Violin Forum/Message Board

[Dave Chandler]

Its been so quiet here I've thought about posting knock-knock jokes to see if anyone is out there.

I may have posted this before, but I have since stumbled on another paper presented to the Southern California Violin Makers association that has similar findings and suggestions for assymetrical graduations. Apparently this Jack Fry, Professor Emeritus (deceased) at MIT studied many famous instruments, and made adjustments to some 60 or more instruments to improve their sound by making some graduation changes based on what he found in many Strad-contemporary violins. Its interesting, some of it a bit corny, but there may be something here worth thinking about.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8-rOvWeV8k
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[L P Reedy]

Didn't have time to watch all that and I'm not really familiar with Fry's methods. In easily available Loen-type thickness maps of Strads I see no patterns in bellies but backs often have the thickest part on the treble side a little above the sound post position. The thinnest parts tend to be in the upper and lower bouts on the bass side. The distinctness of the pattern varies a lot, with the "Betts" being the most extreme. I have no idea whether this pattern was intentional or whether it makes a difference. Del Gesus do not seem to be so afflicted.

[Michael Darnton]

I was working at Bein & Fushi when Fry started talking about this, so since I was already taking grad charts of violins, I added two measuring points, one at the post, and the other exactly opposite, to the spots I regularly measured.

I took these measurements of about 40 Cremonese violins of all names, not just Strads, and the results were clear: about 40% of the time the left was thicker, about 40% the right, and 20% there was no difference. When there was a difference, it was not large.

I took this to mean that the intention was probably to make the two sides the same, but this was casually enforced, as would be expected with the measuring tools they had.

I think Fry's work is not that inspiring. In the video I have seen (didn't look at the linked one), the person who plays for him is an adequate, but not spectacular, violinist who seems a bit too eager to give him what he wants. My experience has been that feedback from only one or two violinists is not enough, and that great violinists--the specific people who use Strads and del Gesus--view the abilities of their instruments very differently from someone who does not play something of that caliber on a daily basis, to the point that asking your locally-available violinist to evaluate a violin on those terms is precisely equivalent to asking my mom about how a Maserati handles.
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