THE OLD MASTERS AS VIOLIN MAKERS
There is a “Life” of Stradivari[D] by Messrs. Hill which contains a deal
of valuable and reliable information of the utmost importance to those
interested in violin tone. It does not, indeed, deal with the subject
from the point which we are now about to approach, but it makes such a
fitting prelude to our theme that I regret my inability to quote this
work extensively. I therefore earnestly advise my readers to procure a
copy of that work if they are not already acquainted with it, as, in
dealing with the subject of tone from my own point of view, I am
prevented, through considerations of space, from giving much information
which would add background and perspective to this discussion, and
thereby add materially to its interest and understanding. With this
digression I will now proceed.
The old masters divided the art, or work, connected with the manufacture
of a violin into two parts. The first was that of preparing the various
pieces of wood and combining them into a more or less finished violin,
and the second consisted in so manipulating these parts as to control
the tone and cause the instrument to give forth, when finished, exactly
the quality, intensity, flexibility and refinement of voice which the
maker intended. The resulting violin would, within human limitations,
embody the tone ideal of the master. The great tone builders, for the
most part, were surrounded by workmen and pupils whose duty it was
partly, if not wholly, to prepare the wood and bring the instrument to a
more or less rough state of completion. In addition to developing the
tone the master designed the moulds and determined the exact size and
shape of the instrument, this being a work having much to do with tone
as, upon the perfection of the design, depends the type of tone which
the master will produce in the instrument. It is probable that some of
the Amatis were as well equipped with ideals of tone as Stradivari, but
the model which they used prevented them attaining such good results,
although producing tone of much refinement. Here is seen one reason for
the never-ending changes which the masters made in the shape of their
instruments. They were seeking the best possible base upon which to
build tonal ideals, and not endeavouring to design a violin which would,
in itself, possess these characteristics--an impossible task, as I shall
presently show. Equipped, therefore, with high ideals of tone and a
splendid model in which to develop and control every essential that
makes for the creation of the perfect voice, it is not difficult to
understand why certain makers were able to create, with remarkable
uniformity, a great toned instrument; or others, with an equally good
model, but not so gifted with ideals, a violin inferior in tone; while
others again, like the copyist of form, without ideals, or the ability
or desire to apply them if he possessed any, turned out a violin lacking
in those essentials of tone which characterise the perfect instrument.
The violin has figured in the minds of its devotees as a curio for so
long that points relating to its great asset, tone, cannot well be left
to a mere statement of fact. Especially is this the case in dealing with
matters forming the base of that cult to which they belong, for their
knowledge of the instrument, its history, and its makers is profound,
and embraces an intimate acquaintance with the many theories and
experiments advanced and tried during the past hundred and fifty years
to account for and unravel the mysteries of tone. While the reason for
tone which I advance in this work is not only obvious, but actually in
use at the present day, achieving consecutive results identical with
those named in this chapter, it may not be amiss to set forth here, for
the benefit of those who may be interested, some arguments in favour of
the fact that tone in the violins of the great masters was due to their
ideals of _tone_, and to no other reason. The process employed in
developing these ideals was in no sense a secret with these masters.
Great results in all art are due to the talents of the artist. Method
and process, being but means to an end, may be imparted to another by
precept and example, but the ability to express a high ideal was never
the outcome of any “secret” in constructing a violin, or the preparation
of canvas and pigment, or due to any special virtue contained in mere
wood, paint, or marble.
If, therefore, those responsible for the grand tone in the old violins
did no more than make the instrument, or supervise its manufacture by
the workmen and pupils by whom they were, in most cases, surrounded; if
the creation, regulation, and _control_ of tone were due to any set, or
even variable, rule of design, construction, arrangement of parts,
manner of applying varnish, or method of selecting wood, then the pupils
of, say, Stradivari, by following these rules, etc., could not fail to
obtain like tonal results. But tone equal to that of Stradivari, or of
any other great tone-creator, has never followed the copying of anything
that could be discovered by the most painstaking measurement and study
of their instruments.
Again. It has always been supposed the old masters attracted pupils
desirous of learning from them the purely mechanical art of constructing
a violin. With this idea I entirely disagree. There is nothing about the
mere making of a fiddle to warrant the supposition. If these pupils were
attracted because they wished to acquire, as nearly as possible, the
high _tone ideals_ of the masters, and become versed in the delicate
method of its embodiment in a violin, for the purpose, in short, that
has always attracted pupil to master in all art, the matter becomes
clearer. Pupils of the masters frequently stated the fact on their
tickets, and it is hardly possible they did so merely to advertise the
source of their cabinet-making knowledge. Modern builders, more often
than not, work to satisfy connoisseurs of form rather than exponents of
tone; but, with the earlier makers, we are assured by an authority of
the highest eminence that “tone was the only consideration.”
To hold any other view of tone-creation leads but to confusion. If
mechanical construction alone attracted pupils they would certainly
acquire all necessary knowledge with the same facility as knowledge is
acquired to-day in all branches of mechanical art. There would be
nothing connected with the matter that could not be seen with the eye
and reproduced with the hand. Even if they failed or were at times
careless in the last degree as carvers of wood, we know by the work of
Joseph Guarnerius del Gesù, this is no bar to tone.
Yet we have makers taught by the greatest masters, heirs to their models
and, in the case of the sons of Stradivari and Bergonzi, to patterns,
tools, wood, and even partly finished instruments, but who still failed
to produce the tone of their teachers and fathers. Surely no clearer
evidence than this is needed to indicate that it was high ideals alone
that placed the masters above others--even their own sons--as poets in
tone. Let me repeat that this is no mere theory. Violins are developed
to ideals to-day, and I believe it has been done since the days of da
Salò by one maker or another. By no other process is it possible to
create, as the masters did, a tone _characteristic_ of the maker. No
mechanical process will produce _this_ result, whatever else it may
accomplish, and however complicated, “secret,” or scientific it may be.
I believe experts agree that the most striking characteristic of the old
masters’ violins is not simply the grandeur of their tone, but the
extraordinary regularity with which this tone was reproduced in
successive instruments. It is said that _consecutive_ reproduction of
any kind of tone is the most infrequent as well as the most difficult
thing in present-day fiddle making. So far as the instrument is
concerned, nothing has occurred to make this more difficult to-day than
in 1725, when Stradivari, Guarneri, and Carlo Bergonzi were
accomplishing _their_ consecutive tonal marvels. The fiddle itself has
no secrets which can be hidden. It does not defy analysis, and to add
that the mere building of a violin never has given and never will give
consecutive tone results, is but to say what is already known and has
been repeatedly demonstrated for more than a hundred years. Lest it be
supposed that any method is, in itself, a never-failing producer of
grand tone, let me say positively it is nothing of the sort. With the
highest ideals even the masters did not produce a stereotyped tonal
grandeur. A fine tone was, with them, the rule, and a tone of lesser
worth the exception--but there were such exceptions. With others less
gifted tone of a lower grade was the rule, and fine tone the
exception--and here, again, there were exceptions. In both, however, is
found the unmistakable and individual character of tone personal to the
maker, and inimitable. It is for these reasons that I should condemn any
method of tone creation which is purely mechanical; which depends upon
method rather than upon ideals, as being entirely outside the system of
tone-creation used by the great makers of old time.
While dealing with the old masters and tone, we may as well continue
with their immediate followers and devote a chapter to the decline of
grand tone after the period of decadence was reached.