Many will cite Antonio Stradivari as the greatest luthier of all time, but Borchardt considers Amati the greater genius: ‘He was the one who made something from nothing. Or, at least, something that was a huge leap forward. And he is the one who made the first instrument we today recognise as a violin.
‘I don’t know if he knew Leonardo da Vinci or some great mathematician. But the geometric construction of his violin form is extremely complex, with many classical proportions such as the Golden Section inherent in the shape of the body… He created something that could withstand the stresses and strains of everyday life and survive for 500 years. That’s incredible. A Stradivari is no better than an Amati; it’s just that Stradivari was lucky enough to live for over 90 years, which effectively gave him two whole generations of life to perfect the work begun by Amati.’ Though little is known of Stradivari’s early life, it is thought that he was apprenticed to Amati’s grandson Nicolò, who took over his father’s business in 1630. This was an important year for violin making since a plague epidemic put paid to the stringed instrumentmaking tradition in neighbouring Brescia, leaving Cremona as sole bastion of northern Italian luthiers.
In 1680, Stradivari, now just over 30 years old, opened what was to become the most famous workshop in the history of the violin. Using the work of Amati as a firm foundation, he set about evolving the design of the violin, lengthening the sound box and modifying the settings of the curving for the belly and back of the body. By 1690, working with two of his sons, Francesco and Omobono, he was turning out violins of peerless quality at a prodigious rate. By the time of his death in 1737, his workshop had been attributed with the construction of as many as 1,000 instruments. Nearly half a millennium later, the luthiers of over 140 workshops in and around Cremona remain utterly dedicated to creating instruments according to the very same principles, measurements and techniques as those perfected by Stradivari.
A luthier is never happier than when visited by the musician for whom he is crafting an instrument. ‘We talk of a violin’s sound being light, dark, brilliant, rich…’ explains Robert Gasser, Board Director of the Antonio Stradivari Consortium of Violin Makers. ‘It’s much the same as assessing a good French red wine; there is a vocabulary of words that has grown as the complexity and variety of wine has grown.’
Founded in 1996 to promote contemporary Cremonese violin making, the Consortium comprises some 60 luthiers who adhere to the traditional standards of craftsmanship. To those of us steeped from an early age in the tutorials of relentless technological progress, this standpoint might seem entirely retrogressive; akin to deciding that a 250 GTO cannot be improved upon in any way whatsoever, and that every Ferrari produced thereafter must be as close to a perfect reproduction of that model as possible, even to the techniques used for its construction. ‘Well, we recognise the shape of a Stradivari violin to be perfect, and have no desire to develop that any further,’ explains Michele Dobner, Vice President of the Consortium. ‘In fact, the only part of the violin that has not evolved since the days of Stradivari is the body. The neck has become longer, most other components, such as the fingerboard, have been modified and we don’t even use the same type of strings anymore… ’
In the workshop of Stefano Conia, the only evidence of the 21st century, other than electric lighting, is the gentle tinkling of a mechanical varnish mixer. For Conia, silence is golden. ‘In the time of Stradivari there were no machines and general noise levels were far lower,’ he frowns. ‘I believe that background noise, wherever you are, is now so loud that we’ve lost the ability to detect the very finest nuances in sound. So maybe they were able to tune a violin to a greater state of perfection than we can today. For me the beauty of this work is the silence, the peace, the tranquillity. I could drill a hole in this for a peg in five seconds. But I’d rather take five minutes and do it by hand while listening to Mozart.’ Perhaps the most significant effect any changes wrought by this unique combination of evolution and tradition have had on the violin is that today’s instrument is much more powerful; a necessity for it to be heard as its status grew to that of a solo instrument leading a full orchestra.
To the expert eye, evidence of these subtle, centuryby- century changes may be witnessed at the Cremona’s Municipal Palace where, almost invisibly suspended in the manner of Damien Hirst’s formaldehyde-bound tiger shark, a dozen glass cases house the cream of the Municipal collection Gli Archi di Palazzo Comunale. Among the collection are two Stradivari violins, the Clisbee of 1669 and Il Cremonese of 1715, as well as one of the violins Andrea Amati constructed for Charles IX in 1566. The expert ear may also discern the barely perceptible changes in the sound of the instruments over the centuries because, happily, every instrument in this exquisite, €40m collection is played every day of the year. Cremonese luthiers liken a violin to a classic Ferrari; it was designed to be used regularly, and will only suffer if it is not. And what, lest we forget, of the bow? ‘A violin is Italian,’ says Gasser. ‘And a Ferrari is Italian… But a good bow is French. Like the work of a watchmaker, it’s highly specialised and only a few of us make bows as well as violins. We prefer to concentrate on that which we do best. Ferrari doesn’t make yachts…’
Source : ferrari.com
The Cremona luthiers’ reputation spread throughout Europe.
And, much like the acquisition of a Ferrari, owning a violin made in their workshops became, for European royal courts and the great musicians, not merely a mark of distinction, but also a guarantee of the excellence of the quality of the instrument. Ironic then, that the world should actually owe such a lavish bequest to one of the darkest periods in the history of European artistic endeavour: the Spanish Inquisition. This, at least, is the theory of one of Cremona’s current generation of luthiers, Gaspar Borchardt. He believes the origins of the violin to be Spanish, via the introduction of a lute-like instrument played by the Moors.
‘Spain was once a fabulous melting pot of art and culture,’ considers Gaspar. ‘But by the turn of the 16th century the Inquisition had turned its back on the enjoyment of pretty much anything, so anyone who knew how to make nice things had to escape. They fled to France, Germany and, via Venice, Italy. Venice, of course, embraced those able to make the lute with open arms, on the basis that good music enhanced the glory of what was then an independent Republic.’ Gaspar is also convinced that the development of the violin owes a great deal to the ship-building abilities of the Venetians, who were renowned for their skills in all aspects of wood working; most specifically in lightweight, ribbed construction, gluing and steaming techniques, and the treatment and preservation of wood against moisture.
Allied to this, the honing of steelmaking techniques imported from Toledo was also significant, allowing for the fabrication of tools sharp enough to carve wood with the precision required of a violin’s unique constructional complexities. Thus armed, a new generation of luthiers moved inland from Venice to Brescia and Cremona, the latter city attracting one Giovanni Leonardo di Martinengo, of whom the legendary Andrea Amati is presumed to have been a pupil. Little is known of Amati’s early life, although he is believed to have been born in 1505. By the middle of the century, however, he had become wealthy and successful, his greatest commercial success a commission to produce the instruments of a complete orchestra for Charles IX of France. Many will cite Antonio Stradivari as the greatest luthier of all time, but Borchardt considers Amati the greater genius: ‘He was the one who made something from nothing. Or, at least, something that was a huge leap forward. And he is the one who made the first instrument we today recognise as a violin.
‘I don’t know if he knew Leonardo da Vinci or some great mathematician. But the geometric construction of his violin form is extremely complex, with many classical proportions such as the Golden Section inherent in the shape of the body… He created something that could withstand the stresses and strains of everyday life and survive for 500 years. That’s incredible. A Stradivari is no better than an Amati; it’s just that Stradivari was lucky enough to live for over 90 years, which effectively gave him two whole generations of life to perfect the work begun by Amati.’ Though little is known of Stradivari’s early life, it is thought that he was apprenticed to Amati’s grandson Nicolò, who took over his father’s business in 1630. This was an important year for violin making since a plague epidemic put paid to the stringed instrumentmaking tradition in neighbouring Brescia, leaving Cremona as sole bastion of northern Italian luthiers.
In 1680, Stradivari, now just over 30 years old, opened what was to become the most famous workshop in the history of the violin. Using the work of Amati as a firm foundation, he set about evolving the design of the violin, lengthening the sound box and modifying the settings of the curving for the belly and back of the body. By 1690, working with two of his sons, Francesco and Omobono, he was turning out violins of peerless quality at a prodigious rate. By the time of his death in 1737, his workshop had been attributed with the construction of as many as 1,000 instruments. Nearly half a millennium later, the luthiers of over 140 workshops in and around Cremona remain utterly dedicated to creating instruments according to the very same principles, measurements and techniques as those perfected by Stradivari.
A luthier is never happier than when visited by the musician for whom he is crafting an instrument. ‘We talk of a violin’s sound being light, dark, brilliant, rich…’ explains Robert Gasser, Board Director of the Antonio Stradivari Consortium of Violin Makers. ‘It’s much the same as assessing a good French red wine; there is a vocabulary of words that has grown as the complexity and variety of wine has grown.’
Founded in 1996 to promote contemporary Cremonese violin making, the Consortium comprises some 60 luthiers who adhere to the traditional standards of craftsmanship. To those of us steeped from an early age in the tutorials of relentless technological progress, this standpoint might seem entirely retrogressive; akin to deciding that a 250 GTO cannot be improved upon in any way whatsoever, and that every Ferrari produced thereafter must be as close to a perfect reproduction of that model as possible, even to the techniques used for its construction. ‘Well, we recognise the shape of a Stradivari violin to be perfect, and have no desire to develop that any further,’ explains Michele Dobner, Vice President of the Consortium. ‘In fact, the only part of the violin that has not evolved since the days of Stradivari is the body. The neck has become longer, most other components, such as the fingerboard, have been modified and we don’t even use the same type of strings anymore… ’
In the workshop of Stefano Conia, the only evidence of the 21st century, other than electric lighting, is the gentle tinkling of a mechanical varnish mixer. For Conia, silence is golden. ‘In the time of Stradivari there were no machines and general noise levels were far lower,’ he frowns. ‘I believe that background noise, wherever you are, is now so loud that we’ve lost the ability to detect the very finest nuances in sound. So maybe they were able to tune a violin to a greater state of perfection than we can today. For me the beauty of this work is the silence, the peace, the tranquillity. I could drill a hole in this for a peg in five seconds. But I’d rather take five minutes and do it by hand while listening to Mozart.’ Perhaps the most significant effect any changes wrought by this unique combination of evolution and tradition have had on the violin is that today’s instrument is much more powerful; a necessity for it to be heard as its status grew to that of a solo instrument leading a full orchestra.
To the expert eye, evidence of these subtle, centuryby- century changes may be witnessed at the Cremona’s Municipal Palace where, almost invisibly suspended in the manner of Damien Hirst’s formaldehyde-bound tiger shark, a dozen glass cases house the cream of the Municipal collection Gli Archi di Palazzo Comunale. Among the collection are two Stradivari violins, the Clisbee of 1669 and Il Cremonese of 1715, as well as one of the violins Andrea Amati constructed for Charles IX in 1566. The expert ear may also discern the barely perceptible changes in the sound of the instruments over the centuries because, happily, every instrument in this exquisite, €40m collection is played every day of the year. Cremonese luthiers liken a violin to a classic Ferrari; it was designed to be used regularly, and will only suffer if it is not. And what, lest we forget, of the bow? ‘A violin is Italian,’ says Gasser. ‘And a Ferrari is Italian… But a good bow is French. Like the work of a watchmaker, it’s highly specialised and only a few of us make bows as well as violins. We prefer to concentrate on that which we do best. Ferrari doesn’t make yachts…’
Source : ferrari.com
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