Violin Forum/Message Board

CT Dolan · Member Joined: 29 Jun 2008 Posts: 143

"Is there any indication that arching/graduation patterns also separate K's untrained hand from GdG's, or did GdG handle the sound production elements and allow K to work on the other parts?" - Good question!

Personally, I am not so concerned with graduation. For one, this is an aspect that has in many cases been altered over time, so there is only so much to go on here. What really interests me is who realized the outer form, the arching. As for me, I don't see anything in the arching which suggests the work of another, not that I am all that experienced, but I don't. What I do see is the gradual evolution of form one might expect from a single individual, a talent coming of age, so to speak. However, as for f-holes and heads, of course there is a lot going on here, many changes afoot! But with regard to the arch, not so much, but again perhaps I have not yet developed an eye for it...

Andres Sender · Posted: Fri Sep 11, 2009 5:25 pm Post subject:

Yet this very issue arose as a result of the observation that the top long arches are atypical. Smile

I can imagine a conversation between Del Gesu and Katarina that might have led to that result. ...or perhaps it was just an example of a teacher encouraging a student to experiment with ideas that interest the teacher but that the teacher isn't willing to risk an instrument on. Now where have I seen that before... Wink

Michael Darnton · Posted: Fri Sep 11, 2009 6:09 pm Post subject:

That sounds reasonable, Andres. Try it and report back. :-)

Janito · Member Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 114 Location: USA

Ok, so help "The Slow One".

Is the proposition that K made some instruments soup-to-nuts?

If so, are her superlative violins that have survived 'flukes'?

Just checking, in case I am in for some luck.

Michael Darnton · Posted: Fri Sep 11, 2009 10:10 pm Post subject:

"Soup to nuts"? Don't understand.

I don't think she was a fluke; I think she made great violins, for whatever reason. Good teacher, maybe.

Janito · Member Joined: 08 Oct 2007 Posts: 114 Location: USA

I sometimes use cross-cultural idiomatic phrases, so I had to check.

Good news; "soup-to-nuts" is American-English:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soup_to_nuts

In any case, I'm off to find my next teacher!

Michael Darnton · Posted: Fri Sep 11, 2009 11:22 pm Post subject:

OK, I get it. Yes, I think she made them from one end to the other.

Something that you see through all of del Gesu's periods is a lot of concentration on arching. Other things can wander or get less attention, but his archings are always perfect renditions of what he's trying to do in that period (though they might not all work). If I were guessing about the ones I think are Katarina's, he probably left her entirely on her own, except when she was arching, and then came over around near the end and told her where to scrape at the end.

Otherwise, I don't see much of him in them.

CT Dolan · Member Joined: 29 Jun 2008 Posts: 143

Yeah, as I mention above the arching is the one area in which I see a single hand, or perhaps it would have been better said a single guiding influence. Michael, what you have suggested may make the most sense, and of course it need not have been an either/or proposition. After all, they were husband and wife, so one would expect some collaboration!

Roger Hill · Junior Member Joined: 06 Jul 2008 Posts: 18

Any thoughts on what GdG was thinking when he did the arches on the Kochanski? Very low arches and the minimum point of the edge fluting is much more inboard than those shown on the other posters of GdG's I have. In the hands of Aaron Rosand, this violin has highs as silky as those on any Strad recording I've ever heard. Thanks

Michael Darnton · Posted: Sat Sep 12, 2009 1:45 pm Post subject:

The Kochanski is sort of coming out of a period where that is even more excessive, with some extreme examples around 1735-38 or so. You can see these in the Biddulph books, because they're the pristine examples (i.e., not worn out in the concert hall); arches as low as 13mm, and inexplicable amounts of scoop. I think that as he realized that wasn't working, he came slowly out of that into more effective styles, like the Kochanski, and then kept going further, resulting in the Cannone as the most extreme, and effective. Too bad he didn't make another dozen like the Cannone!

Roger Hill · Junior Member Joined: 06 Jul 2008 Posts: 18

Thanks, Michael. I also noticed that immediately after the Kochanski he did the Lord Wilton which has arches reminiscent of Strad, perhaps even higher. Maybe he concluded the old guy had the right idea all along.

CT Dolan · Member Joined: 29 Jun 2008 Posts: 143

Michael Darnton · Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2009 6:07 pm Post subject:

Those are all possible good answers. I haven't thought much about them because I don't particularly like those violins, myself. I've always been more focused on the models that I thought I had a good chance of making good new violins on.

CT Dolan · Member Joined: 29 Jun 2008 Posts: 143

Makes sense, thank you.