Stradivari's Genius: Five Violins, One Cello, and Three Centuries of Enduring Perfection

228 Pages·2006·2.26 MB·English

by  Toby Faber

PRAISE FOR
STRADIVARI’S GENIUS
“The real delight of Mr. Faber’s book lies in his decision to tell the
Stradivari story through the lives of six of the master’s best-known
instruments.”
—The Economist
“Enthralling and accessible.”
—Booklist
“Faber’s stylish account savors Stradivari’s marvelous acoustics and the
individual personalities of his instruments while exploring the science
behind them (X-rays, chemical tests and tree-ring analysis have all been
deployed to unlock their secrets) and regaling readers with colorful tales
of the musicians who built their careers around them. The result is an
illuminating look at an enduring cultural monument.”
—Publishers Weekly
“A captivating account of the often tangled histories of six celebrated
Stradivarius instruments … Especially impressive is Faber’s depth of
research.… Highly recommended.”
—Library Journal (starred review)
“Lovingly researched … [Faber] is able to let the evolution of the violin
unfold before us.”
The Sunday Times (London)
“Stradivari, said Paganini, ‘used only wood from trees on which
nightingales sang.’ That flight of fancy typifies the reverence which these
instruments still inspire, and that reverence pervades Toby Faber’s
knowledgeable study of the Strads, sharpened by scholarship and a keen
eye for an anecdote.”
—Literary Review
“These stories … Faber weaves seamlessly together, in prose of
admirable lucidity.… [He] pitches his story just right, neither
patronizing nor baffling the reader.”
—The Times (London)
“Faber is chatty, user-friendly, eagerly non-elitist, and minimizing of
sources, yet his passion for his subject, his painstaking research, his faith
in the integrity of musicianship and craftsmanship lifts this book above
gossip for the string-playing classes.… Faber’s observations are always
illuminating.”
—Financial Times
“Even the most straightforward biography of Antonio Stradivari, the
virtuoso instrument-maker whose craftsmanship to this day baffles
scientists and musicians alike, would make for a gripping read.… But
Toby Faber is far too restless and instinctive a storyteller to be content
with a single time or place. His is more of a quest across centuries and
continents in search of elusive treasures rather than a conventional
‘life.’ … It is fascinating to follow his passionate pursuit of the Davidov,
a cello currently in hands of Yo-Yo Ma, and five violins, including the
fabled Messiah.… Faber keeps the many separate strings of his story in
harmony.”
—The Observer
“Stradivarius is an inspired idea for a book. Because these instruments
and their players have reputations that have endured, Faber has been
able to find fine tales that hang on each of them. Unlike so many books
of this sort, which focus on small things and pan out into world history,
Faber has needed no padding or special pleading. Best of all, he remains
clear-headed about his subject.”
—The Daily Telegraph

2006 Random House Trade Paperback Edition Copyright © 2004 by Toby Faber All rights
reserved.
Published in the United States by Random House Trade Paperbacks, an imprint of The Random
House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
RANDOM HOUSE TRADE PAPERBACKS and colophon are trademarks of Random House, Inc.
This work was originally published in the United Kingdom in 2004 as Stradivarius: Five Violins,
One Cello and a Genius by Macmillan UK, and in hardcover in the United States by Random
House, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., in
2005.
Grateful acknowledgment is made to The New York Times for permission to reprint a brief excerpt
from an article entitled “Davidoff ‘Cello Arrives on Paris” from the November 29, 1928 issue of
The New York Times, copyright © 1928 by The New York Times Co. Reprinted by permission.
eISBN: 978-1-58836214-8
www.atrandom.com
v3.1
CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Epigraph
Introduction
Chapter One
F
IVE VIOLINS AND ONE CELLO
The Messiah, the Viotti, the Khevenhüller, the Paganini, the Lipiński, and
the Davidov
Chapter Two
“T C ”
HE INCOMPARABLY BETTER VIOLINS OF REMONA
The Amati dynasty
Chapter Three
“H ”
E WAS A GENIUS ALREADY
The origins and development of Antonio Stradivari
Chapter Four
“H ”
IS COSTUME SCARCELY EVER VARIED
Stradivari’s golden period, decline, and death
Chapter Five
“S ”
O SINGULAR AND SO BEAUTIFUL
The violins of Giuseppe Tartini and Paolo Stradivari
Chapter Six
“M ”
Y VIOLIN SHOULD REALIZE A LARGE SUM
Viotti and his Strad
Chapter Seven
“T V V ”
O THE IRTUOSOS OF IOLINS
Prince Khevenhüller, Count Cozio, Joseph Böhm, and Tarisio
Chapter Eight
“T ”
HE TURNING-POINT IN THE HISTORY OF VIRTUOSITY
Paganini, showman and dealer
Chapter Nine
“I ”
HAVE 80,000 FRANCS ON ME
Vuillaume and the Hotel of Delights
Chapter Ten
“U ”
NVEILED IN ALL ITS INTACT GLORY
The Messiah makes its mark
Chapter Eleven
“F ”
IND HIS MAJESTY’S SOLOIST
Charles Davidov and his cello
Chapter Twelve
“A ”
N IMMENSE RESERVE OF STRENGTH
Marie Hall, the Hills, and the Edwardian era
Chapter Thirteen
“N ”
O MATTER WHAT THE PRICE
Four Strads go to America
Chapter Fourteen
“W ?”
HAT CAN WE SELL THIS AS
Violin dealers and the postwar world
Chapter Fifteen
“T ”
HE SOUND KEPT ON COMING AND COMING
The Davidov, the Paganini, the Khevenhüller, the Viotti … and the Marie
Hall
Chapter Sixteen
“A S ”
RUN-OF-THE-MILL TRAD
Interpreting the Messiah
Afterword
Appendix One: Chronology of Classical Luthiers
Appendix Two: Glossary
Appendix Three: Price Conversions
Bibliography and Sources
Picture Acknowledgments
Dedication
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Violins are the lively, forward, importunate wits, that distinguish
themselves by the Flourishes of Imagination, Sharpness of Repartee,
Glances of Satyr, and bear away the upper Part in every Consort. I
cannot however but observe, that when a Man is not dispos’d to hear
Musick, there is not a more disagreeable Sound in Harmony than that of
a Violin.
,
THE TATLER APRIL 1, 1710
I have a violin that was born in 1713. It was alive long before me, and I
hope it lives long after me. I don’t consider it as my violin. Rather, I am
perhaps its violinist; I am passing through its life.
IVRY GITLIS, THE ART OF VIOLIN, 2000
A great violin is alive; its very shape embodies its maker’s intentions, and
its wood stores the history, or the soul, of its successive owners. I never
play without feeling that I have released or, alas, violated spirits.
YEHUDI MENUHIN, UNFINISHED JOURNEY, 1976
INTRODUCTION
When I was about ten my parents bought me a violin. Comparing
instruments was a way for those of us at the back of the second violins
to fill the inevitable longueurs of school orchestra rehearsals. One had an
elaborately carved fish at the end of its neck instead of the usual snail-
shell scroll. Another was a striking, if rather nauseating, olive-green. But
we had three more standard criteria to use in comparisons: the violin’s
age, where it was made, and the name of its maker. On most of our
violins we could establish all three from the labels visible through their
left-hand soundholes.
My own violin did reasonably well on our first criterion: the 1809 on
its label meant it was pretty old, although, I knew even then, too young
to date back to the true golden era of violinmaking. Age added more to
violins than just antiquity; they needed to be old to sound good. It was
this that caused my secondhand damaged instrument by a nondescript
maker to cost more than a brand-new one. It had a good tone, despite
the small crack in its belly.
On our other two criteria, however, my violin scored rather poorly. It
was made in Mittenwald, in Germany. The name meant nothing to us,
although a lot of our school violins seemed to come from there. As far as
we were concerned, good violins came from Italy. If we had known
enough, I am sure we would have graded towns within Italy into a
pyramid with Cremona at its apex, but I don’t think we had even heard
of the place. We were most definitely familiar, however, with its most
famous citizen. Stradivari was the only violinmaker whose name carried
any weight with us at all. That was the third criterion: your violin either
carried the meaningless name of a long-dead maker or it was a
Stradivarius.
One of those orchestral instruments met all our requirements
gloriously: “Antonius Stradivarius Cremonensis Faciebat Anno 1716” (or
some similar date), its label proclaimed with splendid confidence. It was